Hear Ye, Hear Ye!

I just finished reading an article advocating "spreading the word" about the wonders of infant adoption. The author is fer it and I'm agin' it. SS,DD.

You would think that with a high-dollar, government-sanctioned industry doing PR through every media outlet in the nation, the adopters would feel content to sit back and enjoy their booty and their delusions. Not so. It seems, from what I read in that article, that they feel the need to pile justification on top of spin-doctoring like an overdone Dagwood sandwich.

Or maybe it's a "look at me, the saint" kind of thing. Once they assume that adopter halo, they want all to see it. The mistaken notion that they have rescued a baby from a horrible life still is maintained by the self-entitled.

Look at it as if you were a PAP, infertile and desperate to have that to which you believe you are entitled. You are not looking for a "particular" child. You have no knowledge of who you will pull in when you cast your net. You just want a baby. The "chosen child" is such a myth. For the adopters, as long as it is a healthy infant, any child will do. The harsh fact for many adopted people is that, had they not been adopted by the family they had, they would have been adopted by another. They are the crop, we are the fields and the industry is Big Agriculture feeding a hungry consumer.

The word that has been getting out, on this blog and others, without benefit of big-time PR agencies, is that we need to take a long, hard look at this industry and the idea that mothers and babies are interchangeable. Big Adoption is selling the idea of adoption as some kind of ninth-month abortion...after-the-fact birth control. Young mothers are falling for this because they are inundated with anti-choice messages and are buying into the idea of heroism in sacrifice. Baloney! If you create a life and carry that life to term, then be responsible and raise your child. What is so hard to understand about that concept?

It is really hard for those of us who are mothers of the BSE to watch this. We had no way to prevent pregnancy except abstinence and condoms, when they were to be had, and we all know how well THOSE work. We had no legal, safe way to end a pregnancy and we had no autonomy...no choice at all...in what happened to us or our children. Most of us would have given our right leg and a kidney to have been supported in keeping and raising our child. We wanted the responsibility of our children.

Young mothers of today seen to miss the fact that they are living in an era when they have this choice. They think that the present situation is forever and opt for a permanent solution to that temporary problem. Many mistake open adoption as enforceable and a way to co-parent. T'ain't so. The openness often becomes pictures and a short note once an year and pleas from the adopters to stay out of little Lilly's life in order to save her from "confusion." In most states, those doors to openness can be slammed shut and locked by the adopters with impunity.

For every PAP or adopter that blogs to "get the word out," for every starry-eyed beemommy on a mission who pushes adoption as just the most wonderful thing to do, and for every politician that lines his or her pockets with cash from the Adoption Industry lobbyists, there needs to be one of us blogging, writing letters and talking to our friends and neighbors.

We don't have the funds to rent, furnish and staff our own "Crisis Pregnancy Centers" and we sure don't have the big bucks to put up "keep your baby" bill boards. All we have are our voices, our passion and a few open venues. We can make use of what we have.

So, PAP/adopter blogger, you spread your word and we'll spread ours. If you keep fighting the truth, it eventually comes back and bites you in the rear. For every pretty "family" portrait, there is a painful separation and unending grief for the mother and pain and confusion for the child. That is the truth you try to hide. Maybe you are out-shouting us because you have bigger mouthpieces and more money.

But we are persistent.