The 2009 Colonizer of the Year Award: Foiled in Malawi
YOU MAY HAVE TEN SCREENS in your home, three limos, five platinum albums, two swimming pools and a twenty thousand dollar smile, but anyone who is anyone in the world of celebrities knows that you really just aren’t styling until you scoop up a few kids from an impoverished nation!
ONCE UPON A TIME in Internetland, about twenty Internet Years ago (in non-internet years, that’s about 2.8 years) I was in the habit of guest posting at a blog called Jesus’ General, where I had been invited to kick it live on topics of my choice. This was a cool move, I thought, when patriotboy offered me the spot. I’m not sure my blog (UMX: El Grito) was yet one year old at the time (we’re rolling up on three, here) and Jesus’ General had a huge following, in comparison. It was a different crowd of readers, though of course there was a tiny bit of overlap.
At my blog, and among my blogmigos, we spoke all the time about racism, messaging from the dominant culture as it reified its hierarchies and values, our feelings as attached to all these things, imperialism, conquistadores, lost or falsified history, colonization of the land and the mind, and the invisible values that we carry with us, especially when they are mostly unexamined or unchallenged. And at Jesus’ General’s blog, it was a satire site for the most part; a smart, liberal, humor blog commenting on US politics through the fictional character of “Jesus’ General.”
When I posted what I thought was a pretty funny mocking of Angelina Jolie’s habit of adopting foreign and exotic babies, and as written for my audience but dropped into JG’s…it was almost like dropping a match into a gas tank. Whoa. To some of that crowd, it felt like a flat out assault upon…don’t know. White people. Women. Celebrities. The Generosity of Rich People Hungry for a Snazzy Brown Baby. A combination? The crimes were, I suppose, the assumptions underlying my humor. And then there was the fact that I was being so disrespectful of those assumptions I was attacking them. And not only that, but with humor! Which always cuts twice as deep. Finally, in some cases, there was the resonance of a man criticizing a woman, which the internet helped teach me a lot about, actually. In a good way.
Anyway, I didn’t plan that splash, just so that’s clear. In fact, I felt blindsided by the lashback. Those were the days I was realizing just how muscular the Long Tail could swing and how much kinetic force it could bring with it. But I had no idea the reaction would come. I guess reading the post now, I have to laugh at myself. What did I expect? But at the time, I just thought it was a reasonably funny poke at a creepy pattern of behavior. The kind of thing satire is made for. Sure, it’s not the best satire in the world. But I didn’t think the crowd would start throwing rocks! Ah, well. It’s all behind us and many lessons learned.
Anyway, I thought of that big debacle when I saw this video and I have to say it made me laugh and at the same time I thought to myself I guess it’s funny now. Funny.
Hey, I think you were right from the beginning on. Adoption here and abroad is a huge racket and it makes a lot of money for the people who engineer it. “Rolling Stone” and “Mother Jones” have been publishing some very interesting articles about Third World babies being stolen for export.
thanks mary. yes, i’ve read a few articles since those days about what you mention. i’ll keep my eyes open for more, thanks.
Dang, it would have been nice if the clip was viewable outside the United States, but ni modo…
Being related to a passel of Virginia dairy farmers plunked out of a Colombian orphanage, I can’t see any way to make some sweeping generalizations about cross-cultural adoptions.
While these high-profile cross-cultural adoptions are media events, they somewhat distort the reality. I don’t question the motives of those who want to adopt a child (more power to ‘em) and sometimes foreign adoptions are in the best interest of the child. What is bothersome is the assumption that “our” way is the only way to raise a child, that access to consumer goods (and being raised in a consumer society) is, in itself, in the child’s best interests.
I have, a couple of times, run into people who are seeking information on Latin American adoptions. Most of these are good hearted people, but all too often, they are making the assumption that a life with more money is a better one … or, they don’t realize how sensitive an issue this is for those of us in the less-wealthy nations.
The popularity of cross-cultural adoptions has led to some horrifying abuses, and still does — a Guatemalan baby-selling operation was in the news this morning, as is the on-going scandals at a Mexican children’s home that appears to be a front for either a kiddy-porn ring or child-selling. The desire for a “foreign” child can led to children being stolen, or parents being murdered… something the would-be parent doesn’t see.
On the other hand, there’s a tendency to overplay these horrors, at least partially grounded in the racist assumption that “those people” only care about money and are naturally corrupt (or corruptable). Not every adoption from our part of the planet is a theft… some are just unfortunate necessities, or seen as an unexpected opportunity for the child in question.
Secondly, don’t kid yourself that other cultures don’t have their dark side. Is a girl who will become chattel as soon as she reaches puberty better off in her own culture? And, just leaving the child in their own nation doesn’t guarantee the child will be raised in their own culture. I don’t see Spanish-speaking nuns in Bogota doing any better at preserving indigenous culture than a Virginia dairy farmer.
And, there’s the bottom line. Most of us think it’s better to be alive than dead.
i appreciate the nuance in your comment, but ultimately it feels filtered through some kind of western paternalistic lens that really irks me. as if we “leave” them there, then death is the only option? we have plenty of kids here who need to be scooped out of a hell if that’s the idea. we dont need celebrities with their actions like neon signs getting free ad space to reinforce that type of thinking. i love what bill gates and madonna or jolie-pitt or oprah or anyone else does with their money, in helping these areas. but i stand behind the viewpoint i’ve made quite clear here over the years when it comes to this sort of thing in general. your falsely dichotomized “bottom line” does not budge that.
and i’ll never undestand why so many men come in here talking stuff like “dont kid yourself” or “study ALL revolutions” etc. like frustrated professors who dont even know what class level they are teaching. richard, after these years knowing me online, do you really think i think in those kinds of terms that you argue against? as dichotimized as this “bottom line” offered? i don’t. don’t kid yourself!
There’s probably a childless Mixtec couple right willing to rescue an English child from the unspeakable horrors of a bleak future of empty consumerism, a class-ridden educational system, disassociation from the land, crappy climate, and inedible food.
What’s been said about(or is said by) Madonna’s adoption sure does sound paternalistic, but it was the first comment, “Adoption here and abroad is a huge racket” is whatever the reverse of that is… assuming omnipotence over the lives and destinies of other human beings.
Don’t kid yourself… bottom line… it’a guy thing
well, i do see how a broad statement might bother you in that regard, but i think there’s enough important truth in it to chase after what specifically is going on, rather than reject it outright due to disagreement with the broadest application of the words.
yeah, a guy thing. sheesh. MEN!
Richard, the adoption industry (and it is an industry) does indeed arrogate omnipotence over people’s lives here and abroad. For women who lose their children to adoption, it is a wound that never heals. The assumption on which the whole institution rests is that economically stable people have some sort of right to the children of people who are not as prosperous as they. (In this country some years back pregnant women who were considering surrendering* their babies for adoption were asked if they would still consider it if they had $200,000 in a bank account. Unanimously, the answer was no.)
*That is the verb commonly used.
This is an interesting topic. I can’t have children naturally and I always thought I would probably adopt someday.
I don’t think it’s for everyone. Some people don’t want to have a kid that isn’t biologically their own. For my medical condition in-vitro is risky for your heart, a donor egg is required, and yet many women chose to undertake it. They are willing to risk money and health issues to have a kid that they carried themselves and is at least their partners genetic material if not thiers.
Other people may not be able to handle the challenges of an adoptive child. Whether in the US or abroad, a child’s life from birth has a profound effect on them even if they don’t remember it, and most people adopting will be adopting children that for at
least the first year of their life they weren’t there.
Many adoptive parents feel helpless to solve their child’s problems. And they may wish they could rewrite their kids past history when they see their kid hurting. I just think of all of the amazing people who went though adversity and difficult childhoods to try and remind myself that erasing tough times means erasing a part of a person that could be a beautiful, valuable part of who they are.
This is something I’ve seen in both foreign and US adoptions, the problems being more than parents expected.
So my first reaction, as someone who found out she coudn’t have kids at 8 and has been thinking about it for 20 years, is that the media make these celebrity adoptions seem all sunshine and daffodills and easy. I mean, yeah, most people know at some level that raising a kid is hard work, even a biological one, but I do think media can put stars in peoples eyes before they’ve fully prepared and comprehended the full weight of what adoption actually means.
International adoption is something that really makes me stop and reflect. First off, sadness that anyone is exploiting parents and children to make money off of the children. And I appreciate what Nezua has said on the issue – I do get the sensitivity to a child being taken away from their home culture, I realize I can’t ever give a child the upbringing they would have in their own culture, and I am interested in hearing debate on the issue. I remember when I first read Nez’s article, going to a link someone posted where people spoke out about their experiences as people adopted from other countries. I am not closing my ears.
I do think there are some situations where moms give their kids up for adoption because they want them to have a better life. And sometimes it’s not just money but the family situation the child would be brought into, or the time of the mom’s life she didn’t feel she was ready to be a mom. I hate to think anyone was exploited out of their child. I know there are moms who change their mind when they see the baby they gave birth to and want to keep them. I’ve also read a book on women who got pregnant as teenagers in the 1950′s and left town to go to houses for pregnant teenagers, gave the baby up for adoption, and had to go back home and pretend nothing happened. They all felt a real ache and like a part of them was missing. In a different country and in today’s climate it may be a different situation leading to a mom giving up her child for adoption, but that doesn’t mean the pain of giving up your child is any different.
I get the Jolie article. I too am pissed off if kids are talked about like fashion accessories, I know the media is slanting “white people adopting the babies of color” in a very racist way, and the article does work as a counter to the ignorant people who do think adopting is some kind of charity. And the Madonna thing pisses me off. I know I’m talking about people I don’t know, but it seems like the dad wanted to be in the sons life and it was irresponsible for Madonna to take his son away, and also, she expected to not have to follow the same laws and practices others had to follow adopting from that country, and that’s just wrong, too.
But as someone who has known that she can’t have kids since she was a child herself, I have my story, too. When I think about adopting I think about the responsibility, that there are problems money can’t solve, and it takes more than money to provide a safe and loving home. I don’t feel that Nez’s article was dissing adoptive moms, but the discussion has turned to adoption in general. I’m trying to take this all in,from the pain mothers must feel giving up their kids to the voices of kids that were adopted transnationally. I’m trying to take in that there are adoption rings that make money off of exploiting families. Taking in how ethnocentric people may adoopt internationally and totally screw the kid up by the way they act about the culture of the kids’ birth country. How even sensitive, caring people who do an internatonal adoption are taking a kid away from their birth parents culture and they will never be able to understand exactly what that must feel like for the kid. None of that changes the fact that I’m someone who can’t have kids, and has thought for years and years that if the time came to be a mom that I would adopt. reading these stories doesn’t make me go away or dissapear.
absolutely not. and there are a lot of viewpoints to come at this from.
i think you can adopt and give a wonderful life to a child, and even one who doesnt hail from the same exact background as you——tho i do think thats best. and if not, then have that kid in as much surroundings that simulate or are of the culture you cannot give them but that they belong to and their lives filled with people “like them” and art and books that are attached to the same places and events that their names are and KEEP their names and no matter what else be careful and always remember its about, or should be about, the child. who they are already, where they come from, what they belong to and will always belong to. and it is not about you or your idea of the Grand Situation the child would be happier in if they only had a chance to peep it.