Better Child Adoption?
- Thread starter The Dud
- Start date
Perhaps a chemical spill or medication causes women to become sterile. Without the ability to have children of their own, they turn to orphanages.
Have the Roman Republic/Early Empire survive until present day, where adoption was the preferred way of selecting the family's heir.
That won't do anything for orphans, though, unless he did something extraordinary for his adopted father à la Ben Hur, or he's the biological son of someone important.
That won't do anything for orphans, though, unless he did something extraordinary for his adopted father à la Ben Hur, or he's the biological son of someone important.
m
Does popular equal better? Adoption as it is currently practiced in the United States at large is something Id like to see less popular. Much less popular. In fact, if it were up to me, adoption as it is all frequently practiced would be a criminal offense. Child trafficking would be prosecuted under RICO procedures, and parents who adopted children would be stigmatized rather than praised.
Why I do I write this? Because I despise the practice of closed adoptions. I abhor the idea that adults can strip a child of their previous legal identity, their very name, their heritage, that a child can be treated as a possession which can be traded from hand to hand, and that the people who financially profit from this entirely repellant state of affairs have created a billion dollar industry.
I do not oppose foster care per se. It is sadly, a necessary evil. I, however, have no truck with the idea that the legal identity of a child can be changed without their consent, and put under a veil of secrecy. This, in my opinion, is a grotesque violation of that child's human rights, and the practice should be outlawed. No one should be legally adopted into any family under any circumstances until that child is an adult of legal age to consent to said adoption.
As an FYI, the above opinions are those of a product of the foster care system in Canada, and yes, an adoptee who also happens to know a thing or two about adoption as is exists in our neighbor. Color me extremely biased on the subject.
Does popular equal better? Adoption as it is currently practiced in the United States at large is something Id like to see less popular. Much less popular. In fact, if it were up to me, adoption as it is all frequently practiced would be a criminal offense. Child trafficking would be prosecuted under RICO procedures, and parents who adopted children would be stigmatized rather than praised.
Why I do I write this? Because I despise the practice of closed adoptions. I abhor the idea that adults can strip a child of their previous legal identity, their very name, their heritage, that a child can be treated as a possession which can be traded from hand to hand, and that the people who financially profit from this entirely repellant state of affairs have created a billion dollar industry.
I do not oppose foster care per se. It is sadly, a necessary evil. I, however, have no truck with the idea that the legal identity of a child can be changed without their consent, and put under a veil of secrecy. This, in my opinion, is a grotesque violation of that child's human rights, and the practice should be outlawed. No one should be legally adopted into any family under any circumstances until that child is an adult of legal age to consent to said adoption.
As an FYI, the above opinions are those of a product of the foster care system in Canada, and yes, an adoptee who also happens to know a thing or two about adoption as is exists in our neighbor. Color me extremely biased on the subject.
m
Does popular equal better? Adoption as it is currently practiced in the United States at large is something Id like to see less popular. Much less popular. In fact, if it were up to me, adoption as it is all frequently practiced would be a criminal offense. Child trafficking would be prosecuted under RICO procedures, and parents who adopted children would be stigmatized rather than praised.
Why I do I write this? Because I despise the practice of closed adoptions. I abhor the idea that adults can strip a child of their previous legal identity, their very name, their heritage, that a child can be treated as a possession which can be traded from hand to hand, and that the people who financially profit from this entirely repellant state of affairs have created a billion dollar industry.
I do not oppose foster care per se. It is sadly, a necessary evil. I, however, have no truck with the idea that the legal identity of a child can be changed without their consent, and put under a veil of secrecy. This, in my opinion, is a grotesque violation of that child's human rights, and the practice should be outlawed. No one should be legally adopted into any family under any circumstances until that child is an adult of legal age to consent to said adoption.
As an FYI, the above opinions are those of a product of the foster care system in Canada, and yes, an adoptee who also happens to know a thing or two about adoption as is exists in our neighbor. Color me extremely biased on the subject.
I think most people would agree with you so far as the child trafficking cases go; those groups in Asia and Africa who basically yank children from their mothers' arms to put up into the adoption market overseas. But... stopping all other forms of adoption too? Telling couples who can't have children on their own that they can never adopt a child and can never raise a child? That seems cruel...
Tate the Brewer
Banned
Yeah, I agree. The concept of closed adoptions is fucked up. But that doesn't mean I disagree with adoptions period. If parents want to give up their legal responsibilities to their children, then by all means, they should be able to - baby hungry gay people like myself would jump at the opportunity. Just as long as those legal rights are signed away and the parents who elected to give up what matters most in the world can't come into my home and demand that I return their child - and have an actual case to be argued in court. If you sign away your children to someone else, that needs to be irreversible. Children are entitled to stability, and having a bunch of adults bicker over who gets to keep them like they're some piece of property doesn't facilitate a stable environment.
Speaking in terms of how we can make this more popular in the United States - I think adoption would be hugely popular if it weren't so damned expensive. If you can figure out a way to keep adoption from becoming the trillion dollar industry that it is, then you might have something. But as long as it remains the financial and legal nightmare that it is today, I can't imagine it growing in popularity. People just don't have $50,000 to hand over for ONE kid in need, half the time.
Is it just me, or is this conversation about 75% mostly material for chat, rather than actual alternate history?
Tate the Brewer
Banned
It seems like chat, to me. It would be an interesting idea for alternate history, but we need some kind of a PoD in the "industry" or in adoption law for that.
Please read my post more carefully. I do not disagree with foster care. I have no issues with children being raised by foster parents provided the latter are qualified to do so. I have no issue with the children remaining with the foster parents permanently. I have issue with that child's legal identity being irreversibly altered without their consent, before they are of age and able to understand what they are consenting to. It is the person who is adopted who should be the final arbiter of what family relations-if any-he wishes to adhere to. It should be an arrangement freely entered into. This scenario would not prevent parents from raising children. It merely curbs the unfortunate tendency in law to treat our children as an exchangeable possession. That is what I object to, and not the necessity to foster children with non-biological guardians. I have no desire whatsoever to outlaw foster care. That would be absurd.