Due to popular demand, this post has moved to the International Adoption Blog.
Trash adoption, sell a book
May 20, 2007 by Sandra Hanks
32 Responses
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Paradise Preoccupied 
Well this 100% pre-adopter thinks that that 50% woman 50%”dark cloud over the bright hope that is adoption” must be the one who is Satan’s helper. I would like to wash her mouth out with soap. Thanks for the adoption statistics link, I needed that a few days ago.
I linked in to this entry from a comment you left on another blod.
Several months ago, I wrote a blog entry about Lori Carangelo, President of Americans for Open Records. I pointed out then that she wasn’t for anything, she was against adoption. I am pretty sure Mirah Riben’s got her stats from Lori’s website.
What I found surprising is that Ms. Carangelo uses research on the “adopted child syndrome” to support her claims of adoptees mental health issues. The research she quotes is out of date… 1953 to be exact. Twenty years later, the University of Washington observed a pattern of birth defects in unrelated children. The common denominator for all these kids was maternal alcoholism. Funny, no where on her site does Ms. Carangelo address the issue of FAS and how that diagnosis provides an adequate explanation for the mental health issues, problems with police and disrupted school experiences that whe blames on adoption. Nor does she discuss the percentage of alcohol affected children who are available for adoption because of neglect related to addiction.
ARGH… one of my hot button topics!
It takes two people tp speak the truth – one to seak and one to hear. Onviously, these posters have an agenda which doesn’t include actually reading any of my web pages or books which offer ALTERNATIVES to the archaic practive of adoption as it is practiced in America. The many thousands of adoptees, parents and adopters I’ve assisted without charge in overcoming obstacles in that oppriessive systrem can attest to the need for replacing sych a system, but uwilling ears can’t hear them either. See http://Amazon.com/e/B001KCH348 and http://LoriCarangelo.com/Books for enlightenment.
Being far too busy to waste time discussing anything with Lori Carangelo, I’ll just link to a piece that sums things up nicely: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/05/04/726866/-The-callous-crusade-to-abolish-adoption …
No one denies the existence of Fetal Alcohol Syndrome as some try to censor mention of the existence of adoption abuse. In “KONDRO– The untold Story of The Longview Serial Killer” Kondro was taken from his Native American mother at a time when Fetal Alcohol exposure was rampant among Native Americans.and was placed for adoption to a White couple who abused him, which led to his drug addiction and raping and killing young girls, beginning when he was age 7. Tell me how adoption rescues these children from negative beginnings when the main criteria for adoption placement is the adopters’ finances and own need, and when there’s no oversight to protect the child once an adoption is finalized??? Tell me why you are so hung up on adoption as if it’s the only form of legal custody and care of a child who cannot be raised by his parents? Is it that adoption treats the chld as if a piece of property — one that’s easier to obtain than a a used car — no accountabiity after finalization, and even benefit from adoption subsidies in the process???
Lori, I said you could continue to plug your book. I didn’t say I had any overwhelming desire to get into another ridiculous discussion with an idiot who refuses to see the forest for the trees.
Do I really want to have to bring up mama’s boy Ted Bundy or any of hundreds of other serial killers who were not adoptees?
Is it really necessary to point out that adoption is not about rescue, but rather about families for children who, for a variety of reasons, don’t have one?
Adoption isn’t the only form of legal custody. You should know that.
Easier to obtain than a used car? From which of your crap piles did you dig up that nugget?
I know you’re not big on facts or reason, so why I’m even bothering to moderate and reply to your comments must be down to the fact that we’ve just had a lovely dinner and my kids … yes, my kids … are happily reading at the moment.
Remind me again of exactly what your personal experience with adoption is …
It’s amazing how regurgitated pap keeps coming up, isn’t it?
Thanks for the link.
Sandra, on page 24 of “KONDRO–The Untold Story of the Longview Serial Killer” I not only mention your blog post “Trash Adoption, Sell A Book,”(and my response, “Don’t Shoot the Messenger,”) but also the 2-7-13 conference “A Child’s View of Adoption” by Dina Rosenfeld, LCSW, MSW, New York School of Social Work “and a panel of adoptees” who proposed “educating prospective adopters on a child’s FEELINGS about being adopted.” And Kathy Brodsky, LCSW comment “Most adoption education is focused on preparing adoptive families for their new role or enlarged family. While dscussions on a child’s UNDERSTANDING of adoption and their ADUSTMENT in terms of chronological age (including delays),there is little exploration of what the child directly FEELS, HEARS, SEES or EXPERIENCES.” Isn’t it incredible that the same was sugested in 1953 in the first studies of adoptive families by adoptee and social worker, Jean Paton and the social worker community STILL hasn’t listened to adoptees themselves? I know you’ve never read my books that you’e trashing or you’d know that they are of two types — compilations from others’ tudies (sources cited) and indic=vidual case histories as in KONDRO and collections of such indvidual profilings (ADOPTED KILLERS) to ive those who are said to have no FEELINGS and no REMORSE a voice and in doing so, discivered what these social workers in 1953 and 2013 are still “proposing” as mattering — the chid’s FEELINGS aut being adopted and how it impacts his behaviors and life. But if it’s till “regurgitated pap” to you, , just keep on advocating for adoption status quo and keep on creating disturbed children and adults. Just be sure to arm yourself with military assault weapons and drones for the future you advocate..
Simply trying to decipher what you’ve written here is more than anyone should have to do. Sorry, Lori, but I have a hard time taking a writer seriously who can’t spell or properly construct a sentence.
I am hardly an advocate for status quo anything, being a huge fan of reform in about all areas, and your accusation that I create disturbed children and adults is nothing more than your usual tactic of shouting down the room in hopes of having people pay less attention to what you say than to you. (And, of course, to attempt to sell another book or two.)
As for the weapons silliness, sociopaths are born, turned into monsters through genetic makeup, head trauma or illness, not created by the adoption process.
Must ask if you’re at all aware that the world is far wider than the USA and that for millions of children in this world the most basics of basics are beyond reach. Can you comprehend circumstances the exist beyond the end of your nose? Have you spent time in orphanages where malnourished children languish year after year or die before their fifth birthday … or their first? Do you have some magic wand to wave that changes global reality?
Once again, your connection to adoption is exactly what?
This is just a suggestion but, if you take issue with anything in Mirah’s book, you might want to do some research before trashing it out of hand. There is an extensive bibliography at the end of Mirah’s first book, which I am currently reading, and while I have her second one at home, I have not read it as yet. However, the facts that she quotes may or may not have come from Lori Carangelo’s website. There are numerous sources all over the internet and in bookstores that substantiate every quote.
You can check out Adoptive Mother, Barbara Raymond’s book about Georgia Tann, The Baby Thief for general information about the history of adoption and sealed records, or you can also check out David Kirschner’s book, Adoption; Uncharted Waters. Kirschner who is not connected to adoption in any way other than as treating them, states an even higher figure for adoptees who commit parricide, fifteen times as high as the non adoptee.
You might do well to do a little more research, and for a beginning you can start with the “Notes” section in Mirah’s first book, where she addresses many of the items that you took issue with in your piece. Her list of references alone is worth the price of the book and is a valuable resource on issues related to failed adoption, infertility issues, adult adoptees and their issues and many of the other items to which you took exception.
Sandy Young
OriginsUSA.org
I wouldn’t bother to ‘take issue with anything in Mirah’s book’. It was a poorly written, agenda-ladened article I picked apart. As I suggested here often crap is just crap.
Just FYI, I’ve read some of the work you mention. Suffice it to say that Mirah Riben is no Barbara Raymond.
Funny how you reveal that you really haven’t read any of the books you trash. Is that how you listen to your adopted kids too? Hope you’ve got a bunch of adoption oriented shrinks ready in the wings. I’ve been hearing from an adopter of four — All four kre all on anti-psychotic drugs for their depression, PTSD, and acting out “behaviors” she said, and a psychiatrist and therapists visit their home twice a week, in her belief that the kids should be “resilient” enough (word she used) to adjust to the unnatural state of being adopted. No, Sandra, this is not a war between adopters and bio-parents. This is a blog site you’re using to try to satisfy your need for control by spreading poison, probably as you also try to brainswah YOUR kids that they are actually YOURS and it doesn’t matter how THEY feel.
You are one confused puppy, aren’t you, Lori. Your personal nastiness is really not charming at all.
Now that you’ve done such a wonderful job of showing exactly the sort of person you are, my job is done.
Wow. It is clear that “The Stork Market” has hit a nerve and pushed a lot of your adoptive mother insecurity buttons.
It’s a real shame that you – and your like-minded readers – have publicly revealed yourselves to be so nasty and not exactly the sort of people a prospective birthmother would choose to parent her child. That’s probably all for the best though, so keep it up. You’re doing a great job of encouraging women who might be considering adoption to think again.
I sincerely hope that you do not and will not trash your children’s natural mothers in the same manner that you have trashed Mirah Riben. I hope, too, that you may come to a point of not being so very threatened by birthmothers and by the truth of current adoption practice.
Lynne Roberts, adoptee
You’re crackin’ me up, Lynne! Thanks for the laugh.
By the way, just FYI, it’s considered bad form to refer to an expectant woman as a “prospective birth mother”. Very coercive, underhanded and demeaning. You might want to try educating yourself so you don’t offend people.
“Maternal envy teaches daughters to be passive, fearful, conformist, obedient as well as similarly cruel to other women.” Women view one another as “rivals and potential replacements” and they often betray, hurt, and humiliate one another. Phyllis Chesler, Women’s Inhumanity to Women
Klassyfide,
So, that’s why Riben feels compelled to name-call and write such nasty things about adoptive mothers! Or, at least one reason.
Thanks.
[…] came about as a direct result of the slur campaign Mirah Riben and cohorts conducted in reaction to my post shredding a piece of trash she tried to pass off as ‘information’ that started out here, then was moved … by […]
I find it curious that the few folks who trash AmFOR.net’s web pages, particularly the page at AbolishAdoption.com, are so adept at “reading between the lines” as to the author’s intent ,yet so poor sighted (or is it short sighted?) that they overlook what is actually written. AmFOR’s Abolish Adoption page, ( in plain English and terminology that “even a Caveman can understand” (-: ) that we favor expressions of legal custody that respect the best interests of the child….and goes on to provide a comparison of Adoption to Legal Child Guardianship.
My favorite pro-adoption comments include: “If there was no adoption, what would happen to children who are abandoned or abused?’ and “Just because those people have bad adoption experiences, why spoil it for people who could not otherwise have children of their own?” and “Non-adopted children get sexually, physically and emotionally abused too, so why pick on adoption?” (… perhaps because decades of parents were pressured to voluntarily relinquish their children to assure them a “better” life?)
On the same site is AmFOR’s “Alternatives to Adoption” and AmFOR’s much copied “Statistics of Adoption” page (citing sourses for every stat) in further support our statements. Although all of AmFOR’s hundreds of pages are copyrighted, the author has given permission to quote any material on the site, on condition that AmFOR, and any original source noted, is also cited. Many simply cut and paste whole pages and make them their own, perhaps because they agree with the wording but are afraid of appearing “anti-adoption” by acknowledging the source. To those who observed common courtesy, thank you.
The “Adopted Child Syndrome Page” details how and why “old” theory is now “newly endorsed” by “experts” who previously turned a blind eye to even their own data when it was “politically incorrect” to suggest that the myths and lies inherent in adoption may not be in child’s best interests. Because several decades of adoptees, parents and adopters have come out of the closet (see also AmFOR’s “Adopters Against Adoption” page), they and their plight is no longer “invisible” and so easily ignored. Of course, there are none so blind as those who refuse to see.
Lori Carangelo
Americans For Open Records (AmFOR.net)
PS: “Praise Adoption, Sell a Child.”
[…] who are willing to expose Ms. Carangelo’s facts for what they are – pure bullshit. This from Sandra Hanks Benoiton’s blog: What I found surprising is that Ms. Carangelo uses research on the “adopted child […]
So is “f$%!icking” amd “bullshit” the extent of your vocabulary in supporting your non-position?
Writers tend to use words, sometimes even rather obscure big ones like ‘mountebank’ when appropriate … as that one is when addressing Lori.
Victims and advocates write books. Their enemies burn them.
Huh? That’s way up on the list of ‘dumbest things ever written down’. Many people write books about many things for many reasons. Some of those people even know how to write. Those that burn books are small-minded idiots for whom ideas are scary things.
Really bad books are better used as toilet paper … crap for crap.
Feel free to continue to advertise your book here.
“Burning books” is a common expression describing those who trash writers with lies when their position on an issue is different or stronger than yours. You’re saying non-adopted kids get abused as well as adopted kids. What are you doing about it besides trying to censor those who speak out or write about it ? Obviously you’re not part of the solution so you must be par of the problem..
Censor? Honey, I’m letting you tout yours right here.
And you have NO idea of what I do for children in the world.
BTW, the only people I’ve ever heard speak against open records are birth mothers. Adoptive parents (or ‘adopters’ to quote you) are pretty much universally in favor of their children having access to their history.
For one thing, most others never wanted secrecy — It was imposed by law to allow adopters to keep the secret for life of they wanted to.. Almost every state law still requires sealing and falsifying the borth certificate, even in “open” adoptions — a slap in the face to adopters who DO want to adopt with truth? What are you doing about that?
http://www.amazon.com/Lori-Carangelo/e/B001KCH348
And yet another plug for yourself. I really hope people do read your book, as it makes the point that you’re an idiot much better than anyone else could ever do.
Did you ever read the book I wrote for Adoption.com … “Adoption.com Guide to US Infant Adoption”? It’s a bit dated now, as laws have changed, but the pith of it fits.
Read it, then get back to me. It’s online now, as far as I know.
The fight for open records goes on. Progress has been made, but more must happen.
I would never normally feel compelled to post on Sandra’s blog, but this subject has rendered me incapable of resisting. I should point out that I have no knowledge of the intricacies and challenges of international adoption, so am largely unencumbered by the “statistics” and “facts” to which Lori, Lynne and Sandy appear so vehemently to cleave.
However, one subject of which I have intricate knowledge, is the relationship my friend has with her adopted children. Whilst I am admittedly biased, my affection and respect for Sandra is born out of a belief, that she is a thoroughly decent person, who is devoted to her children.
Sandra’s kids know where they came from and, more importantly thanks to her, have a much more promising perspective of where they are going. They are sunny and engaging children, who have been spared an inexorably bleak existence, to live life as a valued member of a stable family. There is equally no question of the love and support Sandra devotes to her children.
I have to ask ladies, what possible reason could you have for wanting to prevent this sort of family growing from such terribly inauspicious beginnings? I would suggest that your motives are, at best, misguided, at worst, dangerously sinister. I’ll leave you to establish where you want to sit on that scale but so far, based on your “prose”, it’s not looking good…..
Oh, and by the way, “Just be sure to arm yourself with military assault weapons and drones for the future you advocate” has categorically got to be one of the most intellectually retarded and inflammatory suggestions I’ve ever read (from an adult at least). In a country, I assume you are in the US, ravaged by firearm-related crime, you’re focusing your attention on the rising, adopted children army, by advocating military grade weapons ownership….Smart.
Thank you Sandra. I had no idea, thank you for speaking out on behalf of adopted persons. The auto-serial killer crap has always been a thorn in my side.