Problematic: The Orphan "Success" Story

The Tokyo Olympics are here and it must be a world record the number of international, transracial adoptees competing for America's Olympic teams.

However, I cannot help my utter disgust when I see headings like the one on this video by NBC:

A near-perfect dive completes an incredible journey from orphanage to Olympics | NBC Sports

In a nutshell: 

This young man went from worthless and lowly to decorated and valuable because of his ability to perform.

I am disgusted. This adoptee did NOT "turn his life around." He was an infant. He had no choice! And his ability to perform athletically has no bearing on his worth as a human being. He could be an average diver and he'd still be just as worthy. 

I find versions of this title everywhere:

From orphan to valedictorian!

From abandoned Chinese orphan to cherished American daughter!

No matter what you make of life, the greed and cruelty of the exploitative news media will not hesitate to drag you back down to your "lowly orphan beginnings" to get more clicks on stories and videos, and ultimately more ad revenue.

My life "journey" is not yours to commodify.

I am not for placed on this earth so that you can turn over a profit.

I am NOT an object. My life is not yours to exploit.

The comment section is rife with ignorance as always, because the title says it all: wow, his adoptive parents must have been gracious and charitable enough to give an unwanted orphan opportunities. 

This reiterates how adoptees should always be groveling for their right to life with endless gratitude and orphan tears. Never fully enough. Never fully human. Never worth as much as non-adopted people because we've been tainted by orphanhood. And thus, we need to be thankful for every scrap of kindness we have ever received because society will never let us forget: you were an orphan once and you are worth so much less than normal people.

It's an endless cycle of having to prove ourselves, to prove we are worthy of life, to prove we are just as good, to prove we are enough. A sensationalized headline like "from orphanage to the Olympics" clearly exemplifies that short of being perfect, orphans can never dig themselves out of being a worthless, unwanted orphan. Because clearly, all orphans must be worthless and unwanted.

The title of this video reveals the toxic soup of societal norms that we swim in. Adoptees have no voice. The news dominates the adoption narrative.

Even a comment said "Well what if an orphan saw this and was inspired that they can be so much more?"

Again-- so much more than... being worthless? Orphans aren't criminals, aren't bad people fallen from grace. From circumstances under which we had no control, we ended up in an orphanage. The onus is not on the adoptee to "turn their life around" to "be inspired to be greater than they are."

We adoptees owe this world nothing. We should not need to perform for the masses. We should not have to prostitute out our talents just to be seen as an "orphan success story."

Society has a responsibility to make adoptees feel welcomed and loved, and not shit on them every chance they get.

Thanks NBC, for shitting on us once again.