Forever Young (and Other Rants)

***Did you read the post title?  You have been warned…***

This is not a post about the report itself  (sorry, no link).  Or the content, or the conclusions, or the potential impact, or really anything meaningful at all.

It’s about the cover.

The report itself, in the Executive Summary, boasts of turning to “the experts: adult adoptees”.  Wow, I’ve gone from being some crackpot “angry adoptee” to an expert overnight!  What’s next, the Presidency?  (Yes, that is a joke.)

The paper goes on to say:  “Too often, our understanding of identity, particularly of those adopted across race/ethnicity, has been formed through research involving children and youth.”  True enough.  To rectify this, the study’s participants consisted of 468 adult adoptees — nary a child or yoot in sight.

So my question is… why the picture of four CHILDREN on the front cover?  Oh right, because we adoptees apparently cease to be worth looking at after we reach the age of twelve.  I mean, why remind people that their cute little gotchababies may actually grow up to be adult persons of color who are sick of being INFANTILIZED? Yes, the study did ask adult adoptee respondents to reflect on their experiences as children, but the main focus is on our perspective as ADULTS.

But cute sells, and everybody knows it… apparently even people who aren’t selling anything.

Since we’re talking about the cover photo, does anyone else find it odd that the photo not only features adopted children, but also features them at a culture camp?  Now, the paper doesn’t say that culture camps are bad per se, but does call them “insufficient”.  Not sure why you’d want to call something “insufficient” and then go give it prime real estate on your cover page, but whatevs.

(Interestingly, a photo that includes adoptees who look like they might be at least around the age of twelve, doing something that the paper highly recommends, does make an appearance back on page 39.  This seems like it would have made a more sensible choice for a cover photo… but what do I know?)

And the fact that the photo is apparently from a Vietnamese culture camp, despite the fact that the primary cohort of adoptees in the study were ALL from Korea, AND the fact that there are approximately four bazillion Korean culture camps out there  and probably forty-three bazillion photos from them that could have been used?  Well, you know how those Asians are…. all-look-same so details-no-matter.

**sigh**

I’m disappointed, but mostly because I suspect that this paper actually does have a lot of merit.  I haven’t read it yet (the whole thing is ridiculously long), but a skim of the Executive Summary suggests that I will probably end up agreeing with many of its recommendations.  I may even be able to set aside my (deep) frustration that none of the conclusions are nearly as “groundbreaking” as the authors — including the Korean adoptee author — would like to believe.

I just wish that a first look at the cover didn’t reinforce a lot of the same old crap.

Front Page?

At this very moment, a story about adult adoptees is currently on the front page of the New York Times web page.

It almost makes up for all that Relative Choices crap from 2 years ago.

Almost.

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The article highlights a study that supposedly says many of the things that adult adoptees have been saying for years — much longer than *I’ve* been saying them, or even thinking of them.   I was heartened to see a few fellow KAD-bloggers mentioned, and overall thought that the article itself was pretty decent.

I expect that I’ll have more to say about this later, so stay tuned.

Good Luck, Ken

I have no idea who Ken Hill is, except that he is an adult domestic adoptee who is looking for his biological parents.  He writes:

-Searching for biological parents
-Male Adoptee:
-Born May 2nd, 1970 at Virginia Mason in Seattle.
-Weighed 4lbs, 9oz
-Father was Senior in High School, ASB President, skilled in logic and debate.
-Mother was Junior in High School, skilled in painting and played guitar.
-Ancestry: German, Scottish, Irish, Czech

Reporting on Ken’s quest to find his biological family through Facebook and the Internet, Margie Boule writes in The Oregonian:

He grew up happy and comfortable with the knowledge he’d been adopted at birth.

But now he wants to meet his biological family. And the state of Washington makes that difficult.

Adoptees, Ken says, can’t view their original birth records. The state will allow adoptees to pay $500 and get a court-appointed intermediary to look up the information and contact the biological parents. “But the intermediary might say your biological parents don’t want to know you.”

Ken believes adoptees have a right to know who they really are. “When the state withholds it, they’re discriminating. And there’s something just wrong about having to pay $500 to the state, with no guarantee you will get the information you so want. It’s not a hard amount to save up, but it’s the principle behind it. It could be $20 or it could be $1,000. I shouldn’t have to pay it.”

Ken says he’s “a working-class guy that lives paycheck to paycheck” and can’t afford private detectives.

So he decided to take his search online, in hopes it goes viral. “I’m asking people to spread it around. Human interaction is the key element in this thing. The Internet is just the technological vehicle.”

If you have any information that could help Ken, please contact him at:

http://multimancer.livejournal.com/58120.html

http://www.facebook.com/multimancer

kennethghill at gmail . com

Vote Often and Early… for Dawn!

UPDATE:  Thanks everyone for voting for Dawn; she won the “Best Adoption Blog” prize and I am so happy!  I’d like to give a special thanks to anyone who came here from Resist Racism and clicked just because I said to.

So there’s this little “Best Blog” contest going on at some parenting web site called “The Bump”… you may have heard of it?  Anyway, one of my favorite adoptive parent bloggers Dawn of This Woman’s Work is one of the contenders, and I’d like to encourage anyone who still reads here (yes, all three of you!) to go on over and give her a vote — no registration required.

In her post about why she wants to win this contest, Dawn writes:

• Because I’m tired of the same old cultural ideas about adoption getting play ALL THE DANG TIME.
• Because adoption may be a miracle for the adoptive parents but it’s a whole lot more complicated for our kids, for our kids’ first parents and for the communities/countries that lose those kids.
• Because if I won the $1000 grand prize I’d donate it to Ethica, who “advocates for national and international improvement of adoption practices, offering support, education and advocacy to all persons affected by adoption.” (per their mission statement)

As of this writing, another blog is currently in the lead.  And if that blog wins, the $1000 grand prize will be used to….  fund the blogger’s adoption of a girl from South Korea. Who will be re-named Lily. **sigh**

Obviously folks can make their own choices, but I would rather support the important work of Ethica and a progressive adoptive parent ally than yet another adoption from the world’s 14th largest economy.  If you agree, please go and vote for Dawn!

Jenna writes eloquently on her own blog about why she nominated Dawn and why Dawn deserves to win:

Promoting change is as easy as sharing your story, honestly and openly. Promoting change is as easy as helping people learn about themselves by learning about yourself in a public forum. Promoting change doesn’t have to be big and scary. Promoting change starts here and now.

It is my opinion that Dawn’s blog embodies what the adoption blogosphere should be working toward: honestly accepting the challenges that face us and working toward ethical goals. We’ll all make mistakes along the way but we can do it.

Yes, we can.

p.s. Apparently the contest folks said it’s okay to hit refresh and vote a bunch of times, so please vote often until the contest ends at 11.59 pm Eastern on Monday!

(In case you’re wondering, Jessica, the comments are closed to encourage people to go and vote.)

Protected: Book Proposal FAIL

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What I Think About When I Think About Love

Let’s try this again…

Sometimes, at 3 am, I can’t help but wonder how I can know what love is, what love means, what it means to love and be loved… because the first act of “love” that I ever knew was to be placed at the side of a road, outside tall black iron gates and brick walls, never (?) to see my family again.

How can I trust that people will say what they mean, that they will do what they say, that their definition of love is the same as mine?  I wonder if we are calling different things by the same name, if “love” suddenly means “dirt” and “lily” suddenly means “ocean” and oh yes, ocean, that’s what will separate us, because I never want to see you again… because

Invisible Adoptees

Here’s a tip for any adoptive parent who is thinking about writing  “An Open Letter to the Adoption Community”:

Addressing your letter to “the adoption community” is fine.  However, signing it “For our internationally adopted children” is not. My first reaction upon reading the closing words was to forget the odiousness that came before it and think, “Wait, I don’t have any internationally adopted children!”

Who exactly did the author of this letter have in mind when she referenced “our” internationally adopted children?  Clearly, she was thinking about other adoptive parents…. not adult adoptees.

It may seem like a small thing that isn’t worth “choosing” to be bothered about.  But it’s through small ways like this that adult adoptees are routinely ignored, overlooked, and made invisible during conversations about adoption — seemingly inconsequential acts that ensure the power stays in the hands of those that already have it.

As an adult adoptee, I AM part of the “adoption community” … despite the little ways that people try and tell me I’m not.

Thirtysomething Years Ago Today

… I might have been born.

Another “birthday”.

Another year.

And still, the same things that were unknown before are unknown now.

Perhaps, as The Man in Black says, I should get used to disappointment:

Inigo Montoya: Who are you?
Man in Black: No one of consequence.
Inigo Montoya: I must know…
Man in Black: Get used to disappointment.

Except that rather than wanting to know who anybody else is, I simply want to know who I am.

Why is that too much to ask?

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This June has been the darkest month I’ve seen in a long time… and I mean that both figuratively and literally.  (Those of you who live in my neck of the woods should have no problem understanding the literal part. >< )

But the crazy weather aside, I’ve really been struggling lately.  Not only have I not been writing in this blog, but I haven’t been reading other people’s blogs either.  So my apologies for being more than a little out of touch.

I’m keeping this blog open for now, if only because I have a habit of suddenly finding myself with lots to say just after I announce that I am going into hiding.  I’m also thinking of starting another blogging project, which I may announce here if it ever gets off the ground.

But things may continue to be quiet.  Jus’ saying.

An Open Letter

Rant ahead.  Standard warnings apply.

Dear Adoptive Parents, Social Workers, and Anyone Else Who Organizes Adoption-Related Events:

When adult adoptees offer to give of their time, sit on your panel, share their insights and experiences, write you long and extensive emails, give you feedback, or do anything else that helps YOU, please keep in mind just that — that we are

Protected: Nine Adoptees Who Piss Me Off

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