Statement on Haiti
This statement reflects the position of an international community of adoptees of color who wish to pose a critical intervention in the discourse and actions affecting the child victims of the recent earthquake in Haiti. We are domestic and international adoptees with many years of research and both personal and professional experience in adoption studies and activism. We are a community of scholars, activists, professors, artists, lawyers, social workers and health care workers who speak with the knowledge that North Americans and Europeans are lining up to adopt the “orphaned children” of the Haitian earthquake, and who feel compelled to voice our opinion about what it means to be “saved” or “rescued” through adoption.
We understand that in a time of crisis there is a tendency to want to act quickly to support those considered the most vulnerable and directly affected, including children. However, we urge caution in determining how best to help. We have arrived at a time when the licenses of adoption agencies in various countries are being reviewed for the widespread practice of misrepresenting the social histories of children. There is evidence of the production of documents stating that a child is “available for adoption” based on a legal “paper” and not literal orphaning as seen in recent cases of intercountry adoption of children from Malawi, Guatemala, South Korea and China. We bear testimony to the ways in which the intercountry adoption industry has profited from and reinforced neo-liberal structural adjustment policies, aid dependency, population control policies, unsustainable development, corruption, and child trafficking.
For more than fifty years “orphaned children” have been shipped from areas of war, natural disasters, and poverty to supposedly better lives in Europe and North America. Our adoptions from Vietnam, South Korea, Guatemala and many other countries are no different from what is happening to the children of Haiti today. Like us, these “disaster orphans” will grow into adulthood and begin to grasp the magnitude of the abuse, fraud, negligence, suffering, and deprivation of human rights involved in their displacements.
We uphold that Haitian children have a right to a family and a history that is their own and that Haitians themselves have a right to determine what happens to their own children. We resist the racist, colonialist mentality that positions the Western nuclear family as superior to other conceptions of family, and we seek to challenge those who abuse the phrase “Every child deserves a family” to rethink how this phrase is used to justify the removal of children from Haiti for the fulfillment of their own needs and desires. Western and Northern desire for ownership of Haitian children directly contributes to the destruction of existing family and community structures in Haiti. This individualistic desire is supported by the historical and global anti-African sentiment which negates the validity of black mothers and fathers and condones the separation of black children from their families, cultures, and countries of origin.
As adoptees of color many of us have inherited a history of dubious adoptions. We are dismayed to hear that Haitian adoptions may be “fast-tracked” due to the massive destruction of buildings in Haiti that hold important records and documents. We oppose this plan and argue that the loss of records requires slowing down of the processes of adoption while important information is gathered and re-documented for these children. Removing children from Haiti without proper documentation and without proper reunification efforts is a violation of their basic human rights and leaves any family members who may be searching for them with no recourse. We insist on the absolute necessity of taking the time required to conduct a thorough search, and we support an expanded set of methods for creating these records, including recording oral histories.
We urge the international community to remember that the children in question have suffered the overwhelming trauma of the earthquake and separation from their loved ones. We have learned first-hand that adoption (domestic or intercountry) itself as a process forces children to negate their true feelings of grief, anger, pain or loss, and to assimilate to meet the desires and expectations of strangers. Immediate removal of traumatized children for adoption—including children whose adoptions were finalized prior to the quake— compounds their trauma, and denies their right to mourn and heal with the support of their community.
We affirm the spirit of Cultural Sovereignty, Sovereignty and Self-determination embodied as rights for all peoples to determine their own economic, social and cultural development included in the Convention on the Rights of the Child; the Charter of the United Nations; the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples; and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. The mobilization of European and North American courts, legislative bodies, and social work practices to implement forced removal through intercountry adoption is a direct challenge to cultural sovereignty. We support the legal and policy application of cultural rights such as rights to language, rights to ways of being/religion, collective existence, and a representation of Haiti’s histories and existence using Haiti’s own terms.
We offer this statement in solidarity with the people of Haiti and with all those who are seeking ways to intentionally support the long-term sustainability and self-determination of the Haitian people. As adoptees of color we bear a unique understanding of the trauma, and the sense of loss and abandonment that are part of the adoptee experience, and we demand that our voices be heard. All adoptions from Haiti must be stopped and all efforts to help children be refocused on giving aid to organizations working toward family reunification and caring for children in their own communities. We urge you to join us in supporting Haitian children’s rights to life, survival, and development within their own families and communities.
Signers:
United Adoptees International (UAI)
HALT (Helping Adoptees Lead Together)
AFAAD (Adopted and Fostered Adults of the African Diaspora)
Sahngnoksoo, Seattle, WA
So Yung Kim, Oakland, CA queer femme of color, writer, filmmaker, transracial abductee, Outlandish Remarks blog
Indigo Thuy Willing, Australia, Transnational and Transracial Adoptee of Colour
Lisa Marie Rollins, Oakland, CA. writer, author of A Birth Project, Founder of AFAAD
Mia Mingus, Atlanta, queer, disabled, Korean transracial and transnational adoptee
Leanne Leith, adoptee of color
Ida Davis, Korean adoptee
Danae Kovac, Chicago, adoptee of color, Korean adult adoptee
Kim Langrehr, Chicago, adoptee of color, Doctoral candidate at Loyola University of Chicago
Dave Room, Berkeley, adoptee of color, global citizen
EunHye Kim, Oakland, adoptee of color
Juli Martin, Oberlin OH, queer disabled Korean adoptee artademic and zinester
Kristin Pak, Adopted Korean American, unwilling immigrant adoptee
Erick Anderson, musician and composer, black american Adoptee, Minnesota, US
Tobias Hübinette, Ph.D. in Korean studies, researcher at the Multicultural Centre, Sweden
Amalia deloney, transracial/transnational adoptee activist, Dezplazada blog, Guatemala
Tammy Ko Robinson, artist researcher, South Korea
Kim Stoker, Duksung Women’s University, Seoul, Korea, South Korea adopted to U.S.
Mervyn Marcano, PR strategist, afrolatino, U.S.
Becky Belcore, Chicago, Adoptee of color, Korean adult adoptee, mother
Tammy Chu, filmmaker, Seoul, Korea, adopted to U.S.
Cori McMillan, adoptee of color, Korean adult adoptee
Brian Belcore, adult Korean adoptee
Bryan Thao Worra, author, Laotian American Adoptee
Tk Karakashian Tunchez, queerfemme adoptee activist, To tell you the Truth, Guatemala,
Amie Kim, queer korean adoptee, community organizer, musician, cultural worker
Diego Hayim, adoptee
Angarita Horowitz, adoptee
Connie Galambos Malloy, adoptee of color, AFAAD Board Member
Anders Riel Muller, Korean adoptee
Endorsers:
Jamaesori, Korean-Am progressive women’s drum group in SF Bay Area, adoptees and allies
Oori Sori, Korean American women percussion group, made up mostly of mothers.
National Korean American Service & Education Consortium (NAKASEC)
Korean Resource Center, Los Angeles
Korean Community Center of the East Bay, adoptees and allies
Nodutdol for Korean Community Development, adoptees and allies
Korean American Women In Need (Chicago, IL)
Korean American Resource & Cultural Center (Chicago, IL)
Working Hands Legal Clinic (Chicago, IL)
International School for Bottom up Organizing (ISBO)
Michele “Shelly” Vendiola, Co-founder Community Alliance & Peacemaking Project
Juliana Hu Pegues, PhD candidate, American Studies, U of MN, author activist, and mixed-race educator
Bao Phi, community organizer and spoken word poetYoungju Ji, mother of two (4 and 8 yrs old), working for women and children affected by domestic violenceMimi Kim, Oakland, Executive Director, Creative Interventions
Inhe Choi, immigrant from Korea, mother of 2
Curtis Muhammad, SNCC veteran, organizer
Miriam Ching Yoon Louie, Oakland writer
Angel Kyodo williams, Founder, Center for Transformative Change
Steph Eunha Lee
Richard Wright, Bay Area grad student, dj, activist
Christine Hong, Asst. Prof, Asian-Am & Critical Pacific Rim Studies, Literature Dept, UC Santa Cruz
Yuni Cho, Korean-Am, mother, teacher, Southern California
Cynthia Goldberg, adoptive mom of an international/transracial adoption 25 years ago
Christen Lee, Korean-Am attorney
Christopher Williams, Attorney and father
Kat Choi, Korean citizen
Emily G. Park, Oakland, Korean American
Debanu Dasgupta, San Francisco, Queer Theorist
Elakshi Kumar, PhD Student, Dept of Gender, Women and Sexuality Studies, U of MN
Claudine O’Leary, Youth Worker, Milwaukee
Trisha Park, Teacher Candidate, Stanford Teacher Education Program
Joyce Kwon, musician based in California
Louije Kim, ally and student
Stella Kang, UC Berkeley Graduate Studies
Dennise Moon, Psychology Student at the Wright Institute
Eddy Zheng, “The more I suffer, the stronger I become”
Thuy H. Nguyen
Jennifer Pae, Community Organizer/Advocate
La Peña, Austin, TX
Thank you for posting this. I wholeheartedly agree and I think people considering adoption would do well to listen to the voices of now-adult adoptees who can express their experiences and caution against the mistakes of the past. Sad to say it looks like those mistakes will continue to be repeated and adoptee voices will continue to be dismissed as irrelevant.
[...] Adoptees of Color Roundtable’s Statement on Haiti has come out, culminating in: All adoptions from Haiti must be stopped and all efforts to help [...]
I concur on all points. How can I be of assistance?
[...] The Adoptees of Color Roundtable’s [...]
A broad coalition of adoptee activists is the next step–and beyond that outreach to our communities of color. For example, I have returned to my native Lebanon; I know many who have returned to Korea and Guatamala, for example. How do we move forward with our work that speaks for any and all dispossessed peoples? The danger is to become too insular, which is what the dominant structures in an Anglo-Saxon society would want of us, and which was the reason for our abductions in the first place. I am willing to help in this regard in any way I can.
I totally agree with this as an adult adoptee of color stolen from my family for the purpose of adoption. If i can help in anyway please let me know.
Here is a link to my story http://www.missingindiankids.com/searching/vanessa/index.htm
On behalf of the board of the United Adoptees International (UAI) we would like to address that the above statement is shared by the UAI and that we share the same concerns which are published in this message.
It is time that Adoptees all over the world become active and participate in the international and national adoptiondebate at all levels of society and decision making government bodies and show that the time of Infantilization and the monopoly on adoption by adopters and their politics is over.
The adoption triangle starts with the (intersts of) parents, not the adopters. It seems that everyone in the adoption debate forgot that. Including the Hague Convention on Intercountry Adoption.
We can change the world. Not by sitting down and wait, but to feel the power flowing within in us and everyone who is capable to understand what is really going on.
United Adoptees International
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United Adoptees International is registered by the Chamber of Commerce under no. 34299425, in Amsterdam – The Netherlands. The UAI foundation is applicable under Dutch Law and refers in all her activities to the International Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC). Especially articles 8, 16, 20 and 21. The UAI strives for equality and justice for adoptees and human dignity to all whom are affected by separation and adoption.
Amie Kim’s writes with a compelling and passionate voice,and I hear the reason and justice of her statement. These same children 10 years from now will be echoing these same thoughts and questions in one phrase “who am I,who are my parents?”
I hope more people learn to listen to their children’s and your experiences more carefully for this. Thanks for posting.
YES!!!!!!!
How can American domestic adoptees (who are Caucasian) add our voice and support to what the roundtable has so powerfully stated?
There are many domestic adoptees who are placed in same-race families who experience difficulties because of loss of birth culture…..and the U.S. adoption industry as a whole has a deep history in questionable determinations of “legally free for adoption”. It is only LOGICAL that we must carefully monitor international adoptions where another government’s legal system is determining “availability for adoption” – especially in the face of natural disaster & pressure from agencies who profit from adoption.
The compassion and urge to help these children is not the issue – it is how you act on that urge that counts.
I concur as well with this roundtable on all point. These children need their families, their identity and their culture. I even know of children that were adopted away from their mother in Haiti to Colvile,Wa because she felt there was no other way to keep them safe. Why was a temporary safehaven solution not offered and or assistance to this woman to keep her family together? This is not helpful but abhorent.
I (and consequenty The Daily Bastardette) absolutely endorse your powerful statement.
[...] & Fostered Adults of the African Diaspora has added the Haiti Statement by Adoptees of Color Roundtable (see my previous post) to their site as well, adding two important bits at the top and bottom: [...]
This in an invaluable piece. I added it to the Adoption Mosaic’s blog
http://blog.adoptionmosaic.org/?p=601 piece on the topic and will share it elsewhere.
Catherine
I am so relieved to hear of this. So relieved to know that there are so many of you out there who know what I know and are actively making yourselves heard. Everything in the statement is everything that I believe and have experienced. Helping others to help themselves rather than creating a sense of helplessness is SO the way forward. I so, so agree with you all! Thank you so much for connecting with me. Let me know also how I can help being a transnational and transracial adoptee myself.
Thank you.
Aplause!!!!!!!!!!!! Hear, hear!!!
@Helena…
Thanks for the kudos, but I can only take a fraction of the credit. There were 8+ of us involved in the writing and editing of this statement, most of whom are much more articulate and knowledgeable about international issues than I am! ~Amie
Thank you for this very powerful statement.
We adoptees are all well aware of the First World cultural mindset that believes it to be in “the child’s best interests” to be stripped of his or her original name, identity, family, culture, religion, language and history in exchange for being provided with basic human necessities.
As long as the First World views this Faustian Bargain as a “good thing” or as fulfillment of God’s will (their god, not yours or mine), they will continue to be shocked and mystified by any opposition to their agenda.
Acts of benevolence by the color-blind privileged add yet another layer of violence to the personhood of vulnerable little people, compounding their losses. The redistribution of children of color is rooted in the marginalization of ethnic groups and the propensity to make fetish objects of their children. It is no charity to exploit a time of tragedy – or any time – to take a nation’s most valuable resource for personal gain.
It is a sad statement when those that capitalize on tragedy pat themselves on the back for their charity. The truly charitable would offer to help victims to help themselves. This feeding frenzy we are witnessing today by would-be child importers truly reveals the darkest aspects of man’s ability to rationalize the ugliest of acts.
It’s high time we respect the humanity of all peoples by preserving families and allowing them the dignity to build their own strong societies without the intervention of self-interested parties. THAT would be the action of an enlightened, advanced, civil society.
[...] Please feel free to add your endorsement in the comments section below this statement at the Adoptees of Color Roundtable Statement on Haiti [...]
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Mimi Poinsett, Yvette . Yvette said: More on Haiti adoptions-from the Adoptees of Color Roundtable: http://bit.ly/9MXBsD [...]
[...] Please feel free to add your endorsement in the comments section below this statement at the Adoptees of Color Roundtable Statement on Haiti [...]
This entry brought me to tears. I appreciate these words and I hope that other’s hear it for its truth and honesty.
I agree with this powerful statement. How can there be a mobilization of a Family Reunification “tent” be set up next to the medical tents?
Thanks for your comment on my website about Haitian Adoptions. I did not want to respond to one comment and several people (including you) took care of it for me.
I am a white mother with a husband of colour and baby boy of colour in a very open adoption. We have a relationship with 10 of his birthfamily members and understand how essential and enriching it is for everyone.
Just realized you did not comment on my website but someone else did and they referenced your blog. I added you to my blogroll.
[...] that I’ve got your heartstrings all tugged good and proper, however, read this article written by adult adoptees of color who make a convincing argument that fast-tracking adoption [...]
Social comments and analytics for this post…
This post was mentioned on Twitter by yayayarndiva: RT @PPR_Scribe: More on Haiti adoptions-from the Adoptees of Color Roundtable: http://bit.ly/9MXBsD...
Very much in support of your joint statement.
I have linked this in my website.
Any way to make contact with you? Need outreach and comments here locally (Buffalo, New York, USA:
http://www.buffalonews.com/home/story/936390.html?error=5#comment
Lancers reunited with new son from Haiti
Local family greets Geoffrey in Miami
[...] on the adoption of Haitian “orphans” and so, so much more. I wish i could quote the entire statement. Fierce and brilliant. Thank you! “We bear testimony to the ways in which the [...]
Hi there,
I’m a reporter at the Toronto Star in Canada, and I would love to interview someone who helped put this statement together. I’m working on a piece about international adoption in relation to Haiti for this weekend’s paper. I can be reached at nbaute@thestar.ca.
Sincerely,
Nicole
[...] urge all people who read this post to read the very important statement issued yesterday by Adoptees of Color Roundtable. This is clearly an appeal by adoptees of different races who oppose the rush to adopt Haiti’s [...]
[...] Haiti Statement by Adoptees of Color Roundtable Filed under: Uncategorized on January 29th, 2010Tags: Haiti, Mike Doughney [...]
I agree. Your voices = my voice.
FINALLY! The truth being published and by those directly impacted by adoptions. I highly commend you for this well written and insightful article. The media, adoptive parents and society in general seems to conveniently forget that in order for an aoption to occur a great LOSS first must happen. Instead the focus has always been on the supposed gains of being adopted and that adoptess should somehow always feel grateful! It is long overdue for your voices to be heard and you have my full support and acknowledgement.
Thank you!
Kelly
As an adult adoptee of colour, early childhood educator and social worker I appreciate your powerful statement which represents my personal and professional experience and views. Thank you!
As an adult transracial adoptee I would like to to thank you for writing this. I feel very strongly that the International Adoption process needs to be investigated as a whole. I also agree with your statement about Western Society. I was born in North America and am disgusted that so many North Americans have the nerve to judge other countries and decide that we live a superior way of life. I have suffered trauma throughout my life due to loss of culture. I know children who were adopted Internationally who are suffering. It saddens and angers me to know these children will continue to struggle in future. Many people do not understand or comprehend the importance of culture in a child’s development. Many people think they are ” saving ” children while truly they are actually harming them. More focus needs to be on the best interests of these children not the adoptive parents. Assistance needs to be given to the communities in which these children live so birth familes can stay together.
Wonderfully put. I only wish that they could articulate adoptees and their alies view points in the media. Please complete the contact information section of your website. So we can have a way to contact you, add our voice and support your voice.
As a fellow adoptee, beautifully said! Honest and much needed in this whole thing. BRAVO and be heard, the innocent kids need you to be an expert voice for them.
[...] Adoptees of Color Roundtable: Statement on Haiti [...]
I think your statement raises many valid points, but I am disturbed that you didn’t include an essential condition that would make it more reasonable and humane: a call for individuals, agencies and governmeents to set up the necessary facilities and supplies to provide decent care (including food, housing, health care, clothing, education and recreation, as well as counseling) there in Haiti. No one will be convinced of even your most salient points if it seems that the alternative for these children is illness, starvation and/ordeath.
Thank you for communicating your stand on this issue. I appreciate your perspective and am so glad that the voice from adult adoptees (especially those of color) is ringing out, loud and clear.
[...] entire statement can be found here. Leave a [...]
I’m confused. Who is the “we” in this statement? This appears to be a blog with one post. Is there a group or just a name with just one person behind this? What about the views of adoptees of color that differ from this? While I am aware that many horrible scams involving children are taking place and that professional policies need to be put in place, I am unclear as to who is really speaking here.
As a European-American adoptive parent of a young child from China, I am grateful, challenged and sobered by your statement. I will encourage other adoptive parents to read your powerful words.
Hi there,
I’m the News Editor of the alternative newspaper at York University (TO, CAN) and we would like to re-print this statement if that is possible. We would credit this organization as the author and would include where the statement was originally published. We are entirely run by volunteers and are non-profit.
Please let me know as soon as possible if this is possible,
Thank you,
Carmen
(info@yufreepress.org)
[...] set of methods for creating these records, including recording oral histories. From the “Statement on Haiti” Adoptees of Color [...]
Thank you.
I agree. I am 20 years old and was adopted from Haiti when I was 1 but my younger sister who is 18 was adopted when she was 14. She misses Haiti so much and I know she would much rather be there than here in the U.S. This is not to say that she hates us or anything, but she misses her culture, and Haiti is home to her. I on the other hand didn’t have to struggle with that transition but I still feel this incredible loss for the country of my birth and my birth family. Haiti is a strong country and will rise from the rubble. Haitians are suffering yes, but there are other ways to help than adoption. Adoptions I’m sure will continue after awhile but how about we all do our best to keep the orphans and other people of Haiti alive. Money and supplies can help many people adoption on the other hand only helps a few. I know many people look at the beautiful children on tv and \want one\ but it’s more serious than that. These are children who have lost so much and deserve to be with their remaining family members. It will take time, but it just seems to me that if people want to help these children they give them their families, support, and love from afar, rather than bringing them to a strange land. In my eyes that would just be another loss.