Organs For Sale

Imagine if the same rules and regulations for adoptions existed for organs?  Instead of advertisements saying "Adopt Fast!" they would say, "Get a New Organ Fast!"  Instead of "Adoption Made Easy," they would read "Better Health Made Easy." After all, we all have two kidneys even though we only need one to live a normal healthy life.  What if we could relinquish one...for a fee?  

If this sounds distasteful and unethical, then why does it sound okay to do the same with a baby?

In the 1940s money began exchanging hands for newborn infants, and Adoption as we know it became an industry with its own supply and demand.  The American supply of these infants dwindled after the resurgence of the Woman's Movement and the passing of Roe vs. Wade.  The demand for adoptable infants has since been met through overseas babies, mimicking other market trends.

The adoption industry is subject to acting in the best interest of children.  Adopted children grow up - Do Adoptee's believe their best interests have been protected?  Can anyone believe it is in someone's best interest to have no information about his or her origins and no health information on their mother's side or father's side...ever.

My organ would be just fine if I decided to relinquish it.  If I relinquished my kidney for adoption, it would never wonder where I was or why I gave it away.  My kidney would not search me out later on, hoping to know who I am.  While my health prior to the kidney's adoption would matter, my health afterwards would have no impact on the adopted kidney's future. Sealing the record of who my kidney went to would actually make sense, suppose I changed my mind and decided I needed it back for my own health reasons later on? That's a fear I can understand.

Yet despite all this, it is not legal to relinquish your organ for adoption, only your infant child.    

Mothers

What is a Mother?

moth´er Pronunciation: mŭth´ẽr

Language and thinking are connected. The word mother typically conjuers up images of warmth and protection. The media regularly depicts mother and child as a bond so unique and powerful no other can ever replace it. It's an expression of honor and respect. It's a timeless term that describes the most typical fantasy of young girls. Ah motherhood. My six-year-old is already talking about it. She has big plans for when she reaches the state of motherhood and she can already describe them in juicy detail. My 14-year-old on the other hand, has committed to a life without children!

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According to the Webster Online Dictionary;

mother:

noun. 1. A female parent; especially, one of the human race; a woman who has borne a child.
2. That which has produced or nurtured anything; source of birth or origin; generatrix.
3. An old woman or matron.
4. The female superior or head of a religious house, as an abbess, etc
5. Hysterical passion; hysteria.

adjective. 1. Received by birth or from ancestors; native, natural; as mother language; also the
acting part of having the place of a mother; producing others; originating.

verb. 1. to adopt as a son or daughter; to perform the duties of a mother

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The first thing I find interesting about this word are the parts of speech. To be a mother, the noun form, one must give birth to a child. The verb, to behave as a mother, is to be a person who has adopted a child, an adoptive mother. This makes the phrases "birth mother," "biological mother," "original mother," and "first mother" redundancies, and they should not be used to describe women who surrender their child(ren) to adoption. The term "adoptive mother" may seem like an insult to parents who raise a child they have adopted, but at least it is grammatically correct.

Adoption and Mothers
It may seem a small matter, but the reality is the granting of the title of Mother is about power. Common practice in adoption has always ascribed the title of mother to the adopting mother. Ask yourself why?

Adopting parents from the Baby Scoop Era felt entitled to be called "Mother" and "Father." Their assumed perspective and the one many adopting parents still tend to offer up is because they are the ones who made the financial, emotional, and life changes necessary to raise a child. They supported their adopted child. They wanted their adopted child. They wanted a family. The implication is the adopted person ought to feel lucky, or rescued. In some instances perhaps he or she was saved from a life of poverty and despair. But the true lottery winners are the adopting adults, who without the adopted baby would not be able to fulfill their dreams to be "Parents."

Not only has this typical line of thinking unintentionally ignored the adoptee's significant loss of the Mother, I am suggesting the only person with the right to reassign the title of Mother (and Father) is the adoptee. Any other assumption is to disempower the adopted.

Adoption Media

A pet-peeve I have is adoption media.

I am appalled by the images that say, display, and suggest things like:

Adoption Made Easy

Adopt Fast!

Click the Stroller to Adopt Now

Are you serious??? It reminds me of images like this one:

DO NOT take this to mean my adoptive parents treated me like a slave, or that the abomination of slavery can be compared to being adopted. That is not what I am suggesting. Rather I am offering to you that when media portrays adoption as “easy” and just a click away, the loss of the child’s First Parents is neglected and adoption is reduced to the vile act of purchasing a human being.

Throughout the adoption transaction, the U.S. Government fails to recognize and protect an inherent right of every adopted individual, the human and civil right of every living person - knowledge of one's origins.  Instead, adult adoptees are forced to continue their tedious pleading for access to their own records case-by-case, state-by-state. It is never too soon to correct this error.  

The "Baby Scoop Era"

If you're not angry, you're not paying attention.
-Author Unknown

Were you adopted between 1945 and 1973? Welcome to the baby soop era.

After World War II, the governement offered generous support to budding families through home loans and veteran benefits. Many families enjoyed a sense of surplus and a feeling of fulfilling the American Dream. At the same time, those who were percieved as rebelling against that dream were seen as trouble makers and not worthy.

During this time, unethical practices were commonly instituted through social service agencies and supported by the legal system to isolate and coerce young, single, and poor women into surrendering their rights to raise their child, under the adage "in the best interest of the child."

In the best interest of the child was a lie, however well-intentioned.

It is NEVER in the best interest of a child to be prevented from access to biological information. The obvious need for medical information simply goes without saying in today's technologically advanced world. Can you imagine someone telling you it's in your best interest to not know if there is a history of cancer in your family, or any kind of a genetic disorder?

But it goes beyond just the medical realm. The mental realm craves to answer the age old question, who am I? It is as natural of a process in life as breathing and eating. Answering this question isn't about the journey of life, it is life's journey. Identity development is an organic and continuous, dynamic process of human growth. Adoption, where babies are cut off from any knowledge of their parents or relatives, intrudes upon this process.

It has been argued for decades that adoptees do not remain children forever. They grow up and have children of their own. And when they do, they want to pass on knowledge of their biological heritage, medical and otherwise. This can often be a pivotal time for adult adoptees, launching many into a search for their roots - usually beginning with their mother. I'm not convinced this is because the mother is more significant to the adoptee as much as by default - an adoptee knows the mother is findable. Sometimes it may be only through the mother that an adoptee can gain the knowledge of the father's identity.

Meet Jason:

Jason was adopted in 1962, he was nine months old. When Jason and his wife began thinking about having children of their own, it was 1997 and Jason still had no knowledge of his biological relatives. He decided he would search for his mother, who was easily found, living next door to the very same agency where he was adopted thirty-two years earlier. Jason was sad to find that his mother had mourned him her entire life. She was a recovering heroine addict. Jason's mother informed him that his father died in Vietnam before the two of them could wed, and she had received a letter from him that he would be coming home to her soon. It was their last correspondence; she had not saved the letter. Jason decided to locate his father's Captain in the military while he was stationed in Vietnam. The Captain remembered his father well, but had no recollection of him talking about a pregnant girlfriend and said it wouldn't be the sort of thing they would have discussed, recalling Jason's father as an introvert, a trait Jason identified with immediately. Jason was able to track down his father's parents and siblings. They invited him to visit, so he did. Flying half way across the country to see them, he returned to his wife looking crestfallen. The family denied that their son could have been his father, denouncing his mother as a fraud.

Adoption - The loving option?

I was born a commodity.  So were you if you were adopted as a baby.  The time period doesn't matter much - we were all bought.  The relationship you have with your adoptive parents is not the issue either.  This isn't about that.

The historical roots of adoption in the U.S. are not pretty, and they certainly do not represent anyone's idea of "loving."  Think orphan trains, and black-markets - get the idea? 

Adoptees should NEVER face a mystery about who they are and from whom they originated. This information is the civil and human right of every human being, inherent at birth. Sealed adoption records are a discriminatory practice that keep millions of adoptees powerless in the eyes of the law.