Dear First Mother Forum: Should we adopt through Gladney?

Lorraine

Dear FMF: My husband and I are new to adoptions. We recently decided we want to adopt due to fertility issues. I met a lady at the airport recently who recommended Gladney. I decided to read reviews online before contacting them. I did see on their website they ask for payment for the babies on a Huge sliding scale. So my question is.... do the mothers get a majority of that money? It seems that the center gets paid for the Medicaid and welfare benefits of the mothers, so what happens with the $40,000 the adoptive parents pay? I have a problem paying that kind of money with these horrible stories especially if the mothers do not profit. Could you give me advice? xxxxxinbrazil@gmail.com

What about those babies in....any-poor-nation?

The previous post dealt with the prevailing attitude towards adopting in America today--that there must be a lot babies who need adopting--when they aren't. Continuing that theme of What About Children Who Need adopting, today's post talks about going overseas to adopt:

In the quest to rescue children from deplorable conditions in another country, the number of children adopted from South Korea ballooned to more than 100,000. The exodus of babies began after the Korean War with the mixed-race babies left behind by GIs, but the flow of children didn’t stop when most of those children were settled in America. Exporting children to America became a cash cow for the country, and only lately has this become a national embarrassment.

NOW HOLT HAS ADOPTEE TOURISM 
Today, Holt International Children’s Services, the same agency that facilitated a great many—if not most—of the Korean adoptions, now advertises a side business of guided trips back to Korea for adult adoptees, who may be in search of their parents. If they are lucky enough to find them, now a language and cultural barrier separates parent and child.

What about children who need adopting?

Lorraine at her desk 

While we have been discussing the great damage done by people like Catelynn and Tyler for their continuing advocacy of adoption as shills for Bethany Christian Services, I thought it might be useful to post an overview of adoption attitudes and practices in America. Surely some readers who find themselves here read our posts and say--What about all those children who need to be adopted? 

As I was writing Hole in My Heart, my upcoming memoir, I realized that some readers would have that very thought, and so I include a section under the rubric of "Facts and Commentary" to answer them. It will be posted over the next week in three sections. Part I is today below. 

As for Catelynn and Tyler, it appears that they will meet with the adoptive parents of their first child, Theresa and Brandon Davis, in a segment of Monday's show of "Teen Mom OG" (10 p.m. EST/9 CST). Of course it's edited, but it will be interesting to see the interaction of the four parents of daughter Carly. As for how deeply Catelynn is involved in pushing adoption, I just picked this up from Catelynn's Twitter feed online: Hi, I'm Catelynn from Teen Mom. My goal is 2 be an advocate 4 adoption. Contact us on website 4 speaking engagements & join our fan page!

The Vance Twins: Raising awareness about adoption realities

Lorraine

Speaking up and speaking out about a controversial issue is always scary the first time. Adoption as we know it today has become highly controversial, as adult adoptees and first mothers have opened up about the painful effects of adoption, whether they are the ones who lost a child to be adopted, or the child who grew up in a family not her original one. 

Yet at the same time, with more people--straight couples, gays couples, single people--desiring to adopt, a several billion dollar industry world wide has grown up to serve that market.Those who want to adopt do not want to hear that adoption is anything other than a win-win solution. They imagine there are babies everywhere that need to be adopted, and such a baby will be the fix for infertility; at the same time many churches, both conservative and liberal, are part of the pro-adoption movement to "rescue" children from poverty.

Encouraging intercountry adoptions with hard cash

When half the faculty at Harvard and Boston College Law Schools endorse a bill that encourages poor countries to take children from their mothers and send them to the United States for adoption, you'd think something was amiss. We are talking about a bill  that offers financial incentives to poor countries to facilitate intercountry adoptions.

The learned academics in Boston did not do their homework. They signed a petition endorsing Sen. Mary Landrieu's Children in Families First (CHIFF) bill at the urging of two colleagues:  Prof. Elizabeth Bartholet, an adoptive mother of two from Peru and director of Harvard's Child Advocacy Program, and her former student and professor at Boston College, Paulo Barrozo.

Senate bill encourages more international adoption

Sen. Mary Landrieu

Foreign adoptions have plummeted from just over 23,000 in 2004 to just under 9,000 in 2012, as foreign countries and the U. S. State Department have responded to wide-spread corruption. Gathering its forces, the adoption industry has turned to its long-time champion, adoptive mom and wife of an adoptee Louisiana Senator Mary Landrieu. She introduced the deceptively-named Children in Families First Act of 2013 (CHIFF) "to strengthen intercountry adoption...and ensure it becomes a viable and fully developed option for providing families for children in need."* Among other provisions, the bill (S. 1530) would condition child welfare assistance to foreign countries on whether they allowed Americans to adopt children from these countries.

Foreign adoption may save 'one child' but hurts many

Jane

My post lauding the Russian government for stopping adoptions to the United States made Barbara Paden, an adoptive mother of two Russian children,   mad, really mad. Likely other adoptive mothers as well who didn't bother to comment. Paden, who blogs under "Babes from Russia," charged that my post is filled with inaccuracies and lies.

Paden, like many who adopt foreign children, defends the practice because "we can only save the world one child at a time." These parents tell inspiring stories of rescuing children from prison-like orphanages; it seems heartless to criticize what they are doing. Overall, however, foreign adoption does more harm than good.

Can the media get adoption right?

Jane

"US could face a critical adoption shortage" wails the headline in the Salem, Oregon Statesman Journal over a January 11 USA Today article.* 

What's the cause of this claimed calamity?  "A cataclysmic implosion of intercountry adoption (emphasis added)" according to Tom DiFilpo of the  Joint Council on International Children's Services. In addition to Russia closing its doors, adoptions from China, Ethiopia, and South Korea have declined. Domestic production cannot make up for the shortage because, according to Jenny Pope of the adoption agency Buckner International, "as single parenthood becomes more acceptable, 'there are just not as many women placing their children for adoption.'"

Reproductive exploitation--one more way to abuse women

The other evening as I watched the PBS special Half the Sky, a documentary spotlighting the outrageous treatment of women in many parts of the world, I thought of another abuse of women which needs to be put front and center, reproduction exploitation.

Foreign Adoptions Aren't Plunging Fast Enough

Jane

“’The era of the boom time for international adoption, I think, has passed us by’” Adam Pertman, Executive Director of the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute, told National Public Radio reporters Jennifer Ludden and Marosa Penaloza. To which First Mother Forum says: Good by and good riddence.

Since its peak in 2004, the number of foreign adoptions has plummeted from nearly 23,000 to less than 10,000 in 2010. Considering the known corruption in international adoption--and the 115,000 American children in foster care waiting to be placed--that figure is still obscenely high.

How the media encouarges separation of mother and child

The cover story of New York magazine last week was titled: "Is She Just too Old for This?" and showed a freakish and obviously photo-shopped picture of a very pregnant woman in her, hmmm...late sixties. The story eventually went on to say that old motherhood is great and as long as it's possible, go for it, if that is what you want. There are a lot of bothersome issues about having kids at an age that they will be taking care of senile parents while they are in college or right after, but that's not what caught my attention. Here's one issue that did:

"Among women over 40, birth rates have increased. Among women ages 45 to 49, they've risen 17 percent....Women over 45 who want to carry their own babies most often use donor eggs...."

Demand for babies leads to adoption abuses

It is the rare adoptive parent who, after adopting from overseas, can wrap her mind around the idea that "her" baby might have been stolen, sold or bartered to fill the huge demand for adoptable infants in wealthy nations, of which she herself was a part. 

Is Scott Simon Angry with us?

Scott Simon, author of Baby We Were Meant for Each Other: In Praise of Adoption is upset over three posts* critiquing his memoirs and media appearances.

The gist of our posts was that while Simon found adoption to be “a miracle, the work of divine agency,” it is catastrophe in someone else’s life that led to the child being available to be adopted, and that this aspect of adoption is once again ignored by pleased-as-punch parents, which he and his wife claim to be.

When Disaster Strikes, Adoption is Sure to Follow, Part II (and III)

Would-be adopters have begun circling Japan in the wake of the tragic earthquake and tsunami earlier this month. First Mother Forum readers may recall that after the January 11, 2010 earthquake in Haiti, Catholic Charities and other south Florida groups planned a massive airlift of perhaps several thousand of children thought to have been orphaned (When Disaster Strikes, Adoption is Sure to Follow).

Madonna's Malawi charity fails and Ethiopian adoptions shut down to a trickle: Could there be abuse in the system?

Lorraine

Madonna's plans for a swell school for girls in Malawi (from where she has adopted two children) are going up in smoke, but in the meantime $3.8 million was spent on architectural drawings, nice cars and golf-club memberships, according to news reports today. Oy vey, was all I could think--think what could have been done with that money for boys and girls in Malawi--and their families--instead of turning them into families who are so poor they feel they must relinquish their children to people in more affluent nations to be adopted. By Madonna, perhaps, herself! How lucky is that?*

Guatemalan mother seeking return of son gets her day in court

Encarnacion Bail Romero

In a case which the Missouri Supreme Court described as “a travesty in its egregious procedural errors, its long duration, and its impact on Mother, Adoptive Parents, and, most importantly, Child,” Encarnacion Bail Romero will have the opportunity to regain custody of her four- year-old son. In the mean time the boy, referred to in court documents

Can International Adoption Be Fixed? As well as the drug trade.

The case of seven year old Artyom Savelyev (Justin Hansen) whose adoptive mother, Torry Hansen, sent him back to Russia is only the latest example of intercountry adoption gone horribly wrong. According to Marley Greiner's blog, The Daily Bastardette, fourteen Russian children have been murdered by their American adoptive parents. Disruptions in foreign adoptions are not uncommon, and as we have reported here, corruption is widespread.

While these parents must be held accountable for their horrific acts, another villain, lurking behind the scene, is the demand for foreign kids fueled by aggressive marketing on the part of the adoption industry. These children are attractive to those seeking to adopt because they are thought to come with less baggage (such as mothers) than American children. Glossy ads on the web perpetuate what David Smolin of Cumberland Law School describes as “the adoption myth in the United States [that] sends the message that the love and care found in any normal American home is enough to heal any child.”

Experts have recommended actions which might prevent these tragedies -- better screening of prospective adoptive parents and providing them with accurate information about the child, preparing them for the difficulties that they and the child will encounter; and offering on-going support. (How to Prevent Adoption Disasters, NT Times, 4/15/10). However, there does not appear to be any authority with the power or inclination to force the industry to change.

Intercountry adoptions are regulated by the US Departments of State and Homeland Security, state child welfare agencies, and the governments of the countries which supply the kids. The laws are weak and enforcement sketchy.

This seems unlikely to change. Congress is having difficulty clamping down on the Wall Street practices which brought the economy to its knees. Reining in an industry which “saves children” would be a herculean task. According to The Daily Bastardette, the industry trade group, the Joint Council on International Children's Services has already begun flooding the market with “positive adoption stories” and lining up supporters. When the government has made even feeble efforts to control abuses in adoption in the past, adoption agencies, many operating under the banner of Christ, unleashed an army of prospective adoptive parents to bang on Congressional doors and yammer about bureaucratic red tape preventing their child from joining his American family (albeit they may never have laid eyes on “their child”).

Federal and state officials have shown little ability to respond to even the worst cases of corruption and abuse. The United States Attorney in Salt Lake City allowed Scott and Karen Banks to plead guilty to misdemeanors and receive probation for a massive fraud involving Samoan children which we wrote about here. The Pennsylvania adoption agency Reaching Out Thru International Adoption which placed Masha Allen with pedophile Mathew Mancusco is still in business.

As long as demand exceeds supply, increasing regulation, even if politically possible, is unlikely to have a significant impact. We need only to look at the drug trade where tough laws and billions spent on enforcement has not made a dent. Attempting to impose more regulation over the adoption industry will simply result in a moving cascade of countries using adoption to fill their coffers and empty their orphanages. Where Angelina and Madonna tread, others are sure to follow. As long as there is a buck to be made, someone is there to make it. Congress could take a bite out of that buck, however, by limiting the $12,150 Adoption Tax Credit to adoptions from American foster homes but that’s as unlikely as Congress restoring the estate tax to its pre-Bush level.

The best approach for those wishing to curtail abuse in intercountry adoptions would be an “Adopt America” campaign, encouraging those wanting to “form their family through adoption” to look to their state’s child welfare agency.

An encouraging note is that the demand for foreign children may be waning. International adoptions have declined from a high of 22,990 in 2004 to 12,753 in 2009. Of course, some of this may be fallout from the poor economy. It may also be that as cases of corruption are reported and adoptive parents admit publicly that they cannot handle their kids, fewer people are willing to adopt children from overseas. The Artyom Savelyev case has caused more adoptive parents to speak up, dispelling fantasies about international adoption.

The other side is as Harvard Law Professor Elizabeth Bartholet argues, that reducing foreign adoptions “punishes more children, denying them their best chance to escape institutions into the adoptive homes that are generally available only internationally.” Restricting adoptions because of the Artyom Savelyev case would “ignore the larger story about child tragedy and related policy lessons. That story has to do with the systemic abuse that victimizes the millions of children in institutions worldwide.”

While we at FMF do not want to see children abused or languishing in institutions, we recognize that adopting a few thousand of these children each year does nothing for the millions who are not chosen. In fact these happy adoption stories damage children who are too old, too disabled, or too dark by diverting attention from them. Systemic abuse requires systemic solutions. Money spent on bringing children to the US is better spent on relief organizations like those we’ve written about in India and Ecuador. Finally, of course, foreign governments need to step up and protect their children.

One Woman's Decision NOT to Adopt from Ethiopia

A while back we posted a blog from Charissa who was planning to adopt three children from Ethiopia, but instead of rushing ahead, she did some digging and discovered that the agency handling the adoption (Celebrate Children International in Oviedo, FL) was more interested in supplying children to families willing to pay their fees than making sure of ethical practices in international adoption. We have written about corruption in international adoption several times (those links go to two posts, more to be found if using one of the search functions on our blog), and will continue to do so.

When last we heard from Chrarissa on December 1, 2009, and she was appalled upon learning that the children actually had mothers in Ethiopia. Charissa writes about deciding not to adopt the three children she and her husband were considering here, and tells the rest of the story in at Urbanfunnyfarm:

I wish I could have ended this story with "the children were returned to their families" but sadly that is not the case. We are absolutely heartbroken knowing these children are still orphans. We could have continued with the adoption, and I don't think we would have been wrong to do that. However, knowing what we knew, how could we look into their eyes years down the road and tell them the story of how they came to be in our family without feeling like we took part in their pain and rejection? The one thing that gives us peace and comfort in this is that the orphanage saw a problem too, and now the children are listed with a REPUTABLE agency who is carefully investigating each of the CCI cases.
She ends the post with some very good questions to ask fro all those considering international adoption.

Thank you Charissa, for your courage and doing the right thing. If we had a small part in helping you reach that decision we are gratified.--lorraine

Guatemalan Army Stole Kids for Adoption

Over the weekend CNN reported "Guatemalan Army Stole Kids for Adoption," a story that cannot go unnoticed here at Birth Mother/First Mother Forum because apparently the corruption in Guatemalan adoption is much worse than reported earlier:

"The Guatemalan army stole at least 333 children and sold them for adoption in other countries during the Central American nation's 36-year civil war, a government report has concluded. Many of those children ended up in the United States, as well as Sweden, Italy and France, said the report's author and lead investigator.

"In some cases, the report stated, the parents were killed so the children could be taken and given to government-sponsored agencies to be adopted abroad. In other instances, the children were abducted without physical harm to the parents."

The number of corrupt adoptions--333--involving stolen children in the government report came from examining a mere 672 adoptions between between 1977-89, the time of peak adoptions from that country. Those numbers mean that roughly half of all adoptions examined during that period involved stolen children sold through state-run agencies. So the 333 number has got to be the mere tip of the iceberg. During the country's protracted civil war, about 45,000 people disappeared from 1960 to 1996, about 5,000 of which were children.

The story also noted that Guatemala has the world's highest per capita rate of adoption and was one of the leading providers of adoptive children for the United States: "Nearly one in 100 babies born in Guatemala end up with adoptive parents in the United States, according to the U.S. consulate in Guatemala. As we reported earlier on E. J. Graff's piece in Foreign Policy, many, if not nearly all, adoptions from poor nations are suspect.

Guatemalan adoptions can cost up to $30,000, providing a large financial incentive in a country where the World Bank says about 75 percent of the people live below the poverty level. The report concludes that the lawyers and notaries who were the middlemen for this human trafficking (yes, it is human trafficking) were the driving force for the babies stolen from their parents. Many induced the women to give up their babies, or simply paid soldiers for product, i.e., a baby--because they knew they had a place to market the kid.

While those who push international adoption decry when this kind of baby-selling is called trafficking--they want it only to refer to the sex market--they are kidding themselves. Taking children for filthy lucre is trafficking in human flesh, period. They just don't want to see themselves as baby sellers, promoters of baby selling, or human traffickers, but that is what they are.

Okay, we have known this has gone on for a long time. We've written about corruption in international adoption several times before, including here and here. But you know what is the most amazing thing about this sickening report?

How little attention it has gotten in the United States. Where most of those stolen babies have ended up.

My husband says it was on the AOL story board on Saturday, but only for a couple of hours. A Googgle search seems to indicate that the news reports on what should scare of bejeesus out of all adoptive parents who have children from abroad were scant. CNN, Reuters, UPI wrote brief stories, but the report has largely disappeared from the public consciousness here in America--everyone is more interested in what will happen to foul-mouthed Serena Williams after her bad behavior at the U.S. Open this weekend.

Why? Call me crazy, but it's because we here in the country where these kids are sold into DO NOT WANT TO HEAR THEY MAY HAVE A STOLEN CHILD. I guess I wouldn't either, but how long is the world going to be deaf to what is happening? I still know people who are looking into international adoption.

Are the folks at the Holt International Agency doing a review of the Guatemalan adoptions they processed? Is international adopter and promoter Elizabeth Bartholet rethinking her position that all international adoptions are good ones because children are not raised in poverty, but in countries where people are wealthy enough to buy somebody else's baby? Are there going to be more conferences promoting international adoption such as the one at New York University earlier this year?

Guatemala has suspended all adoptions, but here's what you get at the Christian World Adoption website:

Guatemala Adoption

CWA is hopeful and optimistic that one day the precious children of Guatemala will again have a chance to unite with a forever family through international adoption. Due to the continuing issues with Hague Treaty requirements, Guatemala adoption is not possible at this time, and there is no way to know when it might be possible. We continue to monitor the situation, and we continue to pray for the waiting children.

Can these people be stopped? Do they never learn? We are, quite simply, sick at heart. Real forever families are waiting all over the world to be reunited with their stolen children. We grieve for the mothers.--lorraine
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The Heart to Heart retreat over the weekend in Boston was a wonderful, enriching experience. I want to thank everyone who was there for making it so. Report coming soon.

More Madonna News; Child Trafficking in Asia

_______________

Madonna's bid to adopt a girl from Malawi, Chifundo Mercy James, has been approved by the highest court in that country according to several news sources. The papers also say that while "her family" (ie, maternal relatives, her mother died in childbirth) is for the adoption, her father, who has never seen the girl, also according to these sources, is against it. From Mirah Riben's blog, Family Preservation Advocacy, we took this statement:

We are delighted to report that Malawi's Supreme Court has overturned an earlier ruling denying a petition by Madonna to adopt Chifundo "Mercy" James, and has granted a full adoption. According to the New York Times, Chief Justice Lovemore Munlo, in reviewing the lower court's ruling, said that the first decision was a narrow interpretation based on old laws and that "in this global village a man can have more than one place at which he resides." We agree. Moreover, in our increasingly inter-connected world, a child should not be viewed as the sole responsibility of his country of birth.

--from the press release of ACT for Adoption, a Rye, NY, based organization of adoption attorneys with a Harvard connection through the proponent of all-adoption-all-the-time Prof. Elizabeth Bartholet of Harvard.

Read Mirah's blog, Family Preservation Advocacy, for more on the skinny.

And while we are on the subject of international adoption, read about child trafficking in Asia from Australian radio where babies are brought in fishing boats, packed in styrofoam fish crates with air holes so they don't suffocate. This is from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation:

First world demand to adopt very young babies is driving a new twist in people smuggling, particularly in Asia.

One of Australia's senior law officers, John Pascoe, says more and more, smugglers are trading in pregnant women - the perfect incubators - for access to their newborns. Australia's Chief Federal Magistrate John Pascoe, Australia's Chief Federal Magistrate (analogous to our Attorney General) says that among the measures needed to fight the insidious trade should be a new system of children's rights. To illustrate the shift in focus for the smugglers, Mr. Pascoe describes a 2003 case that happened off Indonesia--where the babies were found in fish crates.

JOHN PASCOE: Sadly this is a crime which is very hidden, trafficking generally is very much a hidden crime, but there are increasing numbers of reports, there are fortunately an increasing number of arrests in this area, so we believe that it's increasing and that the numbers are probably in the thousands rather than in tens or hundreds.

Interviewer LINDA MOTTRAM: So why is this growing? Is it just because the trafficking progress is evolving? The traffickers are finding new and better ways, if you like, to move the people they want to move or are there other factors there?

JOHN PASCOE: We believe that trafficking is always motivated by economics, but also there is significant demand for children for adoption apart from anything else. I believe that most newly born children end up in some sort of illegal adoption process. There's huge demand from first world countries for very young children for adoption purposes.

LINDA MOTTRAM: Well, what can be done about this? There are international conventions on the rights and protection of children but clearly that's inadequate?

JOHN PASCOE: Yes, I think we need to encourage countries throughout the Asia Pacific region to become signatories to the various conventions that protect the rights of the child. and that is not universal across the region. And I am also putting forward that I think we need to move to a system that actually gives a child rights which crystallise the moment it is born and those rights should include a right to know its nationality, to know who its parents are and generally to be properly cared for.

And you know what? Every time a celebrity such a Madonna adopts, three little girls somewhere in the world decide they are going to do their bit for children...and adopt.

Though I thought the weekend would be adoption free, it was not. Someone I know was hosting a friend who adopted two children from Brazil, though from the story I heard, the adoptive mother found the siblings in separate orphanages or homes and reunited them when she adopted; a good thing, but was there no one in Brazil who could have done the same? And then I heard of someone I knew vaguely who had two children...and since the man telling us the story knew she was not able to have children (as he had once been her boyfriend), he asked the father who had had run into at his office...how this was possible? Surrogate mothers. I think it's more prevalent than we know. This is a story from the publishing world; Jane tells the same about the legal community, and Linda is always meeting adoptive parents by...accident?