Why is the Chinese Adoptee Community Ridden with So Much Misinformation?
Myth: All birthfamilies did not want their babies.
Myth: Most, if not all, finding spots and orphanage files are reliable and true.
Myth: The One Child Policy was implemented everywhere fairly.
Myth: Orphanages and the local police will always try to help your adoptee search for their birthfamily.
Myth: You can only love either you adoptive family or your birthfamily.
Emotions. Power. Exploitation. Insecurity. Desperation. Fear. Love.
One of the greatest frustrations with knowing everything I now know about Chinese adoption (the lies, the fraud, the exploitation, the baby buying programs, the forgery, the corruption) is that many adoptees have not looked back closely enough to realize that the little fairytale story of the finding spot is likely untrue.
When Chinese adoptees are interviewed, they typically report what they truly believe: that the Chinese government and orphanages did not lie and that the documentation is all true. But this just extends the propaganda further, embedding them into the fabric of our Western understanding via the media. When Chinese adoptees made videos responding to the Myka and James Stauffer scandal, these other Chinese adoptee families made broad and unverified claims about babies being abandoned in China without acknowledging 1) it was a forced abandonment, not a willing abandonment because even with traditional gender preferences, the boom of international adoption from China was in the 1990's, therefore, traditional gender preference wasn't enough of a push to cause these mass "abandonments" before the one child policy and 2) many to a majority of our finding documentation is a LIE.
For various reasons, including the adoptee's own well-being, it may not be correct to pop their bubble or push them to question what lies they've been fed. We've known that trafficking occurred since 2005 (actually, it started earlier, in 1991). We've known some orphanages routinely forge documents since 2012 (and clearly earlier). And yet, here I am with my blog and big genesis in 2019, finally coming around to the idea that maybe my documentation is all a lie because it has all the red flags and hallmarks of a lie. Telling me any sooner that my life was a lie wouldn't have helped me to develop. I needed to come out of the fog myself.
Yet, despite Stuy's 2014 research paper in 2014, the Hunan scandal of 2005, and One Child Nation of 2019, there are still Chinese adoptees out there my age, adopted the same time as me who insist that their finding documents are true. And not out of a conscious decision to just pragmatically pick a story and stick with it, but because they never even questioned the validity of their story.
Even today, Humans of New York Facebook page featured a Chinese adoptee who showed how meaningful it was to her that her finding documentation revealed that she was "so-called abandoned" at the two week mark. It meant the world to her to know she was not abandoned right away...yet, it might not have been an abandonment at all. If human trafficking, baby-buying, baby-trading, or even if a relative gave the baby to the orphanage, documents were forged. Birthdays were even changed on purpose to prevent birthfamilies from getting into contact with their children. The date you were born, the date you were found, even your finders and your finding spots...lies, lies, LIES! In other words, she might have been given away much sooner or even much later than the two weeks imply. In other words, these two weeks are MEANINGLESS.
So yes, it upsets me when I see that even my Chinese American friends like that Humans of New York story, unable to see it for what it is: another victim of Chinese propaganda, another adoptee still in the fog, another adoptee clinging to lies, and one who is still SPREADING lies and keeping the FALSEHOOD alive. Also equally frustrating is the multitude of white people commenting on the post who know nothing about Chinese international adoption talking about the "loving sacrifice of the birthmother." Watch One Child Nation, the first half of it, then come back and tell me that to my face.
Images run through my head of ten village officials chasing pregnant women down, tying her up like a hog, holding her down, as the doctor injects the saline solution to forcibly abort her 8-month old fetus. Images of village leaders demolishing homes of the birthfamily and of the extended family because the birthmother will not give her child up, only for the police to surround the house, storm in, and grab the baby from the cradle. Images of women in poverty, nursing their newborn as a trafficker approaches the house, promising that there is a nice place up the hill that will provide good food and healthcare and education for the child...only for the trafficker to turn around and sell the baby for hundreds of dollars. Images of birthmothers and birthfathers waiting in the wee hours of the morning, waiting for someone to collect their baby in the box or basket, with clothes and powdered milk and a note, waiting, until a nice person walks by, perhaps a deliveryman or a motorcycle taxi person, and takes the baby to the orphanage where they receive a monetary reward. All gifts and notes left by the birthparents are thrown out: the international community cannot know that birthfamilies still want their children. Images of the orphanage directors playing buddy-buddy with the police, giving the police money to forge our finding documents as the orphanages make half a million dollars in orphanage donations from international adoptions. Images of women being dragged to the operation room to be sterilized against their will.
Yeah, that country.
With the One Child Policy.
With the propaganda.
That country, that has the West in the palm of their hands: come adopt here, there's a humanitarian crisis, babies abandoned by the dozens, don't look too closely, don't think too much about it...
Of course, China definitely told you the truth. Why would they lie?
Of course, all babies were just...simply abandoned. Why would they lie?
Of course, the finding documents are all true. Why would they lie?
Of course, there are no hidden daughters. Why would they lie?
Of course, you were found in a finding spot. Why would they lie?
Of course, your birthmom made a CHOICE, a DECISION, a SACRIFICE. Why would they lie?
The One Child Policy was tantamount to a civil war. People die in war. It is one of the greatest human rights violations, yet goes unacknowledged. Even Chinese adoptees, for whom our birthmothers and birthfamilies suffered so much, do not even thank them. Instead, we Chinese adoptees blindly believe our official adoption papers and tell the news media earnestly, "Oh yes, my mother left me in a cardboard box, possibly to die." The injustice is so hard to fathom. The well is too deep. It's like saying the Holocaust never happened. It feels just as painful to me because it was so inhumane and so WRONG and yet no one seems to know about it. The Chinese government hid as much as they could from foreign families so that international adoption would not be hindered. They punished reporters who so much as breathed a word about it. It, being the corruption, the coercion, the confiscations, etc. And even now, with the privilege of living a life of freedom in America or the UK or Australia or Canada...how do we thank our birthmothers? We spit on our birthmother's image as we confidently tell the world, "Yes, I was abandoned."
Instead of, "My birthmother had no choice...I don't really know what happened."
If you want to learn more about the different possibilities or red flags in finding documentation, click here.
If you want a step-by-step guide for how to learn the truth, click here
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