International Adoption - What's the Fuss?

What's All the Fuss?
By Damsel Plum

(This feature first appeared in the Spring/Summer 1998 issue of the Bastard Quarterly.)

"They kill baby girls in China, honey. That's why international
adoption is a good thing."

My husband and I were at dinner discussing international adoption.
The prevailing popular attitude about intemational adoption is that it is a
good deed--albeit a sometimes risky one.

As someone who was adopted domestically in the U.S. and had
never encountered an international adoptee until I became involved in
the reform movement, soliciting and researching articles for this feature
was very much a learning experience. My only prior exposure-barring
media stories-was hearing about my husband's colleagues who were
adopting from abroad, mostly from China and Korea.

Stories about adoption from China, one of three or four countries that
account for the predominance of foreign babies coming into the U.S.
focus on female infanticide and abandonment, orphanage conditions,
and the relative ease of adoption compared to adopting domestically
or elsewhere.

The horror stories we hear so often involve adoptive parents not getting
what they wanted or expected. These include tales of exorbitant last-minute
bribes, being offered a child older than was expected, Russian kids with Fetal
Alcohol Syndrome, Romanian kids with FAS, severe behavioral
problems that need immediate and expensive attention, even on the
plane ride back to the U.S.

The media focuses on stories which cast the potential intemational adopter
as savior, or which highlight the risks to adoptive parents. Seldom are other
perspectives offered.

Later I read first-hand stories on the Internet, especially from Bastard
Nation members who had adopted internationally. These members have
been known to write in support of their decision, citing their desire to
help a child in need and the difficulties of adopting domestically.

In accordance with the Bastard Quarterly's mission of representing
a wide specttum of the adoptee experience, I sought out a variety
of international adoption perspectives. Unfortunately, those that I found
which were unequivocally positive were so fraught with self-deprecatory
sentiments such as "I'm so glad that I was allowed to live" that I just
couldn't stomach including them in a publication advocating adoptee
empowerment.

On the other hand, there were some essays so bitter and which so transpar-
ently generalized personal angst to an entire population, that they didn't seem
particularly instnzctive either Perhaps I should have contrasted these essays,
but in all honesty, my impression is that such pieces could have been
written by any adoptee and they did not adequately describe the interna-
tional adoption experience nor the complex issues involved therein.

For these reasons I chose to include more factual; broad-based and
seldom-heard stories in this section. Each of these articles was written by
an international adoptee, each from a different perspective.

Albert S. Wei, is an adoptee from California and a member of Bastard
Nation's Education & Training Committee. Al is a Director at a
major American investment bank, where he advises developing country
companies and governments on telecommunications and other
infrastructure projects. He presently resides in Singapore.

Author and public policy expert Peter Dodds questions the premise
and legitimacy of international adoption as an institution.

Journalist Crystal Chappell records varieties of responses to being interna-
tionally adopted, especially as they relate to transracial identity.

It is my hope that the following three articles shed some light on
issues not commonly discussed in the mainstream North American
media and adoption reform community, but which speak to the
wider challenges of achieving social justice in the practice of adoption,
globally.

(This feature first appeared in the Spring/Summer 1998 issue of the Bastard Quarterly.)