American Christian families are adopting children from other countries with the hopes of giving them a better life - but is it actually better? An interview with Kathryn Joyce, author of The Child Catchers: Rescue, Trafficking and the New Gospel of Adoption.
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I don't know. Probably too close to this, since it's an issue I work on at work. But she's all "Adoption is a really complicated narrative!" and then doesn't seem to want to admit that the Hague/not-Hague thing, and the actual processing of International adoptions and decisions about who fits the definition of an orphan in whatever country and the diplomacy that goes with the whole shebang is at least equally as complicated. Which pisses me off.
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I think most North Americans simply need to hear a narrative other than "rescue the pagan babies!" I was probably close to 30 before someone pointed out to me that genuine support would mean many children wouldn't *have* to be adopted. It's hardly consensual when a mother gives up her child because she'll be too poor to care for it.
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I saw an episode of Intervention that had an Indian guy who was adopted at age 3 from a slum by a huuuge family of white evangelicals, and had a very hard time with his sense of identity. Feeling like he didn't fit in with the family and was a charity case contribute to his addiction as a young man, and the guilt he felt because he had been SAVED FROM THE SLUMS AND OWED HIS FAMILY HIS LIFE kept him addicted. It was so sad. The family really fetishized his adoption story. It grossed me out.
ETA Oh man I just remembered a part where the parents were talking about how they were ~ministering~ in this poor part of town and saw him with his mother and "we knew that was our son!". It was groooooss.
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