Is Family Preservation a Euphemism for Anti-Adoption?
By Mirah Riben
"Open adoption and open
records are important byways. But they are not the most compelling route.
Family preservation is." Dr. Randolph Severson, The Soul of Family
Preservation, 1996
What is
family preservation?
Family
Preservation is a recognized part of social service practice and is defined by Child Welfare Information Gateway here: https://www.childwelfare.gov/topics/supporting/preservation/?hasBeenRedirected=1
A
similar, albeit more long-term definition is provided by the National Family Preservation Network: “to keep
families together and prevent unnecessary out-of-home placement of children.” http://www.nfpn.org/about-nfpn
Support
of family preservation can be traced back to the negative reaction to the
'orphan train movement.' The term dates back to the 1890s, and in the
1909 White House Conference on Children it was the top ranked issue. For more, see Wikipdia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Family_preservation Many
states offer family preservation programs that can be found by googling the
term.
These
views and positions are no more radical or idealistic than those of The United
Nations, UNICEF, The UN CRC, The Hague Convention on International Adoption,
and Save the Children - all of which call for family preservation first, then
kinship care and stranger adoption as a last resort - with international
adoption the very last resource after no domestic adoption can be found. They
also call for protection of original identity.
Are
Family Preservationists Anti-adoption?
Being
opposed to adoptions that are corrupt, that traffic children, that involve
exploitation or coercion is not being anti-adoption. It’s being anti- those
kinds of adoptions. Being opposed to unnecessary relinquishments and
recognizing that even when necessary, and even in the most loving adoption -
there is a tragic separation, loss and pain at the root is not being
anti-adoption.
Labelling
Family Preservationists “anti-adoption” is pejorative and dismissive just as
pro-choice advocates are opposed to being labeled anti-life or pro-abortion. To
be labelled anti-adoption suggests a false and absurd extremism that one
supports any and every mother keeping a child - no matter how dangerous that
might be for the child....a position not held by even the most extreme
anti-adoptionists.
Does
Family Preservation mean that every natural mother should keep her baby?
No. No mother
should be forced or coerced to parent any more than she should coerced or
subtly pressured not to parent her own child. Mothers - after giving
birth and seeing and hold their babies - deserve impartial option counseling
that honestly tells them all the risks to them and their child of separation
and the resources to be able to make an informed choice.
Some
women who give birth are unable to provide safe care and some simply do not
want to.
Mothers
in crisis, however, deserve all the resources they need to keep their families
intact because it is in every child's best interest – and preference - to be
blood related to the family that raises them and most people would not simply
trade off all kin connectedness for better or more material advantages.
How do we care for children when parents cannot?
Adoption, as it currently practiced, beginning with a
falsified birth certificate that eradicates a child’s past, his origins, his
heritage and replacing it with a lie – is not the only option to care for
children in need.
Putting
the needs of the child first, before those vying for a child, the first option
is to seek extended family who might be able and willing to provide safe care.
If that
option is tried and exhausted and stranger care is the next step, Permanent
Legal Guardianship PLG can provide all a child in need requires with none of
the lies of adoption.
Permanent
legal guardianship (PLG) is the way adoption was always practiced up until the
1930's when adoptions began to become secretive and records sealed and
falsified to protect the baby brokers like Georgia Tann and their paid
clientele.
PLG
gives caretakers all legal rights for their child's education and medical
needs. The need to change a child's name is not necessary to provide care for a
child, and never was prior to 1930's. Children are often raised by aunts or
grandparents - or in step families - or by married parents with different
surnames. With such a high rate of divorce today, there is no stigma to it.
Physical and legal custody resides with the guardian and cannot be changed
except by a judge and under highly unusual circumstances such as the death of
the guardian or the abuse or abandonment of the child by the guardian. In that
case, PLG would leave the door open for the original parent to step in, if able
to - something not possible under current adoption laws that permanently
relinquish all rights of the original parent. In PLG they would be forever in
the background as a non-custodial parent in a divorce who generally have
liberal visitation rights.
Prospective
"adopters" who find this not in their liking do not have to, as there
are hundreds of parents vying for each child in need.
Alternative
child care is about what is about finding homes and families for orphans and
children in need of safe care - it is not the last step in reproductive
"rights." Children need and deserve caretakers who want what is in
their best interest not to have them as possessions or replacements or pretense
for a biological child.
Wouldn’t
making adoption ethical resolve all issues and allow it to proceed safely
rather than abolishing it?
The word ethical is totally subjective. Unless we
establish clear - enforceable - ethical guidelines, it means nothing more than
"nice." Even the most unscrupulous baby brokers - such as Seymour
Kurtz and Dr. Michael Bergman who procured two babies for the
notorious Joel Steinberg – each received a slap on the wrist.
What is
ethical about domestic adoption agencies taking women out of state, enmeshing
them with prospective adopters and making them feel indebted emotionally as
well as financially for expenses paid for the room, board and medical costs?
What is ethical about predatory practices such as prospective adopters in the
delivery room denying the mother any bonding tome at all? What is ethical about
providing one attorney to represent both parties - something that would never
be done in real estate transaction but is done in very child adoption.
What is
ethical about US adoption agencies accepting children who have been trafficked
kidnapped, stolen and papers forged?
What is
ethical about placing children with pedophiles and others who abuse or kill
them, simple because they can afford to pay the brokers' fees?
What is
ethical about exporting US children out of the country while we import kids by
the thousands?
What is
ethical about falsifying birth records?
There
is no way to hold private businesses to ethical standards that cut into their
bottom line in a country that glorifies and encourages free enterprise and
capitalism...and encourages adoption with tax and other benefits yet has NO
family preservation programs or budget whatsoever. Who will establish and
enforce regulations?
Mirah Riben
