By An Adoptee for Adoptees

This blog was created as a place to share stories from adoptees, share resources about being adopted, and help adoptees with our unique lives and issues. You can call me Jin-woo (진우)!

[little-lagomorph]

personally i lvoe to cry while i read stuff transracial adoptees say about being alienated from their culture/s and other people of their ethnicity, i'm sure this means nothing

[adopteesarevalid]

Transracial by white people is a really wild concept, Im literally born asian but grew up white and it makes me question if im a "real asian" like some fucked up imposter syndrome and then white people deadass just???? Claim to be a different race??? The pure and undeserved confidence and arrogance??

[transracial-trainwreck]

hello! i hope everyone had a decent week. i am physically and mentally exhausted from having to be around my family for the past few days. i feel like this time of year can be difficult for a lot of adoptees so make sure to put yourself first this holiday season. your well-being is worth more than pleasing your adoptive family.

[gatheringbones]

[“Child removal proved to be a profitable career path for many white women. The civilizing machine required humans to run it: white women teachers. The boarding school movement presented them with significant new career opportunities. Middle-class white women in the mid- to late nineteenth century were still largely confined to the private sphere. But civilizing the West was deemed an appropriate extension of women’s domestic duties. This “manifest domesticity,” in scholar Amy Kaplan’s memorable phrase, thrust white women’s work into the center of the settler colonial enterprise. White women could respectably extend their own realm of power and influence through adopting a maternal attitude that saw Natives as children in need of their guidance. According to historian Margaret Jacobs, “the majority of boarding school employees nationwide” were white women.”]

Kyla Schuller, The Trouble With White Women: A Counterhistory of Feminism

[byjove]

Everyone mentions “but there are so many kids in foster care who need homes!” when someone talks about the connection between abortion bans and the adoption trade. Those adoptive parents do not want children with opinions, thoughts, traumas and experiences. They want infants. They do not want the effort of helping a child who has been in the system, they want an infant they can brainwash. This is why those freaky big Christian families often adopt lots of infants and toddlers but not older children. They see children as little pets instead of people with independent lives and personalities and the child being an infant when it comes into their care helps maintain that illusion.

Do not tell anti-abortion people to adopt. Do not. They do not deserve to ruin another child’s life. Not every home is healthy for a child. Not every family will be a family for that child.

[angelsaxis]

The article itself is paywalled so I was only able to read a few lines, but i think it's important to listen to what adoptees have been saying about abortion and adoption.

[actuallyadopted]

Uncle anon I see your ask and I appreciate it! I've just been waiting until I have the energy to write up a proper response 💕

[skullchicken]

Random socializing tip: Tell people when they’ve had a positive impact on your life!

e.g.: “Hey, remember when I asked you for advice on X? That was really helpful, I tried it and now (insert what has improved)”

“You kept gushing about (insert series/book/movie/recipe) and made it sound really appealing, so I checked it out and I really liked it!”

“Thank you for letting me vent recently, telling you what bothered me really helped me to work through it / helped me see it from another perspective / gave me the courage to address it with the person I was talking about.”

It helps people see their own strong points, it deepens your relationships, it makes the people in your life feel appreciated and special and it can give you warm fuzzy feelings!

Win/win all around!

[byjove]

Everyone mentions “but there are so many kids in foster care who need homes!” when someone talks about the connection between abortion bans and the adoption trade. Those adoptive parents do not want children with opinions, thoughts, traumas and experiences. They want infants. They do not want the effort of helping a child who has been in the system, they want an infant they can brainwash. This is why those freaky big Christian families often adopt lots of infants and toddlers but not older children. They see children as little pets instead of people with independent lives and personalities and the child being an infant when it comes into their care helps maintain that illusion.

Do not tell anti-abortion people to adopt. Do not. They do not deserve to ruin another child’s life. Not every home is healthy for a child. Not every family will be a family for that child.

[thatonesuperweirdkid]

Hi former foster youth here, this is actually absolutely true, so much so that often if an older youth is adopted they end being given back to the system & this can happen multiple times the longer you’re in care. Many brown youth that are adopted by those white religious people are tokenized and used as a tool to prove they’re a “pious” “righteous” Christian but then also end up abusing them bc they end up resenting the youth for their brownness, esp when they seek out their heritage as they get older. Wild right? It’s almost like adoption is not the best option and foster care should be the last choice. Maybe let’s not force people to birth so that we just keep these kids out of any of these systems.

[yekkes]

I feel like I've said it before and I'll say it again and probably elaborate later but adoption is not a "solution" to abortion. Pregnant people are not incubators that exist for adoptive parents, babies forced to be alive should not be commodities to buy and sell. Private adoption agencies have lobbied for right wing anti-choice policies and politicians because they know they will profit off that that. You'll hear "there's an shortage of babies to adopt" because in America it's completely normalized to sell children and if that leaves an icky taste in your mouth it's because at the end of the day it's simply true. And they price those children by race and gender, it's wrong, but it is simply a fact.

[yekkes]

LOW AND BEHOLD:

I feel like it should be said America is one of the only countries this is normalized. A lot of people from other countries would give us a horrified look because this sounds beyond the pale and dystopian. But for some reason we're made to believe it's normal. And that's not to dunk on my fellow Americans as much as point out that we're fed propaganda to believe this is normal when it is in fact a hold over by private adoption agencies from Georgia Tann stealing + profiting off of the human trafficking of children.

[actuallyadopted]

Anon I'm not going to answer any further asks on the topic. This seems like a personal experience you're projecting onto me/other transracial adoptees.

[actuallyadopted]

Developing a positive racial identity is incredibly important to the lives and mental health of all people of color, but is something especially neglected among transracial adoptees.

Dr. Aisha White, in her interview for the article "In My Skin: Supporting Positive Racial Identity Development in Black Children" summarizes positive racial identity as follows:

Developing a positive racial identity can be difficult for people of color who did not have a lot of support from or experience with people from their own race/culture. Many transracial adoptees grow up in white families, white communities, and in a white society. It's important for adoptive parents, and adopted adults to surround their child/themselves with varied and positive influences that can meet the complex needs that come with transracial experience.

[actuallyadopted]

How am I waking up today exposed to two different insane fucking takes on adoption from two different sources within hours of waking up.

[actuallyadopted]

The other one is from Twitter BTW, I got recommended a tweet talking about a lady who's saying her adopted kid is being misogynistic for making her perform "emotional labor" by talking about his trauma. And how she uses the "shitty roommate analogy" with her other adopted kid.

I just don't understand how or why someone would adopt a child they don't care about or actively dislike. I've seen it happen and it blows my mind every time. My birth dad had it happen to him. It's so fucked up.

[actuallyadopted]

How am I waking up today exposed to two different insane fucking takes on adoption from two different sources within hours of waking up.

[actuallyadopted]

I didn't pretend to know your story, just sharing my point of view (which you deleted). But you didn't answer my question, without those international adoptions what would be the solution to find a home for those hundreds of babies stuck in orphanages? What makes those adoptions "unethical"? The white saviour thing... well I only heard that on Tumblr to be honest, so I guess is a term that Americans use.

I didn't delete it, I just didn't post it. It was extremely long and had incredibly graphic descriptions of your trauma that could've been unnecessarily triggering for my followers.

https://the-ard.com/2022/01/26/international-adoption-and-the-color-blind-savior/

https://adoption.com/avoiding-the-savior-complex-in-adoption/

https://www.insider.com/im-an-adoptee-im-tired-white-saviors-like-myka-stauffer-2020-6?amp=

https://digitalcollections.sit.edu/cgi/viewContent.cgi?article=3550&context=isp

https://nowhitesaviors.medium.com/international-adoption-and-the-white-savior-industrial-complex-8075c4a67a57

https://megoshea.com/naam/

Here are some sources not from Tumblr about international/transracial adoption and the white savior complex. You're correct in that it's mostly an American term, as most international adoptions are Americans adopting children from overseas.

When I'm talking on the topic of transracial/international adoption, I am talking about the big picture. While there are cases, like yours, of international adoption that are net positive and improve a child's life, the overarching complex is still incredibly exploitative. Because the demand for children from countries like China, Korea, and many African countries is so high, there are many organizations that will often lie to or manipulate parents to separate them from their babies in order to adopt them out to American families for profit. Additionally, while many adoptions do end up being happy and beneficial, adoption does inherently come from the trauma of, for whatever reason, the people who gave birth to you being unwilling or unable to care for you. This is addressed in books like The Primal Wound.

For the record, I am very happy for my adoption. I too was adopted from a dysfunctional family by people who cared about and for me. I was not an international adoptee, but I am a transracial adoptee. My family loves and cares for me, and I love and care for them, but them being white does leave some gaps in which they cannot give me all the support I need navigating things like my racial identity, my experiences with racism, etc.

Our experiences are not the same. While we both grew up in places where the majority of people do not look like us, whiteness is a privilege even in Japan. You aren't in a place to address racism transracial adoptees in white countries face as you are white yourself. Next time you see a post that doesn't apply to you (as most, if not all, of the posts I've made and reblogged about transracial/international adoption are targeted towards adoptees of color) it may be better to simply scroll past. Not everything needs to relate to your experience. White saviorism does not really apply heavily in my case, I simply boost adoptee voices and apply my own knowledge of structural oppression to be critical of systems that uphold it.

In regard to your question about the "hundreds of babies stuck in orphanages," I would challenge you to ask yourself why an American shouldn't, wouldn't, or doesn't adopt one of the many, many children in their own country/city's foster and adoption systems. There are already "hundreds of babies stuck in orphanages" in America, and they are not considered as desirable because it is considered valiant heroism to instead adopt a baby from somewhere else, even if that baby was acquired through unethical means.

[actuallyadopted]

Not to mention, you telling a Korean person that they don't belong in their heritage country is...kind of fucked up. Every experience I have been witness to of transracial adoptees of color visiting their home country has turned out to be a net positive. The therapy group I attend for adoptees of color highly recommends it.

You, being white, are likely not identified as German, Norwegian, or whatever country it was you were adopted from. Every day I am identified as Korean. I grew up surrounded by white faces and not any people who looked like me. Even in foreign countries, white people are often held up to be the ideal. It's very different for a Korean person in America to want to visit Korea than it is for you.

[actuallyadopted]

I didn't pretend to know your story, just sharing my point of view (which you deleted). But you didn't answer my question, without those international adoptions what would be the solution to find a home for those hundreds of babies stuck in orphanages? What makes those adoptions "unethical"? The white saviour thing... well I only heard that on Tumblr to be honest, so I guess is a term that Americans use.

I didn't delete it, I just didn't post it. It was extremely long and had incredibly graphic descriptions of your trauma that could've been unnecessarily triggering for my followers.

https://the-ard.com/2022/01/26/international-adoption-and-the-color-blind-savior/

https://adoption.com/avoiding-the-savior-complex-in-adoption/

https://www.insider.com/im-an-adoptee-im-tired-white-saviors-like-myka-stauffer-2020-6?amp=

https://digitalcollections.sit.edu/cgi/viewContent.cgi?article=3550&context=isp

https://nowhitesaviors.medium.com/international-adoption-and-the-white-savior-industrial-complex-8075c4a67a57

https://megoshea.com/naam/

Here are some sources not from Tumblr about international/transracial adoption and the white savior complex. You're correct in that it's mostly an American term, as most international adoptions are Americans adopting children from overseas.

When I'm talking on the topic of transracial/international adoption, I am talking about the big picture. While there are cases, like yours, of international adoption that are net positive and improve a child's life, the overarching complex is still incredibly exploitative. Because the demand for children from countries like China, Korea, and many African countries is so high, there are many organizations that will often lie to or manipulate parents to separate them from their babies in order to adopt them out to American families for profit. Additionally, while many adoptions do end up being happy and beneficial, adoption does inherently come from the trauma of, for whatever reason, the people who gave birth to you being unwilling or unable to care for you. This is addressed in books like The Primal Wound.

For the record, I am very happy for my adoption. I too was adopted from a dysfunctional family by people who cared about and for me. I was not an international adoptee, but I am a transracial adoptee. My family loves and cares for me, and I love and care for them, but them being white does leave some gaps in which they cannot give me all the support I need navigating things like my racial identity, my experiences with racism, etc.

Our experiences are not the same. While we both grew up in places where the majority of people do not look like us, whiteness is a privilege even in Japan. You aren't in a place to address racism transracial adoptees in white countries face as you are white yourself. Next time you see a post that doesn't apply to you (as most, if not all, of the posts I've made and reblogged about transracial/international adoption are targeted towards adoptees of color) it may be better to simply scroll past. Not everything needs to relate to your experience. White saviorism does not really apply heavily in my case, I simply boost adoptee voices and apply my own knowledge of structural oppression to be critical of systems that uphold it.

In regard to your question about the "hundreds of babies stuck in orphanages," I would challenge you to ask yourself why an American shouldn't, wouldn't, or doesn't adopt one of the many, many children in their own country/city's foster and adoption systems. There are already "hundreds of babies stuck in orphanages" in America, and they are not considered as desirable because it is considered valiant heroism to instead adopt a baby from somewhere else, even if that baby was acquired through unethical means.

[actuallyadopted]

Anon I don't know why you think you're qualified to decide that a white savior complex isn't a white savior complex if ur white. I'm glad ur happy but you don't know my whole story.