There are clearly two sides to this argument. There are those who care about children and ethics and have penetrating insight into the covert motives of evil women, and there are celebrity-worshiping oafs who would rip children from good homes at the behest of rich powerful people and hand them off like dalmation pups to Cruela Deville.
That’s not what’s being discussed here. You’re talking about the fact that only selfish people should be allowed to adopt. You’re putting the needs of the parent ahead of the needs of the child. That should be illegal. And if that’s what all those years of catholic indoctrination got you, then you might want to follow Madonna’s lead and dump that mindset.
I think that unless you have some evidence other than your own smug preciousness then you ought not accuse people. And I think that anyone who presumes to be pro-life should shut the fuck up about quality of life issues for the children when they didn’t give a damn about quality of life when they were making their pro-life arguments. You wanted this kid alive, no matter what. Well, he’s alive, and he has a better chance of staying alive if he’s adopted by Madonna than he does if he stays in Africa. That’s all that matters to you, isn’t it? Pro-life. Pro-life. Rah. Rah.
No.
But it offensive to say that you adopted “only for the good of the child.”
People adopt because they have a hole in their heart that can only be filled by becoming a parent. They choose to fill that hole through adoption Parenting ANY child is simultanously the most selfish thing most people ever do and the most selfless. Adopted children are no different in this than biological children, they are only different in how they arrived in your life.
You wouldn’t look at someone with biological kids and say “how lucky they are that they were born and you didn’t abort them!” It would be offensive. Similarly saying “boy, your kids are lucky you adopted them” is offensive. Saying to people “how selfless of you to have kids!” is offensive - its no less offensive when its adopted kids.
My son is not a charity case. Neither is Madonna’s son. They are our children.
It’s not like I am the only person who has questions about this adoption. Do you seriously think that the birth father’s stated confusion over it should just be brushed off? I guess he’s just an ignorant illiterate from a 3rd-world country…why should his right to understand the papers he is signing matter to anyone? You obviously care a great deal about these people yourself.
And oh, yes, I would GREATLY prefer that the kid be left in an orphanage and die young. That’s exactly what I said. :rolleyes: As Dangerosa pointed out, there are uncertainties around this adoption that may mean that accepted international ethics were violated. Should we all turn a blind eye to that?
Um, hi, we’re talking about MADONNA, the greatest humanitarian to ever live. Of course we should, you fucking twat.
Oh, and in case you couldn’t tell, I’m being sarcastic.
Why? What’s wrong with doing something for someone else’s benefit? It’s completely skewed to choose this one act and say that only selfish motives need apply.
If someone intends to treat a child cruelly, then they shouldn’t adopt. But if someone says, “Hey, I don’t need more kids but I’m willing to take one and will do my best by him because he needs me” what is wrong with that? You think staying in the orphanage is a better fate? Or the US system where the kids get accepted into foster homes because the foster parents want the money?
You explain what you mean, then. Her adopting one child is “distasteful” to you. Her adopting no children would be what? Tasteful? Understated and elegant with a hint of oaky depth?
OK, I think that statement came out badly. I think it does smack just a little tiny bit of something someone would do to publicize the good works they are doing in Africa, and to send a message about international adoption. I don’t know if this was Madonna’s motivation, and it is true that I have no evidence for it other than how it looks to me, so I withdraw that statement, and I apologize for slandering Madonna in such a way.
I still have big concerns about other issues concerning the situation, though.
Perhaps you ought to listen to the father:
He seems to understand what being selfless means…Father
So…let me get this straight…there should be no rules or ethics associated with adoption? And if I believe that the children have rights, the birth parents have rights, and the adoptive parents have rights, all of which need to be considered in these situations, then I am a hypocrite because I am pro-life? And being pro-life means that absolutely anything that will get children out of orphanages and into homes should be acceptable?
I just want to understand what they mindset is here.
Well, first of all, as DSeid said, it isn’t a successful motivation. Long ago, people adopted for mainly two reasons, charity or an additional hand on the farm. The second was nearly a form of slavery. The second petered out as children who had been adopted after the Korean War reached adulthood and started telling their stories. To grow up in a home where the only reason you are there is because your parents were doing some good deed doesn’t make for an ideal situation. Is it better than an orphanage? Almost certainly. But its still not ideal, and its now seen as offensive to adoptive parents to imply that was their motivation. Its also offensive to adoptees themselves. “No one wanted YOU, you had to be adopted by someone who only wanted to do good.” That isn’t the case for most adoptive families at all. The family really wanted THE CHILD. Not some brownie points that could have been gotten donating money to an AIDS hospice or volunteering at the Humane Society. And when you form a family, when you insiuate that my child was unwanted, it hurts him, it hurts me, and its offensive.
Its considered such a bad idea that a lot of social workers won’t pass you on a home study if you motivation is merely charitible. You need to want a child in your life. Perhaps this is where adoptive parents get the idea that its so offensive, its told to you so often in any pre-adoption counseling you go through, throughout your homestudy, that you react with “those people shouldn’t get children!” when you hear about someone who adopted merely to “save” a child. Fortunately, from here, there are more adoptive families than there are placements happening, so it isn’t like that child loses a home, they go to the next, more appropriate home. (There are still lots of children who are in orphanages worldwide - some because they aren’t seen as “adoptable.” Some because their countries don’t let them out. Some because of red tape. But from this end, you can still wait years to get a child - even doing an international adoption).
I’ll admit that, for me, there is an undercurrent of fundamentalist Christianity in the thought that turns me off as well. A lot of stories coming from unhappy Korean and Vietnamese adopted adults have to do with parents who adopted them to “save them from a Pagan hell.” The motivation wasn’t a better life, but a better afterlife.
You know, I’d really question Madonna if this adoption eventually fell through due to criticism about the living parent and the circumstances of relinquishment and she didn’t fund the father and his son in a way that would allow him to retain custody and kept the child fed and healthy. I would hope she wouldn’t dump him back at the orphanage to die.
But we aren’t talking about US adoptions where we can try for ideal. Ideal is great, and perhaps that’s what Madonna is offering this child. But even if it isn’t ideal, what hope is there for ideal?
If the end result of a less-than-ideal adoption is that a child who would be in desperate straits isn’t in desperate straits, I can’t get too worried about motives.
And I don’t know Madonna, but I don’t think she’s a fundy. So while I understand why you would be disturbed by that facet, I don’t think there’s any chance that’s happening here.
You guys are funny.
First it was Madonna ‘cutting the line and buying’ babies…she was a bad person.
Then it was taking advantage of the father who didn’t understand what he was doing and she was a bad person for doing so.
When those complains appear to fall apart, now it’s on Madonna to support the child she would have had, if people had minded their own business.
…or she’s a bad person.
So I guess the only way Madonna can not be a bad person; if the adoption fails, is to sent the father a monthly check and allow him to keep his son out of the orphanage.
How much of check must she send, not to be a bad person?
Since being pro-life is all about life, not quality of life, why are you surprised when I don’t believe you actually give a damn about quality of life?
You, in particular, claim to be a pro-life libertarian, which means that you want kids to be born, and you want them born into a world with as little of a safety net as possible. Now for you to cry that some child might not have an ideal adoption is ludicrous, especially since your evidence that he isn’t going to a loving family is, well, your imagination.
Your “concerns”, as you put it…read as "assumptions. You might want to consider withdrawing those until you have something to back them up.
You are applying assumptions to me that aren’t even necessarily valid in the first place.
So, again, you think that there should be no guiding ethics in adoption? Or that I am hypocritical to believe in them because I am a libertarian? Or because I am pro-life? Which is it?
Well, seeing as how it was that statement that set me off and made me call you a fucking idiot, since you’re now retracting it, I retract the fucking idiot assertion and apologize for coming down so hard on you over it.
Fair enough. But as holmes points out, you have once again come to those concerns without all the facts.
Which of my assumptions, based on participating in threads with you, are invalid?
I don’t believe that a person has to be selfish to adopt, nor that being selfish must be the ideal adoption situation, which you claim. I also see no reason to assume anything about Madonna’s adoption situation, her attitude toward adoption, or her culpability in anything nefarious regarding adoption.
I think you’re a hypocrite because you’re acting like you give a fuck about this child when your political positions reveal that you don’t.