We Need to Talk Vocabulary

Words are weapons and words are powerful. Take away someone's words and ability to communicate in some way, shape, or form, and you leave them to die. You cannot fight back against an unnamed thing. Words matter.

Abandoned

Adoptees are taught to say they were "abandoned" as soon as they are old enough to speak. "I was abandoned by my birthmother." Abandoned means unwanted. This is not true. A communist government forbidding your birthparents from keeping you is not "abandonment." A communist government backing up their laws with physical violence, jail time, fines, and forced surgeries (abortions and sterilizations) is a government that does not leave birthparents "options." Adoptees should not be told that their parents did not want them, did not love them, and willingly left them at some location. In reality, it was forced. In reality, these locations were chosen specifically for the baby to be found and brought to the orphanage. Babies weren't just hidden in random locations.

People say adoption is a beautiful thing, that it is a wonderful thing, that adoptees should be grateful and happy and never, ever, feel sad about adoption at all! And yet, we teach them to say "abandoned." We teach them their parents did not love them. We teach them that their parents willingly left them and act surprised when they feel that adoption is less than spectacularly positively wonderful.

Burden

Adoptees are taught by society to say the word "burden." As in "I am a burden," to either the birthparents who did not "want" to "deal" with such a "burden," or to the adoptive family. Society makes it clear that adoptees are burdens. They are extra children and historically the narrative has been that orphans and adoptees are extra mouths to feed. Harry Potter is viewed as a "burden" to the Dursleys (his blood-relatives). Cinderella was viewed as a "burden" to her evil stepmother and stepsisters. Cosette was a "burden" to those Thénardiers who "took her in" after her mother dies. And then what? Each of them is forced to work for their new "family."

Wow! Look how happy Cosette is!

These are just three well-known examples of orphans/adoptees, but the list is miles long (Gavroche from Les Mis, Tom Riddle from Harry Potter, the Grinch (they recently made a movie showing the Grinch growing up in an orphanage), Hercules, Phoebe from Friends, A Little Princess, A Secret Garden, Snow White (her stepmom tried to kill her!), etc.  There are millions of different orphan and adoption tropes, and each gives a message about what adoptees are or should be and most of them involve mistreatment.

Thankful, Grateful, & Lucky

 Lucky has been discussed already here on this blog, and is probably the number one most hated word in the adoptee vocabulary. Even if the word "burden" isn't used, words like lucky, thankful, or grateful are used instead.

As in "I'm so grateful so-and-so took me in! How could I ever repay you?" or "I am truly blessed to have been loved by you. Even if you aren't my real parents." Sometimes these words are hurled at the adoptee, such as "You should be thankful that we even took you in! Feed you food! Put a roof over your head!"

And yet, somehow, adoptive parents still expect adoptees to not have any problems whatsoever. They want adoptees to say they are happy and lucky and happy and happy and oh, so, HAPPY! Yes, yes, with words like abandoned and burden on the tip of their tongues as soon as they learn how to speak...yes, yes, hum, hum, I see the logic! What a realistic expectation!

Examples (Video and Articles)

Here is an example of young (5-8 ish years old) children who have been taught (for surely it isn't an inherent trait for all adoptees to suddenly learn these magical words) these words.

Your biological parents "couldn't take care of you," my ass. Parents must think everything makes sense to the child. But it would have been much more true and much less painful if they were told their parents were not allowed to keep them. Or "If it wasn't for my mom and dad, I bet I would still be in the orphanage." Ummm, DEAR ADOPTIVE PARENTS, THIS IS A PROBLEM. You should never allow your child to say things that degrade their worth to boost your tiny little ego. Savior complex much? As a grown-ass adult, you think it is healthy and good for your precious adoptive child to think of you as a savior? As someone who prevented a lifetime of having no family and living in an orphanage? As a grown-ass fucking adult, you think that it is an asset for your child to go on television and broadcast such a self-deprecating message to other adoptees. As an adoptee who has been pressured by society to say these very same things, I can tell you that I have struggled for a good part of twenty years to fully believe I own the right to live a happy life and do not owe ANYONE a life debt. Because I am a noble soul whose value does not and never has depended on anyone.

To the young Vlogger adoptive parents on YouTube who think five-year-olds and one-year-olds can give consent to have their coming home and gotcha day stories broadcasted to the public, get your heads checked. Personal family videos are not for YouTube. Stop trying to profit off of your child. Your child cannot give consent. It is a deeply emotional and personal experience for your adopted child and when they grow up to be an adult, I am sure they will not appreciate it being online for everyone to see. Some things are not for likes and followers and social media. You aren't the star of the show. Stop being disrespectful.

Unwanted

To PRI's the World, who in the Hell wrote this piece? Born Chinese, raised American, an adoptee explores her identity The very first paragraph says that the girl was "abandoned" which isn't strictly true because abandoned implies someone willingly left her without care and love, just out on her own, presumably to die. Not true! The One Child Policy gave parents no choice in the matter. They say before she was a "cherished" American daughter, she was an "abandoned" baby girl. Excuse me, but did you seriously just place a valuation of a BABY into your article? So this baby had no value in China because she was just abandoned and now that someone wants her she is "cherished" and thus valuable? 

OUR VALUE DOES NOT RELY ON OTHERS' ABILITY TO WANT US. OUR VALUE IS INNATE. 

The article then goes on to say that she was "landed" in an orphanage. Excuse me, is that the proper term for living under institutionalized care? We don't say that kids got "landed" into foster care. What is wrong with this person who places "catchy" opening lines over the human dignity of the adoptee?

And finally, our most wonderful quote: "China’s orphanages began to fill up with unwanted baby girls"

Unwanted. How wonderful! Unwanted. Unwanted. Unwanted. 

Is this woman aware of the pain and the loss of birthmothers and birthfamilies? Is this woman aware of the sheer number of families reaching out to reunite with their children now, in the age of DNA testing? Or did the adoptee have to be "unwanted" to fit the fairy tale story...well, no one wanted her, so thank God the American woman came along. It is so inappropriate for this author to speak for the thousands of Chinese birthmoms in telling us adoptees that we were "unwanted." Who is she to make such a harmful declaration? Because it adds to the drama of the story. Because adoptees and their feelings are the furthest thing from her mind when she writes a story about them.

And people wonder why adoptees feel terrible. 

And people wonder why adoptees feel sad. And people scratch their heads and wonder...why do adoptees feel like burdens? Feel unloved? Feel unwanted? 

Because we are steeped in hatred. Because society does not care about vulnerable adoptees. They callously fling words out to imply we are anything but valuable. They use words which belittle us.

Only with adoptees/orphans will you ever see an article casually evaluating how "wanted" we are. 

Only with adoptees/orphans will you see the words "abandoned" and "grateful" and "lucky" and "burden" littering the page.

Examples of Articles Using "Unwanted" to describe Chinese Adoptees (a running list for when I get pissed)

1. https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-37024334
2. Born Chinese, raised American, an adoptee explores her identity
3. https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/cnainsider/china-disabled-orphan-keyuan-singapore-adopted-alenah-9965340

Articles that state that Children were NOT UNWANTED

1. https://www.deseretnews.com/article/900053555/forced-abortions-sterilizations-and-abandoned-babies-sundance-film-shows-the-dark-side-of-chinas-one-child-policy.html
2. https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/connecting-chinese-adoptees-birth-families-couple-makes-discovery-about-china-n1172301