Indoctrination Through Adoption

Osolomama's recent post, Adoption: When Satan Doesn't Want You To, brings up the disturbingly increasing trend of fundamentalist Christians who are adopting so as to indoctrinate children into their particular flavor of Christianity. Before I get into this, let me point out that I don't have a problem with Christianity per se. I do, however, have a problem with ANY religion that attempts to impose itself upon others, especially children who have no ability to stand up for themselves.

Witness (heh) some of these quotes from evangelicals attempting to justify their actions:

• The Lord is calling them to that ministry.
• [God] predestined the path of the child by adoption.
• Adoption is war because Satan and unseen beings contest it. They oppose adoption . . .

(Shouldn't that be a corellary to Godwin's Law: that if you bring up Satan in an argument it's automatically over?)

But what is most horrifying is the quote in the comments, from an adoptive parent's blog:

“we also have the advantage of understanding our host culture’s worldview and their very deep superstitious beliefs. thus, we were not surprised that sterling was given to us with a jade luck charm – a buddhist charm meant to bring good luck, fortune and protection. we, however, know that this charm is associated with spiritual forces meant to keep people in bondage. thus, we smiled and accepted it as we should, and then later went to the park, broke it, and threw it into the pond, and prayed for our sterling that all spiritual bondage over him would be broken. these spiritual forces are alive and real, and manifest themselves in more obvious ways (but with the same degree of power) than in the west, but we know that the power and grace of the God who created the heavens and the earth is infinitely greater than the forces of evil.”

On behalf of the adoptee in question, I am F---ING PISSED. These adopters had absolutely no business breaking that charm, which the adoptee might very well have cherished throughout his life as a tangible link to his past. This isn't about "breaking the spiritual bondage over him", it's about imposing their own flavor of spiritual bondage, not to mention their claim on him to the utter exclusion of his birth parents. And since when is Buddhism evil? Do they even know the first thing about Buddhism? To make the child witness this... what a horrific thing to do, telling the kid his culture and heritage is evil, which by extension means his birth family and he, himself, are also. How the hell do people like this pass home studies? (Never mind. We all know home studies aren't worth crap.)

People like this scare the, ahem, bejesus out of me. If you don't believe exactly what they believe, you are E-VIL. Is that really what a Christian savior and a loving God would want? Don't you think there's room in God's creation for a little Buddhist peace, or Jewish prayer, or Wiccan love? I pray that any adoptee who has the misfortune to be adopted by such perverse indoctrinators finds it within themselves to seek out their own spirituality, whatever that may be. As long as we all try our best to be good, kind, compassionate people, it doesn't matter if we pray to God or Goddess or the Spaghetti Monster. Geez, didn't you people read The Chronicles Of Narnia (written by a Christian, no less):

For I [Aslan] and he [Tash] are of such different kinds that no service which is vile can be done to me, and none which is not vile can be done to him. Therefore, if any man swear by Tash and keep his oath for the oath's sake, it is by me he has truly sworn, though he know it not, and it is I who reward him. And if any man do a cruelty in my name, then, though he says the name Aslan, it is Tash whom he serves and by Tash his deed is accepted.

If you can't be open-minded about the culture and religion from which the child comes, you have no goddamn business adopting!

Adoption Records Secrecy Breeds Mistakes

I doubt few people in the adoption reform community are surprised to hear that Catholic Charities, that bastion of super-secrecy, made a mistake in connecting an adoptee with his biological family.

More than three decades after Ryba and Butler gave up their baby son to Catholic Charities of Trenton, N.J., for adoption, and four years after the agency facilitated their "reunion" with Bloete, genetic testing revealed last year that none of them are related.

Lisa Thibault, a spokeswoman for Catholic Charities of Trenton, acknowledged that the situation is "tragic," and that a "mistake" was made somewhere. But she said the agency has done all it is legally able to do for them.

I'm sure CC charged a hefty fee for this botched "reunion". That's how confidential intermediaries work: You pay, they supposedly search and find. But the problem is, there are no checks and balances to ensure that you get what you paid for.

I've written extensively about my own experience with Illinois' confidential intermediary program (here and here), which remains the only state-sanctioned method by which adult Illinois adoptees may attempt to gain access to their records. The word "confidential" is a euphemism for "hiding in the shadows". Their policies and procedures are secret; even participants are not allowed to know what is done on their behalf. Which means if mistakes are made, you might never find out about them. In my case, my identifying information was given to my birth mother without my consent... meaning their policies are more confidential than the privacy of participants. What does that tell you about the priorities of such programs? It's a back-door method of making more money off adoptions. Seal the records, then charge later for access to those very same records. It's not commonly known by the general public but everybody in the adoption reform community knows how the game is played.

Cases like these are exactly why entire concept of confidential intermediaries needs to be chucked. Why should we trust third parties to act on our behalf when we have no way to verify their actions? Sealing adoption records and falsifying birth certificates only breeds these kinds of mistakes, and provides fertile ground for profiteering. Instead, all birth certificates should bear the truthful information of one's origins, with adoption certificates verifying the facts of the adoption, and every single adult in this country, adopted or not, should be able to obtain their original, unaltered birth certificate for the same minimal fee. I spent thousands of dollars trying to get my records, just as these people have spent thousands trying to accomplish what Catholic Charities should have done in the first place.

We need to abolish confidential intermediaries in favor of open adoption records.

See also:

• Compromise Legislation: Why Some Adoptees And Not Others?

And let's note that reformers in New Jersey have been fighting to open adoption records. There's a petition here if you want to sign it to help the cause.

The Power Of An Adoptee's Name, Part II

This month's Grown In My Heart blog carnival is about names. I've blogged about names before. It's said that to know someone's true name is to have power over them. That is never more true when an adoptee's birth name is hidden from them.

Growing up, I hated the name my adoptive parents chose for me. It wasn't ME. It was the person they wanted me to be, the child they never had. When I got married I changed it to one I preferred. I might have changed it to my birth name, had I known it at the time. Apparently I don't have an official name on my original birth certificate, not even "Baby Girl", but in our brief anonymous correspondence my birth mother told me what she called me in her mind. But that name, also, is not mine. It's the person I might have been if I had been raised in my original family. So I'm glad I picked a third name that is neither adoptive nor birth but uniquely my own.

Still, the re-naming of adoptees bothers me. A while back I posted about a couple who is effectively replacing their deceased child with an adoptee. They gave this Chinese girl an Irish name, when she is old enough to know her Chinese one. Being adopted causes enough identity confusion without having your name taken from you.

It seems like a lot of adoptees change their names, either to take back their birth names or to do what I did and re-name themselves entirely. I see this as a reclaiming of our destinies, a way to have a choice in something that, for us, was choiceless. I respect adoptive parents who make their adoptees' original names part of their adoptive names. It's a nice way to synthesize both. But, I think we as adoptees have to forge our own destinies, and for some of us re-naming ourselves is part of that. The first time I tried to re-name myself, I was in third grade and tried to get everyone to call me a nickname based on my initials. The second time, I was in high school. The third time was when I took on the name by which people know me today. Names, for many adoptees, seem fluid. Perhaps it's because there is often this assumption, sometimes true, sometimes not, that we must reshape our identities for the benefit of the people around us lest we be "rejected" once more. Adoptees are very, very good at putting on the masks of expectations, and our names are part of that.

There is also this notion that if we adoptees know the names of our birth parents, that somehow armageddon will insue. This is another way in which names are used as power over others. The adoption industry uses our birth names and the names of our biological relatives to maintain control over us, even after we become adults.

When it came to naming my own children, I had a hard time. I wanted to give them names that would reflect their heritage from both me and their father, but I had nothing to offer from my side. So I picked first names that were vaguely Irish, that being the only heritage I was aware of at the time, and middle names from my husband's family. I wish I knew some names on my birth family's side so I could have considered those. Some people might think that's wrong. I don't see why. People name children after family members all the time, but if you're adopted it's like you're suddenly a crazed stalker merely for suggesting it.

One thing that greatly annoys me is that I cannot get rid of my maiden name, my adoptive parents' surname. It appears on my children's birth certificates, for crying out loud. Having been disowned by that family, I think I should have the right to change it. But there is no ability in the U.S. to change one's maiden name; it's considered something that never changes which is why it's used for identity verification. If they are allowed to disown me, I should be able to rid myself of their name, yet I'm stuck with it.

Names do, indeed, have power, and it's that power that the adoption industry wants to deny to adoptees like me, whose records are sealed. I want the power of my name returned to me in the form of access to my original birth certificate. Until then, I will remain less than those for whom the power of their names has always been their own.