Whow! Where to start? With the news that the American Adoption Industry made $13 BILLION last year in profit? Any industry would be proud of that surely? But an industry that doesn’t call itself an industry and likes to present itself as humanitarian, a human service and about caring, is seriously clever about advertising itself and about it’s propaganda and about concealing it’s true purpose. Any sociopathic CEO would be proud of having got away with that! The usual ‘discussion’ has ensued, in which the hoary old chestnuts are dragged out yet again and the truth is labelled as ‘vile words’, assumptions made and the usual give-away remarks trotted out, which show the true attitude some adopters have to adoptees and adoption. Even the suggestion that adoption is better now got an airing and you wonder which song book it all comes from!
There are still some very taboos areas of adoption which only the very strong-hearted will go near. Perhaps one day those courageous adoptee whistleblowers will give us the facts on some of those tricky areas – the concept of being ‘loved and wanted’, the mismatching of adoptees with adopters, transnational adoption of teens, the appalling death rate of adoptees in America, who is really behind transnational adoption and where Naomi Campbell’s dirty diamonds are now and who else was at that dinner party and why! http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/southafrica/7930669/Mandela-charity-boss-who-hid-diamonds-to-face-investigation
So here’s how it is – adult adoptees are not children and do understand words of more than two syllables.Those of us who were breastfed for a time by our mothers may even have higher IQ’s than you do!
We do not need pity. We are survivors, otherwise we wouldn’t be here discovering your hypocrisy, lies and ignorance. Everyone can learn new things,change their understanding and drop prejudice, adoptism and bias.
Adoption is complicated, one size does not fit all and we all have our own individual stories.
Adoption has many faces, some of them are ugly but no less the truth – don’t tell us we’re speaking ‘vile words’, we probably know a good deal more about adoption than you do.
All adoptions begin with loss and trauma, our lives do not begin on Gotcha Day and please drop the idea that this is a good one to celebrate.
The primal wound exists. We do not need to justify it, explain it or argue for it. It just does.
You all know an adoptee who is happy and content with life. You have not yet known them for their whole life and what makes you think they’d tell you the deepest secrets of their heart?
Having been an adopter for a couple of years or longer or less does not qualify you as an expert on adoption and adoptees. Nothing does.You may eventually know something about being an adopter, nothing more.
Do not make assumptions about our mothers or our families and don’t believe all you read and are told about us. In fact don’t make assumptions about anything.
Do not believe all your agency or orphanage tells you. Do investigate the trade of international adoption thoroughly.
Adoption is not about being on a moral pedestal, being superior to others, being a saviour of an adoptee. And do bin those story books, most of them make things worse.
When you get out of your depth, don’t quote the Bible, it’s of no help whatsoever in a rational argument about facts. We’re still commodities if we’ve been paid for.
Don’t throw out the same old questions about what we are doing about changing the world of adoption. Most of us have done our bit by living the adopted life as required and in addition may be activists, writers, bloggers, video-makers, journalists, lecturers, professors, inventors, foster carers, campaigners and so on. Isn’t it about time you did something to help clean up the mess?
You can add adoptees to this list below – we are so often treated as outsiders, stigmatised and have personal experience of injustice. We also have the ability to see through lies, sense when things are not right and have experienced abuse. No wonder we care about injustices!
Too many mainstream journalists publish the sound-bites they are fed by spin-doctors. It is left to individuals acting on their own consciences to expose wrongdoing. The first to move into action are often LGBT folks, women, and others treated as outsiders. Why? Because they have personal experience with injustice, see through the lies faster, and have the motivation to expose abuse
Whistleblower Manning: an inspiration to other brave secret-busters | www.socialism.com.
The Life Of Von 
Fantastic post – thank you!
Thanks Trace x
Reblogged this on what we discovered and commented:
Adoption is a billion dollar industry!
A $13 billion by the look of it Trace!!
One of the things I love most about my adoptee identity is that it grants me the ability to see complexity and think abstractly about systems and injustice – not just because I want to, but because I’ve had to in order to survive. I really appreciate what you are commenting on because so often, adoptee views are invalidated for the sake of making others feel comfortable about their reality. The truth is, adoption uncovers so many other injustices – human rights violations of women, of the poor, of children – and social inequalities such as racism, sexism, and poverty. I’m not willing to stay silent as an adoptee about the things that I see in the world and how they relate to each other. It’s posts like this that help me stay brave in the face of family, friends, or others who think they have a right to judge – telling me to sit down and shut up. Thank you.
Thank you so much for your comment, so appreciated. I so agree that adoption is a whole bundle of injustices, just as it is about complex trauma, no single traumatic event, although the first was a biggie!