Swan Song

"Despite your years on this cragged sphere, your many books penned, your many battles fought, and your countless death threats received, your feminism is now a draughty hump of nothing and the best you can do to remain of use is to quietly avoid impeding upon the current agenda.”  “Old Women, Shut the Fuck Up!” 

I believe I've passed the age of consciousness and righteous rage,
I've found that just surviving was a noble fight
I once believed in causes too, had my pointless point of view
Life went on no matter who was wrong or right. 
Angry Young Man, Billy Joel

I have spent all of my adult life, since the 1970’s when I was in my late twenties/early thirties until now, in my seventies - researching, writing, speaking, marching, advocating to reform adoption. I devoted my life to exposing and denouncing abuses, exploitation, coercion, and profiteering in the redistribution of babies and children, and advocating to end antiquated laws that deny adopted citizens equal access to their own original birth certificates.

In all that time the biggest changes I have witnessed in adoption are:

·      Fewer American mothers being pressured to relinquish, while corrupt practices abound deceiving and exploiting indigent mothers in other parts of the word or out and out kidnapping their babies at gunpoint or through trickery. While the vast majority of American adoption reformers will use the phrase “child trafficking for adoption” few, if any, DO or even write anything about issues beyond the borders of the USA (or even beyond the borders of their own state).

·      The method of pressuring mothers domestically changed from shame to promises of openness and the new big lie is that expectant mothers are in “control” cause they get to “pick” their child’s new parents! They are lied to, conned, scammed and duped into believing their adoption would be “open” with no explanation of what exactly that meant and no legal protection to enforce such agreements.

·      Fathers have joined the ranks of the deceived and disenfranchised thanks to Putative Father Registries and little is being done to change laws that so wantonly disregard constitutionally protected parental rights.

·      Despicable practices like pre-birth matching abound, and even pre-birth CONSENTS to adoption in some states!

·      Child protective services continue to overstep and not just remove children from suspected harm, but have them adopted out to strangers even when there are grandparents or other family members willing, able, eager and begging to care for their kin. Families being destroyed instead of assisted through a rough patch.

The bottom line is that the demand for babies has not changed – in fact it has increased.

Adoptees and birth parents always have and continue to “get involved” for help with their own personal search and maybe some advise on reunion, especially if they were found.

Some stick around providing much needed shoulders to cry. Much needed, but in itself changes nothing. Others become search angels. Another much needed and appreciated service provided freely. (I too did my share of searches, facilitating hundreds of reunions all throughout the eighties, risking prison to do so without the aid of public online records).

Then there are those who stick around to tsk tsk and write scathing blog posts or share memes on Facebook about the horrors of adoption trauma, and agree with one another that “Adoption sucks!”

Another group of individuals who I highly respect are those who get involved in state legislation in their state. I greatly admire their tenacity, devotion, knowledge and ability it takes to get a bill introduced, through committees, revised and signed into law. In NJ it took 35 years of dedicated hard work. I have nothing but the highest regard and respect for those who work tirelessly, giving up their own personal time. 

But at the same time, I am disheartened by the lack of unity between the states and of course, the slow progress and the number of states who have compromised on true equality with restrictions.

And then there are outliers, the ones who take off with with grandiose ideas like petitions to the President. Ideas that MIGHT have a chance if they were started from a base of a strong national org that we do not have.

We each do what we can. Together I think we could do a lot more, but that has never seemed to happen.

The tears, the support, feeding the vitriolic anger or facilitating and celebrating search and reunion are all necessary. But alone they are ambulances at the bottom of the cliff, picking up the wounded and commiserating while a never-ending pack of of lemmings jump or are pushed.

We have never in all my years neck deep in this movement – even TRIED to do any collective fund-raising to form a cohesive national organization to support state legislation, educate the public and lawmakers, and prevent future adoption loss. Nor has there been any effort to TRY to raise money for a lawyer to sue any state for falsifying our VITAL records!

The AAC leadership is in trouble – AGAIN – and even at its best it is a self-serving pro-adoption organization that does nothing but USES (exploits?) adoptees and birthparents to speak – without compensation of even registration fees – at their conferences which bring in money from aps. Come! Cry and be angry. Share your stories of grief and shame and loss and hardship and we will charge attendees to listen. We will DO nothing to change the pain from happening in the future, cause then we would cease to exist, not unlike adoption agencies!

As opposed to American “bastards” who believe adoption is A-OK as long as they get their records at the age of majority, foreign born adoptees, in largest numbers from Korea, have formed a very strong adoptee community that is actually doing family preservation work.

In Australia, too, family preservation is a major focus. Yet here in the USA the very term “family preservation” is negatively labeled “anti-adoption” as if being against tearing families apart unnecessarily to meet a demand for their children is a bad thing.  The only real adoption reform “work” being done here is the state by state efforts to reclaim birth certificates.

In the end little has changed in all my years. Seven states according to BN have unrestricted access. AAC lists eight because they include Colorado which became an access state in 2014, which BN does not (not sure why not). Two of these access states – Alaska and Kansas - never sealed adoption records, so really the adoption reform movement achieved unrestricted access in five states in my lifetime - about 70 years since Jean Paton started the movement in the 1940s. Another 11 states have partial or restricted access. Not equality.  And all the rest are exactly where they were all those many decades ago.

I cannot help find it depressing.

Even if we were seeing more accelerated progress in terms of access – which we are NOT - so what?  NO ONE has ever challenged the fact that adoptee birth certificates continue to be FALSIFIED! And little more than lip service is given to the continuation of child trafficking for adoption.

The public remains convinced that adoption is a good thing that rescues orphans and continues to promote and encourage it despite evidence to the contrary. Obtaining kids by ANY means – adoption, surrogacy, purchased anonymous eggs and sperm are all considered “choices” or even rights with no regard for rights the children being produced or purchased.

The demand is not about to go away. Not in my lifetime because same sex couples have have now joined hetero infertiles vying for their “right” to buy or create a child of unknown heritage, or with some of their own genetic material.

Th future seems to be on of children with little or no biological connection to immediate, much less extended, family or the human race. Yet, ironically, money will continue to be made by providing DNA testing for those who want to find their biological progenitors. Back to square one.  The self-indulgent who find their OWN kin and do nothing to stop the proliferation of others being separated or created and denied their truth.

I’m DONE!  Burnt out. Finished. Done everything I can. Written every word I can write. It’s changed precious little. I cannot keep spinning my wheels watching more families destroyed to “build” new ones; children treated as objects to be bought and sold or created from purchased genetics and rented body parts.

The Bigger Picture

It's not just adoption. 

I see so many of the social justice causes I have put my life – my heart, soul and so much time and effort into - getting worse not better and I feel my candle burning out in despair. 

For Goodness sake there are still segregated schools! A Mississippi school district is still fight integration. IT'S 2016!!!  Something as simple as being able to breastfeed in public, that I protested 40 years, is STILL an issue!

I’m too tired to go on beating my tired, worn out drum. I feel the toll physically of carrying around the angry passion that drove my life’s works – be it small, local issues or the insurmountable world terrorism and climate change ones. 

I struggle now with how to “let go” and wonder who am I if I am no longer the hippie, rebel fighter of injustice and the voice for the poor, the marginalized and stigmatized, the mothers and babies in crisis.

I thought what I was experiencing was burn-out but I see it now as more like mellowing and fading out. We are often cautioned to pick our battles.  I now find it more productive for myself and my body and soul to put into deeper practice the wisdom of knowing that the only thing I can change is myself and accepting all rest that I cannot change.  I gave it my all and I know that I changed many lives, reuniting families and supporting mothers in crisis.

I am not dropping out, or losing my ideals … just stepping down and accepting gracefully and graciously that I am not indispensable in any of my areas of service.  I step aside and make room for the next generation, while still here to add my two cents. But, who I if I am no longer an activist being passionate about the injustices of the world?

My life is in transition and transitions are seldom easy.  I don’t know what lies ahead for me. Time will tell. I feel no urgency – no burning need to do anything right now. The wind is out of my sails and I am adrift. A rebel without a cause... Just relaxing and enjoying this next level of retirement. 

I don’t know what will fill the void in my life. Like a person retiring from a lifelong career or a mother facing an empty nest, I don’t know what the future holds. Who am I if not a lifelong adoption activist?  Yet to be determined. All I know is I am no longer – CAN no longer be - that.  I can no longer beat my head against the wall.  I am not any more indispensable than any other. Neither I nor my input will likely be missed. 

The Demonization of Mothers

Women's Inhumanity to Women

Traditionally, it was social workers - the vast majority of whom are female - saw it as their job to encourage mothers to relinquish. They told mothers it was the loving thing to do. they did this because they JUDGED the expectant mother in need as a "slut" and unfit based on her age, marital status and financial situation. 

Most adoptions today pit women of means against women who are indigent or in crisis. Adopters have all the power because they have all the money. They have attorneys, the expectant mother may think she has an attorney but if it that lawyer is being paid for by the ap, that is conflict of interest and her interests are not being represented.

Now...in addition to all of this, we have anonymous trolls attacking and demonizing mothers.

UPDATE: Pound Puppy Legacy removed the offensive posts on its site that attacked a mother.

When we started the Demons of Adoption Awards, 9 years ago, the goal was to shame those affiliated with the adoption industry, who don't put a child's best interest as a top priority. 

Over the years, we have maintained this rule. None of the Demon of Adoption Awards was ever granted to a private citizen who happened to be involved in adoption. 

So far, this year, many of the nominations we have received have included personal/vicious attacks made against adoptive parents or birth parents. In fact, so many have been added to this page, we have decided to clean up the nominations, and remove all posts that focus on individual private citizens, with vitriol. 

We want all readers and posters to remember, when making a nomination, PPL requests a short fact-based explanation as to why this candidate is so deserving of this award, without the use of personal attacks against individual birth/adoptive parents.

I am pleased that Pound Puppy Legacy refused to allow a witch hunt and public shaming of a mother to take place on their venue.

I have long admired PPL for its fierce attacks on the adoption industrial complex, baby brokers, coercive and corrupt adoption practices and practitioners as well as evil, abusive, murderous adopters! It is all of these who are generally the recipients of the PPL annual "Demons in Adoption" award.

This year, however, a mother who is battling for the return of her son has been nominated by one or more anonymous posters who accused her of "scamming." 

We in the adoption community should be helping and supporting one another and giving mothers the benefit of the doubt instead of acting CATTY women attacking a woman. Call Nancy Grace!

No is No

If adoption is a loving, selfless, brave CHOICE...a "plan" made by an expectant mother....than why are women forced to go through with adoption when they have decided not to??

You don't have to LIKE the mother nor do you have to agree with her lifestyle or every choice she made. Life is messy. Few of us are the PURE "faultless" virgins who got pregnant via rape or the very first time we had sex. Few of us are teenager forced into relinquishment by our parents. I do not fit that mold. I am NOT perfect or without flaws and imperfections in my messy life. And unless you are, you ought to think twice before casting stones. 

What else matters in regards to any mother - or father - fighting to reverse an adoption? Her morals? How many men she slept with? At what point in time she "changed her mind" about the adoption??

Think about date rape. Does the victim's previous sexual experience matter? Does the fact that she "got herself' into the situation matter; that fact that she kissed him or more?  No! What matters is that she said NO! 

Anything else is a character assassination and he who is without fault should partake in that. I don't throw stones at others' bad decisions because every mother who lost a child to adoption made bad decisions. I know I did! Are all mothers equal? No. Neither are are all saints. 

Who is the demon in this adoption???  Gentle Care.

The Legacy of In-Fighting in the Internet Age

I've written much about in-fighting in the adoption reform movement. It's not unique to adoptionland. In-fighting exists in all grassroots movements, in entertainment, sports, in academia, and in the business world.  

Often, people on the same team with the same goals disagree about how to achieve those goals. The more passionate the issues, the more likely there will be differences of opinions.  And our issues are often very personal and emotionally charged. Disagreements are a part of life and likely there'd be little progress without a heated debate, now and then, as to how accomplish a desired outcome. Compromise is not easy when strong feelings are involved.

In the case of adoption we have people coming at the issues from different perspectives and with vastly different levels of education (both formal and knowledge of adoption issues and history), varying levels of awareness and insight, varying levels of tact, and varying levels of  hurt and healing. 

Obviously there are going to be disputes. We cannot expect everything to just go along rosy. The issue is, how we deal with these disagreements, especially in the Internet age.

We all know that once a naked picture or sex tape gets on the Internet or the cloud it is there to stay. Permanent. (Irrevocable, like a relinquishment of parental rights!)  No do-overs. And no apology can ever erase it. 

Case in point: I googled "B J Lifton" adoptee, distinguished author, lecturer, and highly regarded figure in the history of adoption reform and this is, sadly, what came up. 

First two "hits" on the first page:

This is a huge embarrassment! For one thing, the whole rift was RESOLVED, but of course that, like retractions in newspapers is buried or non-existent.

Secondly, that it happened in the first place is ridiculous. Trifling!

It was wrong and that is why the conference organizers reascended their banishment of BJ from the conference. 

I posted about it as well because it so WRONG and i cna tell you that controversy "sells." My blog posy about this incident got more comments than ANY ever!! And BNs nearly crashed the stratosphere. 

We WILL disagree. Connecticut, which is getting ready to introduce a bill closing up the gap of the years not covered in the first bill that granted adoptee access, will prove once and for all that laws can and WILL be passed incrementally!  Hopefully (though I must admit doubtfully) it will end the name-calling and ruckus made by a small vocal (though not well known or recognized) group of adoptees who put more effort into dissing the hard work of others than trying to get any meaningful legislation passed. Hopefully, it will end their (fear-based) claim that "imperfect" or "unclean" access laws will never be changed. 

Of course the argument ignores the fact all access laws change the existing status quo of laws created to close records that were originally unsealed...and ignores prohibition that came and went. Laws come and go and are changed and amended all the time. It was never an argument that made any sense but it was - and is - the argument against "accepting compromises" - as if any of us want to! (And if those who complained the loudest actually did any work on legislation, they'd know that compromise is the name of the game and you try for as little as possible but have to give in order to get anything!)  

But I digress.

My point here is, and the lesson I hope we can all take from this is that when we disagree let's try to do it in PRIVATE message exchanges and not blast the Internet with our dirty laundry that will remain long after the issue has been resolved.  

Before pressing "POST" remember that you are not just hurting the individual or group you disagree with, but you are hurting the movement and our progress.  And try to disagree with dignity and respect. 

As another example, if you google my name, or my name +adoption you will find thousands of "hits."  One adoptive mother who got her panties in a crunch because I called her on the FACT that she adopted from the same convicted baby broker -  Lauryn Galindo  - used by Angelina Jolie. The ap in question apparently has the money and the inclination to keep her scathing reply to me among the first page of google results! So there it is. The world can see that when you are a mover and shaker and make waves, you upset people! Well shucks.  I ain't a "well-behaved" woman, I'm an activist! 

While we want to be outspoken and HEARD in our activism and NOT silenced, respect among and between us is always a good thing. 

Think long and hard before posting what you want YOUR legacy to be as well as the legacy of others of us. BJ did not deserve to be treated this way and surely does not deserve to be remembered for one of the ugliest scars on the entire history of adoption reform!  It was all much ado about nothing but has left it's mark for time immemorial.

And respect also goes to the heart of the BJ incident - respect for the language we use. None of us want to use language that would hurt another of us, but we also need to be left to use the language we ourselves are perfectly comfortable with,knowing full well the arguments against its use. I see it as exactly the same issue as Black vs African American. To each his own! And even those old-timers who cling to using negro, as the NAACP retains its original name. 

All oppressed groups of people demand and deserve to SELF-IDENTIFY, that often is very individual. 

These are blots on our history and hopefully though they remain have receded from the foreground and allowed us to focus our limited time and precious energy on the far more important issues of equal access, ending corruption, profiteering, coercion, exploitation and commodification. 

HUFFINGTON POST

TO ALL MY FRIEND,S FANS AND FOLLOWERS....

PLEASE FOLLOW ME AT http://HuffingtonPost.com/Mirah-Riben

I will likely still come here to VENT in ways that would be inappropriate for a more formal and more public venue....

But PLEASE do follow my Huff Posts because they are IMPORTANT issues that will benefit greatly from LIKES, SHARES and comments.

Private Adoption: White Knights or Flesh Peddlers

In the late 1980s Geraldo Rivera had a talk show. It was shortly after the world was rocked by the Joel Steinberg trial for the death of his adopted daughter Lisa. See all four short segments of the show to see Aaaron Britvan and Bill Pierece square off on private adoption. 

Part I of the four-part video of the program introduces the audience to Rebekah Dulik, a minor who was lured out-of-state and coached no to tell her parents where she was or that she was pregnant and having her child adopted.  

Judi Cochran of Children's Right of PA addresses Rebekah's situation. 

In Part II Adopters, Lisa and Earl who obtained a child by placing over 100 ads in newspapers. A home study was done a week after they took the baby home from the hospital.

Aaron Britvan, notorious adoption attorney and Bill Pierce, NCFA, who speaks out AGAINST private adoption. Britvan claims the Joel Steinberg case was not an adoption. Pierce and Cochran both set him straight.

Part III Aaron Britvan talks about baby brokers and slipshod adoption attorneys.

Britvan and Bill Pierce of NCFA debate whether Joel Steinberg adopted or abducted Lisa.

I speak out on behalf of the rights of the child in adoption, against private advertising, and for more regulations.

Part IV Aaron Britvan, Judi Cochran and Bill Pierce of NCFA discuss the usage of advertising for babies. Bill Pierece defends Edna Gladney agency. Pierce also compares ads for babies for sale to ads for escort services that are ads prostitution. 

How I Came to Meet Joan Rivers

As the nation mourned of the death of the beloved comic icon, I recalled my meeting with Joan Rivers when I was guest on her short-lived a daytime talk show, in March 1990.

But the story of how that came about began in 1987 with a horrific tragedy that garnered headlines of a “house of horrors” and a six year old girl called Lisa, who died after years of abuse.

In the dimly lit, filthy Greenwhich Village home of attorney Joel Steinberg and Hedda Nussbaum where Lisa had endured unspeakable abuses, police discovered a toddler boy tethered to a table leg in soiled diapers with a bottle of rancid milk. He, like Lisa, had been illegally adopted by the couple. Hedda, who once wrote children's books, was badly abused, and drug addicted. She was given immunity to testify against Joel who was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to 8-1⁄3 to 25 years in prison.  He was denied parole twice and released after serving his time.

The media focused on how Lisa’s abuse had occurred for six years and no one, even in Lisa's school, had known or reported it. It was portrayed as an anomaly in terms of adoption that "slipped through the cracks."

I was writing articles, speaking at local and national conferences, and appearing on talk shows such as Geraldo, and the Morton Downey Jr. Show, twice addressing the need to unseal adoption records. Lisa’s death sent shock waves through the adoption community.

Adoptees of all ages identified with the two victims while mothers who had been persuaded to relinquish children for adoption in the hope they would be provided a better life, worried about the safety and well-being of their children. Could such a tragic end befall their children? How could this have happened?

These two adoptions were labeled “illegal” because Steinberg had failed to file final adoptions papers. Other than that, there was really not much difference between these adoptions and any other privately arranged, independent adoption. It was not then, and is still today, not uncommon or illegal for doctors and attorneys to arrange the transfer of custody of infants without an adoption agency involved in the process.  

In order to bring light to the loopholes in the adoption process, I organized a candle light vigil from Lisa's home to her Greenwich Village elementary a school. The march was televised and garnered news coverage we hoped would help prevent other such tragedies.

At the same time, I worked with the attorney general's office to identify and locate the mother of the toddler boy called Mitchell. I discovered that his mother was a teenager named Nicole Smigel who had kept her pregnancy a secret from her mother who had just hours to deal with finding out about the pregnancy and a baby being born.  The doctor who delivered the child said he had a friend (Joel Steinberg) who would adopt the baby. Nicole's mother, Grace Ann Smigel made all the arrangements.

I contacted Grace Ann and she was initially extremely vested in maintaining the secret. She had done everything so quickly. She never told her husband, Nicole's father or Nicole's grandmother. Nor did the baby father's know anything about his son or the decision to have him adopted. Grace Ann couldn't bear to break it to them that the baby in the headlines was THEIRS! She wanted to keep it all buried and just allow the child to be re-adopted by another family.

I called Grace Ann over a period of weeks.  Every time we spoke I impressed upon her that she and her grandson were given a second chance and that the only way she could be assured of his safety and well-being was to reclaim him. Finally, she and Nicole told the family the truth and reclaimed Nicole's son who she named him Travis.

My 1988 book, “shedding light on…The Dark Side of Adoption” was published with a dedication to Lisa.

And so, Joan Rivers, looking for hot trendy news issues for The Joan Rivers Show invited Grace Ann to describe how her grandson wound up in the midst of this front page horror story. Joan also wanted an "expert" to address adoption laws and explain how this was allowed to occur, and Grace Anne wanted me to be there with her.  And so the two of us were guests on the show along with Joyce Johnson author of “What Lisa Knew.” 

Also appearing on that same Joan Rivers Show was Joan’s friend Howard Stern who recently spoke at her funeral and Angela Bowie, former wife of David Bowie who had just written a tell-all that included how she caught her husband in bed with Mick Jagger!   (I remember being concerned for her young daughter was there with her, backstage, as she revealed this.)

My sister attended the taping with me as did some colleagues.  The Joan we met was professional and obviously wanting to be seen as more serious than her usual comedic persona by conducting an interview about a hot, but unpleasant topic as child abuse, as part of a series she was doing on secret-keeping.

When Joan interviewed Grace Ann, she was initially incredulous that her 17-year-old daughter had successfully hidden a pregnancy for more than nine months, especially from her own mother. Nicole had worn loose clothing and pooh-poohed questions about her modest weight gain. Joan, whose own daughter Melissa was not more than a teenager at the time, appeared sincere in her empathy with Grace Ann’s dilemma in trying to protect everyone.

Apparently, the public preferred Joan as a jokester, however, and the show was soon cancelled. Grace Ann and Nicole kept in touch with me, sending holiday cards and photos of Travis, and updated me until he got into college. My second book, THE STORK MARKET: America's Multi-Billion Dollar Unregulated Adoption Industry (2008) tells the story with photos.

WCBS-TC News coverage of the candlelight vigil for Lisa