Hair New Era

It's November and National Adoption Month, when adoption gets more attention in the media and adoption agencies around the country increase their advertising (and partly why I haven't posted as much this month--everybody else is doing my work right now!)

Take a commercial from the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption from their "I'm Just a Kid" campaign. It's true that you don't hear much from DT about the problems of foster care or the complications of, for example, cross-racial or cross-cultural adoption, but there's one thing you've got to hand it to them for: they keep their ads focused on the kids. Because THAT is what adoption should be about. (No "here's how you can complete your family while rescuing someone" bent.) You don't see a lot of adoptive parents or huge smiling families in their commercials. This one shows all different kinds of kids at all ages and mostly Black who are waiting for homes. An accurate portrayal, from what I know.

Some adoption people out there are gonna hate on me for being so kind to the Dave Thomas Foundation, but I think it's valuable to take a moment and recognize the good of what's happening out there too.

He was unarmed, walking from his house to his grandmother's down the street, when the officers in plainclothes attacked him. Later the police claimed they had thought he might be armed and on drugs. He was neither.

It seems his only crime was being Black and outside at night.

This case has garnered much local and national press, because Jordan Miles happens to be a straight-laced honors student at one of Pittsburgh's most prestigious arts academies. There are no ambiguities here: police were the criminals that night.

The city has largely ignored the issue. The policemen involved are on a temporary suspension during which they are being paid more than they make on duty. (Nice punishment, huh?) The Feds have stepped in, but still nothing has happened.

Sadly, this kind of thing isn't all that rare. Most people know this. As a recovering country bumpkin, I am still baffled when I hear of it, especially when it happens less than 5 miles from my house. So this weekend I attended a rally/march to demand justice for Jordan. And I've chosen "writing against injustice" as a central theme for the two writing classes I'm teaching this term. My students will read about the case (in a media packet I've put together--you may read/download below) and write about it.

These are but small things. Tiny steps to conquer an issue that seems too big. But together with others fighting for peace, may we scale the mountain.


May a better day come.
JordanMiles_MediaPacket

Check out PBS's Point of View series on adoption, part of a national public awareness campaign to examine issues facing adoptees and families who choose to adopt. The next one, In the Matter of Cha Jung Hee, will air Sept. 14. You can also watch them online. (See link to trailer below.)

Spread the word!

Also, they are featuring the film Off and Running, which I posted about here back in February.

Have you noticed the adoption themes cropping up in Glee? I've only caught a handful of episodes, but after watching the last two and observing the delicate and authentic way a complicated adoption story was portrayed, I am committed to catching up with the show.

The two most recent episodes featured Rachel's story as an adopted daughter of two gay men. Apparently the birth mother, Shelby, was a surrogate mother for the men (I wasn't sure if that meant one of the fathers was a bio father? Doesn't appear so.) Rachel's boyfriend asks her about her deepest dream, the one that keeps her awake at night.

"What's missing?" he asks.

"My mother," she says.

Rachel imagines her mother as a famous broadway star (how very typical!) Quickly she locates Shelby, who had secretly found her first. The two look eerily alike, and both are talented singers--and thus a few moments of musing on genetics and inheritability.



Quickly, though, the excitement dissipates. Both mother and daughter realize they had unrealistic expectations for reunion (though moreso the mother, I thought). Shelby realizes that Rachel doesn't need a mother, that it's too late for her to be there for Rachel in the way she wants to be, and then decides they should go their separate ways. She basically rejects Rachel again. Before they part, Rachel asks if they can sing a song together. They do, thus fulfilling Rachel's lifelong dream to sing with her mother.

I don't think Rachel's feelings of rejection were explored much. The adoptive fathers were not present--I'd like to have seen their reactions to Rachel's quest. The search process was truncated to fit among several other story lines in a 45-minute show. But overall I was impressed with the depth of issues that were explored in this adoption story, and that they were not oversimplified or sugar-coated to meet the typical mainstream POV.  Nice job, Glee.

Fellow adoption activist and transracial adoptee (+overall awesome woman) Lisa Marie Rollins was featured on a discussion about transracial adoption and "why it's controversial."
Don Lemon begins the show asking this question, in light of the sometimes non-positive reactions people are having to celebrity Sandra Bullock's recent adoption of a Black American child. He obviously finds those reactions surprising, thinks it's odd that people aren't simply praising Sandra for "saving" the Black child from a lifetime of foster care.

It's amazing to me the profound ignorance of so many people in the mainstream about these issues. It shows how much adoption is shown from only one side, that so often we fail to recognize the powerful forces behind why those kids are in foster care in the first place, and also fail to validate any feelings from an adoptee that are not "grateful."




In her blog post about the show, Lisa points out that CNN was confusing transracial adoption with two white parents with mixed-race bio kids with mixed parentage. Big difference. However, you can still see Ms. Walsh's exoticizing of her mixed kids, saying that they were a "welcome racial curiosity" in their white communities.

Overall, I'm proud of CNN for giving voice to a transracial adoptee--it happens so rarely! And I'm proud of Lisa for being so eloquent and saying what needed to be said!

A recent Saturday Night Live skit starring Kenan Thompson was called to my attention today. Prepare to be offended when you click here to view on Hulu.

Apparently mainstream media has become interested in the age-old Black hair debates. Newsweek recently attacked Angelina Jolie's daughter Zahara, basically saying that it's obvious Angelina has no idea how to care for ethnic hair and nor does she care. And in no simple terms said that little Zahara looks "unkempt." Fury arise! Oh boy. The blogosphere is blowing up in response.