07 April 2006
We don't buy people
Apropos of Seven, One asks me: "So, are you going to buy that girl?"
Now, One has 5 internationally adopted siblings. She's heard "correct" adoption language all her life. She's certainly heard me gently (or not so gently--depending usually on how dirty my hair is and how much/little sleep I had the night before) re-direct questions like this into "proper" terminology. So what is going on here? Of all people, One asks this?
I start the blah-blah-blah: No, honey, you know you can't buy people, and that that what we pay for is processing paperwork and getting approved by doctors and agencies and bureaucracies on county, state, national and international levels and that it costs money because all those people need to be paid and besides that in China we donate $3000 to the orphanage for all the kids who are left behind, and so on and on and on (her earbuds are already in her ears when I get to "county," by the way).
But you know what? We do. Buy. Them. Horrible as it is to say it that way, and inaccurate though it may be when we think these terms against, say, the backdrop of United States history and chattel slavery--we do buy them.
More people would adopt if adoption were free. Or subsidized the way health costs are (for the privileged few--and getting fewer all the time, it seems).
What if we all just went ahead and used the ugly terms people use with us (and, sometimes, "at" us)? What difference would it make?
"You bought that child who would otherwise have grown up, if he managed to grow up, to have no future but what begging in the streets would give him."
Um. Your point would be?
Now, One has 5 internationally adopted siblings. She's heard "correct" adoption language all her life. She's certainly heard me gently (or not so gently--depending usually on how dirty my hair is and how much/little sleep I had the night before) re-direct questions like this into "proper" terminology. So what is going on here? Of all people, One asks this?
I start the blah-blah-blah: No, honey, you know you can't buy people, and that that what we pay for is processing paperwork and getting approved by doctors and agencies and bureaucracies on county, state, national and international levels and that it costs money because all those people need to be paid and besides that in China we donate $3000 to the orphanage for all the kids who are left behind, and so on and on and on (her earbuds are already in her ears when I get to "county," by the way).
But you know what? We do. Buy. Them. Horrible as it is to say it that way, and inaccurate though it may be when we think these terms against, say, the backdrop of United States history and chattel slavery--we do buy them.
More people would adopt if adoption were free. Or subsidized the way health costs are (for the privileged few--and getting fewer all the time, it seems).
What if we all just went ahead and used the ugly terms people use with us (and, sometimes, "at" us)? What difference would it make?
"You bought that child who would otherwise have grown up, if he managed to grow up, to have no future but what begging in the streets would give him."
Um. Your point would be?
Comments:
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You're back! What a completely different view than the very PC "big list" out there. You're making me think about this. :)
Your blogs are very popular with the "Amanda" set! Glad to read you again, I too checked nearly daily for something new.
This topic, very facinating. Perhaps what we are paying is in effect, a ransom, for the life of our child. They are being "held" away from us, a ransom is due to free them, and we are the parents who naturally would "pay" anything to bring them home. Maybe the concept of "paying" isn't so offensive at all?
This topic, very facinating. Perhaps what we are paying is in effect, a ransom, for the life of our child. They are being "held" away from us, a ransom is due to free them, and we are the parents who naturally would "pay" anything to bring them home. Maybe the concept of "paying" isn't so offensive at all?
# posted by 
: 9:34 AM
: 9:34 AM
Your blogs are very popular with the "Amanda" set! Glad to read you again, I too checked nearly daily for something new.
This topic, very facinating. Perhaps what we are paying is in effect, a ransom, for the life of our child. They are being "held" away from us, a ransom is due to free them, and we are the parents who naturally would "pay" anything to bring them home. Maybe the concept of "paying" isn't so offensive at all?
This topic, very facinating. Perhaps what we are paying is in effect, a ransom, for the life of our child. They are being "held" away from us, a ransom is due to free them, and we are the parents who naturally would "pay" anything to bring them home. Maybe the concept of "paying" isn't so offensive at all?
# posted by : 9:35 AM
: 9:35 AM
Thank you Amanda, and Amanda H.!
I'm trying to work through my intense gut reaction to the words used (and according to some ways of thinking about it, MIS-used).
We all know words are very powerful, of course, but that's a piece of theory--whereas, the almost physical pain I feel when I hear something like "internation adoption is just buying children" or hearing it compared to or analyzed as "trafficking," well, that's something I need to think about.
Why does it get to me? I know I'm not Simon Legree......Right? huh? Right?
The notion of a "ransom" is a pretty interesting one in this context. I like it, although I can see that in the wrong hands (um, mouths), it could be associated with kidnapping rather than with the more Biblical sense of it. That is, we are not "ransoming" from bad guys, but rather doing our little bit (little compared to the need that is--our third mortgage is not "little"!) to right imbalances, redistribute, whatever metaphor you find most apt.
And the people whose salaries we pay with our adoption fees and our donations and all the rest--they've chosen a demanding, often frustrating, incredibly difficult way to earn a living. I don't begrudge them one red cent of their quite modest take-home!
I love the way your comments keep me honest, keep me going, on a topic. And one this thorny needs a LOT of thought.
But, yeah, words: gotta love/hate 'em.....gotta keep an eye on 'em. They so often are a quick substitute for real thought.
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I'm trying to work through my intense gut reaction to the words used (and according to some ways of thinking about it, MIS-used).
We all know words are very powerful, of course, but that's a piece of theory--whereas, the almost physical pain I feel when I hear something like "internation adoption is just buying children" or hearing it compared to or analyzed as "trafficking," well, that's something I need to think about.
Why does it get to me? I know I'm not Simon Legree......Right? huh? Right?
The notion of a "ransom" is a pretty interesting one in this context. I like it, although I can see that in the wrong hands (um, mouths), it could be associated with kidnapping rather than with the more Biblical sense of it. That is, we are not "ransoming" from bad guys, but rather doing our little bit (little compared to the need that is--our third mortgage is not "little"!) to right imbalances, redistribute, whatever metaphor you find most apt.
And the people whose salaries we pay with our adoption fees and our donations and all the rest--they've chosen a demanding, often frustrating, incredibly difficult way to earn a living. I don't begrudge them one red cent of their quite modest take-home!
I love the way your comments keep me honest, keep me going, on a topic. And one this thorny needs a LOT of thought.
But, yeah, words: gotta love/hate 'em.....gotta keep an eye on 'em. They so often are a quick substitute for real thought.
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