I’d really like for this to not be a Pit thread, so I’m going to try to carefully word it so it doesn’t become one. I understand when an abandoned baby is in the news (referencing the baby who was allegedly thrown from a car in Florida - latest update here. ) that people feel sympathetic and feel as though they ought to do something for the baby. I also know there are a lot of people who cannot for whatever reason have their own babies. What I do not understand is when the news reports that people have come forward and offered to put these babies through college or to adopt them!
Do the people who make these offers:
- have any real chance of adopting these babies? I mean, don’t these babies just go into “the system” to be offered up for adoption?
- follow through on these offers to send everything from food and clothing to college funds?
- normally put their money where their mouths are? In other words, do these people regularly support children in the system in some way (maybe as foster parents or through regular donations)?
What do “authorities” do in a case like this? I would guess that in a case where the birth parent isn’t known they would probably have to at least keep track of the calls that come in - one of those calls could very well be the abandoning parent, I suppose?
My feelings of sympathy for infants/children whose parents can’t care for them is pretty heartfelt, but somehow I can’t see calling up a hospital where I know an adandoned baby is being cared for and offering to adopt said baby and being taken even REMOTELY seriously.
I think you see a lot of this in the aftermath of any tragedy, regardless of the scale. We saw it after the tsunami in SE Asia: people were saying “oh, yes, I’ll adopt, I’ll adopt.”
I think it’s noble in a way, but few people are serious about it. They see horrible disaster, and then they see pictures of adorable babies: it’s instinctual to want to take those innocent, cute kids out of that horrid situation.
IMO, I think it’s also sort of…unsettling. For one, give them time to look for family/family friends. I’m not saying it’s always better for someone to be raised with a relative, but if they’re at the age where they’re not really going to consciously remember their previous guardians, family deserves to be offered custody first. Secondly, there are thousands of children in the US alone who need some sort of family. Once someone is out of their infancy, the chances of them being adopted drops of sharply, and the chances of them being abused, bounced around from foster home to foster home until their 18 increase. Once a kid hits 10 or so, the chances of them being adopted (from a foster/group home setting) is almost nil.
When my mother worked for CPS, word got out about one of her cases. The mother had, like, 6 kids and she was something like 25 years old. I can’t remember the specifics of why they were taken away, but apparently the mother was doing what she had to do to get them back.
Mom would have women waiting in her office in the mornings, after lunch, etc., who would BEG her to let them adopt one of them (or some. I’m not sure if any of them wanted to take all 6.). I’m talking women who could provide everything a child would need, not just someone who has more heart than they do wallet.
So I think sometimes, yes, people are serious. Mostly I think they are people who are already wanting to adopt, though, and just want it to happen as quickly as possible.
Then there are some, like me, who see kids on TV and really would hop on a plane if they had the resources to do so. (I’d go to Romania.)
Then there are some that just say they’d do it because it sounds good.
I understand the impulse, I think am slightly weirded out by the fact that the news reports these calls. I don’t get why. And I also don’t get what it is that makes people think they COULD adopt these babies - there are agencies to register with if you want to adopt, do they seriously think that calling the hospital and offering is going to get them a newborn over all the people who have been on waiting lists for heaven knows how long? I just get the feeling that a lot of these people think the hospital is going to say, “Well, since you’re our lucky fifth caller, he’s all yours!”
The other thing that bugs me - as Ninja Girl pointed out, the chances of older children being adopted is smaller than that of newborns. Yet we’ll hear a story about foster kids who were abused, starved, kept in kennels, whatever, and all of a sudden people want to adopt these poor kids. Well, where the heck were these people before these kids got into these situations?
Ack! My apologies… ** Ninja Chick**. (Don’t we also have a Ninja Girl here?)