Is TV Making You Feel Gleefull?

SPOLIER ALERT: Do not read this if you TIVO'd Glee and haven't watched the reunion episode yet.

The TV version of "High School: the musical" has two adoption plots.

In plot one a student is pregnant and considering adoption and has lied about who the father is.  There was some very convoluted stuff about a teacher's wife who was going to help her keep the pregnancy a secret and pretend to be pregnant herself and then take the baby...but that fell through. So, we wait to se if she goes trough with the adoption...

At the same time. the star character, Rachel, adopted by two Dads is reunited with her mother. The two are DEAD RINGER look-alikes and are both totally intro singing and performing.

They meet, the mother makes the daughter a costume for an upcoming performance, and they sing a duet. The mother -- who never had any other children -- decides she really wanted her baby back and cannot handle a grown up teenager and abruptly 'dumps' her!

I am hoping it is not yet totally over and she will have a change of heart. It was far too unrealistic for me.

One blog comment addresed watching it with her adopted daughter who felt vicariously the sting of that rejection!  How sad.

I have yet to see a movie or TV show deal with adoption that did not appear to have been written by or consulted with adoptive parents and keep the show "safe" and inoffensive for that audience population, wither  by killing them of totally (figuratively or literally, as in Mother and Child) or by ending with the sappy "Now I know who my 'real' parents are."

Before changing the channel from the subject of television viewing, I want to share a piece of a Dr Phil episode i caught by accident recent;ly.  It may have bene a repeat. the young expectant mom wanted Dr phil to make her decsion for her whether to keep her baby or place him for adoption.  Dr. Phil of course ays that the decision is hers and he will hep her by showing her ALL the options.

He then proceeds to tear apart her entire family as dysfunctional and asks if they would be a family she would choose to place her baby with.  Then he has two young women speak to her.

The first is a mother who shares how proud she is of the loving sacrifice she made to place her baby and make a couple happy!

The second tells of the drudgery of being a teen mom!

Where was the voice of the mother who placed her bby for adoption with a promise of openness that was a lie and she is not distraught and will never heal?

Where were voices of adoptees who have to live with a lifetime of feeling rejected and abandoned because of their mother's "loving choices"?

So much for impartiality! So much for Dr. Phil!  I was left wondering if he gets a commission from some adoption agency.