The Adopted Black Baby, and the White One Who Replaced Her
December 25, 2017 7:13 AM Subscribe
The Sandbergs were talking about expanding their family. They hired a lawyer who found a newborn and when she arrived, what they saw surprised them. She was black. Immediately, Mr. Sandberg said, he thought of the burning crosses and racist taunts, the upheaval in their community over the prospect of black people moving in. Interracial adoptions were far less common then.
“I said at that point that I wasn’t going to go forward with it,” Mr. Sandberg, now 89, recalled. “I thought, ‘My God, how are you going to raise a child in this neighborhood with the way people are feeling about this thing?’” said Mr. Sandberg, the owner of a prosperous manufacturing company. “It just wouldn’t have been great for her.”
The Sandbergs returned the child. A few months later, they adopted a newborn white girl and named her Amy.
I think things turned out as fine as they could be, under the circumstances. I like the fact that the parents didn't just think "We'll just pretend race doesn't exist!"
They were actually ahead of the curve in a weird way in considering how the environment would negatively affect her and them.
Minority adoptees have written about the "colorblind" attitude wreaking havoc on them, even with well-intentioned white parents in good neighborhoods. Here's one good example from The Root.
Just another amazing story from the good old days, when the positive act of adopting a baby means realizing just how racist and damaging your current community is. Very sad.
posted by Freecola at 8:18 AM on December 25, 2017 [8 favorites]
They were actually ahead of the curve in a weird way in considering how the environment would negatively affect her and them.
Minority adoptees have written about the "colorblind" attitude wreaking havoc on them, even with well-intentioned white parents in good neighborhoods. Here's one good example from The Root.
Just another amazing story from the good old days, when the positive act of adopting a baby means realizing just how racist and damaging your current community is. Very sad.
posted by Freecola at 8:18 AM on December 25, 2017 [8 favorites]
well, fine except for the part where a woman was forcibly separated from her infant child because her husband ejected their child from the household against her will in the face of her crying and protesting, and she missed and wrote about her lost child for the rest of her life, and then died never knowing what happened, while the man who decided this for the both of them is still alive and feels absolved of his guilt. except for that, everything turned out fine.
I am happy for the adult adoptees, especially Smith, since the family she had was much better than the one she might have had. not even just better for her, better in general. and for Roost, since she no longer has to feel like she stole another child's rightful place. and Roost's mother's feelings, failure to convince her husband, and subsequent divorce, alcoholism and death are not Smith's problem. and Smith has every right and reason to be glad that Sandberg lost and Mr. Sandberg won. but this isn't a happy story. this story has bad true things to stay about whiteness, adoption, and also marriage. three social institutions that were none of them in good shape in 1962.
posted by queenofbithynia at 8:55 AM on December 25, 2017 [81 favorites]
I am happy for the adult adoptees, especially Smith, since the family she had was much better than the one she might have had. not even just better for her, better in general. and for Roost, since she no longer has to feel like she stole another child's rightful place. and Roost's mother's feelings, failure to convince her husband, and subsequent divorce, alcoholism and death are not Smith's problem. and Smith has every right and reason to be glad that Sandberg lost and Mr. Sandberg won. but this isn't a happy story. this story has bad true things to stay about whiteness, adoption, and also marriage. three social institutions that were none of them in good shape in 1962.
posted by queenofbithynia at 8:55 AM on December 25, 2017 [81 favorites]
I think things turned out as fine as they could be, under the circumstances. I like the fact that the parents didn't just think "We'll just pretend race doesn't exist!"
Show me an interracial family that thinks racism doesn't exist.
posted by ActingTheGoat at 9:40 AM on December 25, 2017 [4 favorites]
Show me an interracial family that thinks racism doesn't exist.
posted by ActingTheGoat at 9:40 AM on December 25, 2017 [4 favorites]
I think you mean "show me an interracial family that didn't realize ahead of time that racism existed".
posted by the agents of KAOS at 10:34 AM on December 25, 2017 [5 favorites]
posted by the agents of KAOS at 10:34 AM on December 25, 2017 [5 favorites]
queenofbithynia, thank you. But also, maybe:
this story has bad true things to stay about whiteness, adoption, and also marriage. three social institutions thatwere none of them in good shape in 1962 are not, and maybe can never be, in good shape to this day.
posted by maxwelton at 11:12 AM on December 25, 2017 [2 favorites]
this story has bad true things to stay about whiteness, adoption, and also marriage. three social institutions that
posted by maxwelton at 11:12 AM on December 25, 2017 [2 favorites]
when the positive act of adopting a baby means realizing just how racist and damaging your current community is you are
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 11:47 AM on December 25, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 11:47 AM on December 25, 2017 [1 favorite]
and this is such a strange story, maybe only because I don't know how adoption worked back then and my expectations are all wrong,
1. how was it possible for parties involved in an adoption not to tell a white couple, in 1962, the race of their prospective child in advance? because in a time when overt racism was as prevalent and as socially tolerated as it was then, it seems both remarkable and stupid that this was permitted to be a surprise only revealed when the baby arrived at the Sandbergs' house. like as a person screening adoptive parents, you wouldn't automatically expect that a white couple in 1962 would be unprejudiced, would you? that doesn't seem wise or safe.
2. if that wasn't how it worked and wasn't what happened, does that mean, then, that either the Sandbergs or Ms. Sandberg alone indicated that they had no racial prejudices/preferences for prospective children, and only changed their/Mr. Sandberg's mind later, like the potential problems only occurred to him when the child physically arrived? this makes him sound worse.
3. or does it mean that the birth mother was not black, and the lawyer who arranged the adoption was also unaware of the child's race, rather than just not telling? are we supposed to understand this implicitly about the birth parents, as we understand implicitly that the birth parents were unmarried from their different last names? with all due respect to the NYT's sanctimonious line about how real life just complicates all your "easy assumptions" about racism and white privilege, providing relevant information is the best way to combat mistaken assumptions. and as it happens, the easy assumptions about white racism don't seem all that wrong.
4. most importantly, how long was Smith with the Sandbergs before being sent back?? a day, a week, a few months? And how long between her return and when her permanent family was found to adopt her? I can't find this in the article but did I just miss it? The article gives you the feeling that Smith wasn't there long enough to bond or feel abandoned, but Roost's brothers remembered their 'other sister' well enough to taunt her about it; would you really remember a baby who was in the house for such a short time as your lost sister? what the hell? if one of the Sandberg brothers is the abusive family member briefly alluded to, that explains why they're out of the story after the horrible opening anecdote, but otherwise the brothers' adult points of view are a bewildering exclusion.
the answer to this would give the answer to how much Sandberg really has to feel guilty about.
posted by queenofbithynia at 11:51 AM on December 25, 2017 [24 favorites]
1. how was it possible for parties involved in an adoption not to tell a white couple, in 1962, the race of their prospective child in advance? because in a time when overt racism was as prevalent and as socially tolerated as it was then, it seems both remarkable and stupid that this was permitted to be a surprise only revealed when the baby arrived at the Sandbergs' house. like as a person screening adoptive parents, you wouldn't automatically expect that a white couple in 1962 would be unprejudiced, would you? that doesn't seem wise or safe.
2. if that wasn't how it worked and wasn't what happened, does that mean, then, that either the Sandbergs or Ms. Sandberg alone indicated that they had no racial prejudices/preferences for prospective children, and only changed their/Mr. Sandberg's mind later, like the potential problems only occurred to him when the child physically arrived? this makes him sound worse.
3. or does it mean that the birth mother was not black, and the lawyer who arranged the adoption was also unaware of the child's race, rather than just not telling? are we supposed to understand this implicitly about the birth parents, as we understand implicitly that the birth parents were unmarried from their different last names? with all due respect to the NYT's sanctimonious line about how real life just complicates all your "easy assumptions" about racism and white privilege, providing relevant information is the best way to combat mistaken assumptions. and as it happens, the easy assumptions about white racism don't seem all that wrong.
4. most importantly, how long was Smith with the Sandbergs before being sent back?? a day, a week, a few months? And how long between her return and when her permanent family was found to adopt her? I can't find this in the article but did I just miss it? The article gives you the feeling that Smith wasn't there long enough to bond or feel abandoned, but Roost's brothers remembered their 'other sister' well enough to taunt her about it; would you really remember a baby who was in the house for such a short time as your lost sister? what the hell? if one of the Sandberg brothers is the abusive family member briefly alluded to, that explains why they're out of the story after the horrible opening anecdote, but otherwise the brothers' adult points of view are a bewildering exclusion.
the answer to this would give the answer to how much Sandberg really has to feel guilty about.
posted by queenofbithynia at 11:51 AM on December 25, 2017 [24 favorites]
would you really remember a baby who was in the house for such a short time as your lost sister?
As a person with adopted siblings, almost certainly if the parents had talked about the adoption with our in the presence of the kids in the run up to it happening. It's similar to how kids are often aware of having lost a sibling to miscarriage or a very early death - free crib might've been bought, the kids talked to about the new baby to mentally prepare them in advance of its arriving (or not arriving), etc, etc.
posted by Dysk at 12:21 PM on December 25, 2017 [5 favorites]
As a person with adopted siblings, almost certainly if the parents had talked about the adoption with our in the presence of the kids in the run up to it happening. It's similar to how kids are often aware of having lost a sibling to miscarriage or a very early death - free crib might've been bought, the kids talked to about the new baby to mentally prepare them in advance of its arriving (or not arriving), etc, etc.
posted by Dysk at 12:21 PM on December 25, 2017 [5 favorites]
Wow, phone typos.
...with or in the presence of...
...death - the crib might've...
posted by Dysk at 12:29 PM on December 25, 2017
...with or in the presence of...
...death - the crib might've...
posted by Dysk at 12:29 PM on December 25, 2017
Yea - I remember my brother telling me he almost had a different sister, because my mother miscarried just before having me (he would have been 3 at the time). Remembering a baby that actually showed up seems completely unremarkable, however long it was there.
posted by the agents of KAOS at 12:42 PM on December 25, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by the agents of KAOS at 12:42 PM on December 25, 2017 [1 favorite]
Snap Judgement had this story recently. More info about how long the baby was there, interviews with some of the involved parties. Deeply moving story. I'm on mobile and having a hard time posting a link, but it's episode #831. http://snapjudgment.org/finding-rebecca
posted by Nancy_LockIsLit_Palmer at 12:48 PM on December 25, 2017 [3 favorites]
posted by Nancy_LockIsLit_Palmer at 12:48 PM on December 25, 2017 [3 favorites]
does it mean that the birth mother was not black
There are photographs. It's so odd to me this isn't the first thing anybody reading would have deduced. AS IF in 1962 an adoption agency serving the Sandbergs would have had a black woman on their books as a birth mother.
I'd be willing to bet cash money the agency people had a few weeks after the birth thinking, oh well the kid doesn't look too black, could be mediterrannean heritage, maybe we won't need to mention anything...o-o-o, maybe not.
posted by glasseyes at 3:09 PM on December 25, 2017 [3 favorites]
There are photographs. It's so odd to me this isn't the first thing anybody reading would have deduced. AS IF in 1962 an adoption agency serving the Sandbergs would have had a black woman on their books as a birth mother.
I'd be willing to bet cash money the agency people had a few weeks after the birth thinking, oh well the kid doesn't look too black, could be mediterrannean heritage, maybe we won't need to mention anything...o-o-o, maybe not.
posted by glasseyes at 3:09 PM on December 25, 2017 [3 favorites]
(A link to Snap Judgment is buried in the middle of the article, BTW.)
I know someone who adopted two black girls -- one of them is, I believe, schizophrenic or has a similar mental illness burden, the younger sister is developmentally around age 8 though now an adult. That probably had more to do with the issues the older daughter had on reaching majority -- she is drug-addicted, often homeless, and very hostile toward the adoptive mother, much of this expressed in racial terms, which my friend finds hurtful because she -- a teacher -- did her best to provide what I guess you might call a race-conscious parenting style.
A somewhat analogous example was subtly highlighted in the film Lion, about the Indian boy who got lost on a train, and was adopted by a white family in Tasmania, Australia, along with another boy who brought with him a heavier burden of possible mental illness (?) or maladaptation, whatever they call not fitting in in these circles nowadays. The film was also pretty subtly side-eyed about the cynicism of even the helpful adoption agent at the orphanage. I think there's a halo of 'good works' around adoption that often obscures how difficult a task it can be to raise a child outside of their native culture or even economic circumstances.
(I also know a Mormon family who adopted a same race girl and promptly became pregnant, and ironically it is the adoptee who has the happier adulthood, though part of that is marrying someone who is spectacularly wealthy.)
or does it mean that the birth mother was not black
That was my immediate suspicion as well. I have a project to investigate the story of Gloria Foster, the actress best known for playing The Oracle in the first two Matrix films. I had always vaguely assumed that she was an aboriginal Australian actress (yes, flay me) until years later finding she had actually grown up on a farm in rural Janesville, my home town, and notably one of the whitest places in America. It turns out her mother -- in 1933 -- apparently was impregnated by a black man in Chicago; whether this was consensual in 2017 terms is not answered in the sources I have. She brought baby Gloria home to the farm and was subsequently hospitalized for mental illness (again, given the era, what this means is a bit murky), so Foster was raised by her -- to my evidence -- white grandparents. But she seems to have kept few connections to this area in adulthood. I have to imagine there are some stories there.
posted by dhartung at 3:19 PM on December 25, 2017
I know someone who adopted two black girls -- one of them is, I believe, schizophrenic or has a similar mental illness burden, the younger sister is developmentally around age 8 though now an adult. That probably had more to do with the issues the older daughter had on reaching majority -- she is drug-addicted, often homeless, and very hostile toward the adoptive mother, much of this expressed in racial terms, which my friend finds hurtful because she -- a teacher -- did her best to provide what I guess you might call a race-conscious parenting style.
A somewhat analogous example was subtly highlighted in the film Lion, about the Indian boy who got lost on a train, and was adopted by a white family in Tasmania, Australia, along with another boy who brought with him a heavier burden of possible mental illness (?) or maladaptation, whatever they call not fitting in in these circles nowadays. The film was also pretty subtly side-eyed about the cynicism of even the helpful adoption agent at the orphanage. I think there's a halo of 'good works' around adoption that often obscures how difficult a task it can be to raise a child outside of their native culture or even economic circumstances.
(I also know a Mormon family who adopted a same race girl and promptly became pregnant, and ironically it is the adoptee who has the happier adulthood, though part of that is marrying someone who is spectacularly wealthy.)
or does it mean that the birth mother was not black
That was my immediate suspicion as well. I have a project to investigate the story of Gloria Foster, the actress best known for playing The Oracle in the first two Matrix films. I had always vaguely assumed that she was an aboriginal Australian actress (yes, flay me) until years later finding she had actually grown up on a farm in rural Janesville, my home town, and notably one of the whitest places in America. It turns out her mother -- in 1933 -- apparently was impregnated by a black man in Chicago; whether this was consensual in 2017 terms is not answered in the sources I have. She brought baby Gloria home to the farm and was subsequently hospitalized for mental illness (again, given the era, what this means is a bit murky), so Foster was raised by her -- to my evidence -- white grandparents. But she seems to have kept few connections to this area in adulthood. I have to imagine there are some stories there.
posted by dhartung at 3:19 PM on December 25, 2017
how was it possible for parties involved in an adoption not to tell a white couple, in 1962, the race of their prospective child in advance?
The plural of anecdote is not data, but I would imagine it happened a lot as long as the child could pass as white. DadFreedom was adopted by a white couple in 1961 - his birth parents were a white boy of Irish-American ancestry and a Chinese/Russian girl who had arrived to America as a stateless refugee 5 years before. His adoptive parents were told nothing at all about his ancestry and assumed they were getting a white baby. DadFreedom looks white, so no one ever knew until we started doing research into his birth family. His birth mother and birth grandmother look extremely East Asian - although I know they passed as white when they first arrived to the country. We (DadFreedom, me, and my sister) are all olive-skinned, and we are white. I don't think anyone would have ever known if we hadn't found my dad's birth mother, so yeah, I think it's totally possible that no one told this couple the race of their prospective child.
posted by chainsofreedom at 4:02 PM on December 25, 2017
The plural of anecdote is not data, but I would imagine it happened a lot as long as the child could pass as white. DadFreedom was adopted by a white couple in 1961 - his birth parents were a white boy of Irish-American ancestry and a Chinese/Russian girl who had arrived to America as a stateless refugee 5 years before. His adoptive parents were told nothing at all about his ancestry and assumed they were getting a white baby. DadFreedom looks white, so no one ever knew until we started doing research into his birth family. His birth mother and birth grandmother look extremely East Asian - although I know they passed as white when they first arrived to the country. We (DadFreedom, me, and my sister) are all olive-skinned, and we are white. I don't think anyone would have ever known if we hadn't found my dad's birth mother, so yeah, I think it's totally possible that no one told this couple the race of their prospective child.
posted by chainsofreedom at 4:02 PM on December 25, 2017
I am adopted. I am white, and was adopted by white parents. My mom knew by the time she was 20 that she wouldn't be able to have children, so after she got married, her and my dad went and talked to an adoption agency. They jumped though all the hoops, passed all the tests, and eventually asked to be put on the waiting list for a white newborn child. They waited for 8 years.
I initially was horrified to find out that they had specified that they only wanted a white child. To my modern ears, it sounds racist and shitty. But my mom put it like this: in the 70s, people didn't talk as openly about adoption as they do now. She didn't want me to be forced to have a conversation about my origins with people if I didn't want to, and if I looked different from them, she felt people would potentially ask questions. And I think most of all, she wanted people to assume I was hers versus assuming immediately that I wasn't.
I think if I were in her situation today, I'd make a different decision. But I understand why she chose to do what she did, and I'm ok with it.
posted by tryniti at 4:42 PM on December 25, 2017 [8 favorites]
I initially was horrified to find out that they had specified that they only wanted a white child. To my modern ears, it sounds racist and shitty. But my mom put it like this: in the 70s, people didn't talk as openly about adoption as they do now. She didn't want me to be forced to have a conversation about my origins with people if I didn't want to, and if I looked different from them, she felt people would potentially ask questions. And I think most of all, she wanted people to assume I was hers versus assuming immediately that I wasn't.
I think if I were in her situation today, I'd make a different decision. But I understand why she chose to do what she did, and I'm ok with it.
posted by tryniti at 4:42 PM on December 25, 2017 [8 favorites]
(this story and the SJ version of jt has come up repeatedly in my various adoptee-community groups since release and it's provoked divisive reactions. i'll stay away from my own take here.)
If you are interested in learning more about changing American adoption practices over history, Kinship by Design is a reasonable overview.
With regard to efforts to place adoptees into putatively-similar-ethnicity adoptive families, yes, this was a crucial structural element of American institutional adoption right up through the end of what is known as "the baby scoop era," when more single mothers began to keep their children, and demand for adoptees, specifically for infant adoptees with barriers to birth-parent reunification and contact, drove the expansion and acceptance of interethnic and international adoption.
posted by mwhybark at 6:34 PM on December 25, 2017 [3 favorites]
If you are interested in learning more about changing American adoption practices over history, Kinship by Design is a reasonable overview.
With regard to efforts to place adoptees into putatively-similar-ethnicity adoptive families, yes, this was a crucial structural element of American institutional adoption right up through the end of what is known as "the baby scoop era," when more single mothers began to keep their children, and demand for adoptees, specifically for infant adoptees with barriers to birth-parent reunification and contact, drove the expansion and acceptance of interethnic and international adoption.
posted by mwhybark at 6:34 PM on December 25, 2017 [3 favorites]
I had no idea about the "Baby Scoop era" and oh my god
posted by effugas at 9:41 PM on December 25, 2017
posted by effugas at 9:41 PM on December 25, 2017
My understanding is that at the time, there were pretty powerful forces within the black community as well who were against interracial adoption, because they (understandably) saw it as forced assimilation and theft. Depending on your perspective it could be a liberal stance as well to not want to adopt a black baby in that environment.
posted by miyabo at 11:15 PM on December 25, 2017
posted by miyabo at 11:15 PM on December 25, 2017
According to the cited book, generally speaking, from about the turn of the century forward, ethnically-and-faith-tradition-aligned formal adoption institutions came into being, all of whom strove to place relinquished (or otherwise adoption-eligible children, such as orphans) within the child's perceived ethnico-religious community of origin. This certainly included agencies oriented to serving the African-American community, as well as Jewish, Irish- and Italian-Catholic communities, and so on. The book is the best place I am aware of to obtain specifics.
posted by mwhybark at 12:08 AM on December 26, 2017
posted by mwhybark at 12:08 AM on December 26, 2017
As far as I'm aware, I'm not adopted. All my siblings however, are. I'm the eldest child, my oldest sister is adopted from just outside Hanoi in Vietnam, my younger sister from Chongqing in China, and my brother, the youngest, from Baoding in China. My family lived in Hong Kong at the time of the adoptions. My parents and I are white Danish, and my parents and siblings all live in Denmark (the two youngest still live at home, being young teenagers). My parents have never pretended to be colourblind, and interracial adoption is fairly common in Denmark (decent welfare state with good abortion access and not too many cultural hangups about abortion, not a lot of "local" orphans).
My oldest sister (who is close to my age, unlike the younger pair) was four when she was adopted, and had a lot of mental health baggage. Pretty severe attachment disorder, and developmental disorder. As a kid, I was always expected to be the "normal" one. I'm not, really (trans, probably autistic). This was... not helpful for me. I've not done great out of life, exactly. My oldest sister is in an assisted living situation, and has a good life in her terms. My younger siblings both seem happy, confident, and well adjusted. They're very much aware of their heritage, and have as much of a connection to it as my family can provide (food is how we do culture in my family - it was my primary experience of my Danish heritage when I was growing up in Hong Kong, and it's probably the largest part of how my siblings experience their heritage - my dad is a mean cook, learned a lot from cooking with his students in Hong Kong, and my siblings are just as happy eating proper Chinese food as they are with flæskesteg med sprød sværd, though they turn up their noses at westernised Chinese takeaway fare).
I have... mixed feelings on the topic of interracial adoption. I think that there's a very different angle on it in the US with its relationship to race, and its history and culture. I get annoyed at Americans talking about the dynamics of it in the US in universalist terms, even as I recognise some of the criticisms as valid outside of that context. I know that I have a very hard time with my oldest sister for a variety of reasons relating to how her presence in my family as we are growing up was very damaging for me, but I love my younger siblings as family in exactly the way I would biological siblings. They've all done better or are doing better than I ever did. I hope they don't feel like they've been robbed off something, and I don't think they do, but I would understand if they did.
It's a complicated and emotional topic.
posted by Dysk at 12:31 AM on December 26, 2017 [11 favorites]
My oldest sister (who is close to my age, unlike the younger pair) was four when she was adopted, and had a lot of mental health baggage. Pretty severe attachment disorder, and developmental disorder. As a kid, I was always expected to be the "normal" one. I'm not, really (trans, probably autistic). This was... not helpful for me. I've not done great out of life, exactly. My oldest sister is in an assisted living situation, and has a good life in her terms. My younger siblings both seem happy, confident, and well adjusted. They're very much aware of their heritage, and have as much of a connection to it as my family can provide (food is how we do culture in my family - it was my primary experience of my Danish heritage when I was growing up in Hong Kong, and it's probably the largest part of how my siblings experience their heritage - my dad is a mean cook, learned a lot from cooking with his students in Hong Kong, and my siblings are just as happy eating proper Chinese food as they are with flæskesteg med sprød sværd, though they turn up their noses at westernised Chinese takeaway fare).
I have... mixed feelings on the topic of interracial adoption. I think that there's a very different angle on it in the US with its relationship to race, and its history and culture. I get annoyed at Americans talking about the dynamics of it in the US in universalist terms, even as I recognise some of the criticisms as valid outside of that context. I know that I have a very hard time with my oldest sister for a variety of reasons relating to how her presence in my family as we are growing up was very damaging for me, but I love my younger siblings as family in exactly the way I would biological siblings. They've all done better or are doing better than I ever did. I hope they don't feel like they've been robbed off something, and I don't think they do, but I would understand if they did.
It's a complicated and emotional topic.
posted by Dysk at 12:31 AM on December 26, 2017 [11 favorites]
I would like to just take a moment and remind people responding to this that there are people in this very thread who have white mothers and are neither 100% white nor adopted and suggest you give their feelings the same care you might when an author of a piece shows up in a thread.
Now to go read this story.
posted by dame at 9:40 AM on December 26, 2017 [4 favorites]
Now to go read this story.
posted by dame at 9:40 AM on December 26, 2017 [4 favorites]
well, fine except for the part where a woman was forcibly separated from her infant child because her husband ejected their child from the household against her will in the face of her crying and protesting, and she missed and wrote about her lost child for the rest of her life, and then died never knowing what happened, while the man who decided this for the both of them is still alive and feels absolved of his guilt. except for that, everything turned out fine.
This is difficult, because the reverse would also require that one of the parents do something they categorically do not want to do. While it's a horrible scenario, how do you decide which choice is the best? It's also suggested that the choice wasn't made easily, so i'd prefer not to ridicule any of the parties.
posted by trif at 2:53 AM on December 27, 2017
This is difficult, because the reverse would also require that one of the parents do something they categorically do not want to do. While it's a horrible scenario, how do you decide which choice is the best? It's also suggested that the choice wasn't made easily, so i'd prefer not to ridicule any of the parties.
posted by trif at 2:53 AM on December 27, 2017
Those situations are not even remotely comparable. One of them requires forcibly taking a child from her mother. The other requires a man to put up with a child or leave. It's pretty easy to decide which choice is best.
posted by Dysk at 1:11 PM on December 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by Dysk at 1:11 PM on December 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
I think we read different stories - I didn't see a guy decided if he could 'put up with' the child, but I did read a story about a guy deciding whether the child would be ok in their situation. Seems pretty horrific to say that a dad deciding that keeping the baby would be bad for the child should just let it happen anyway. Women aren't the final arbiters of what is good for a child.
posted by the agents of KAOS at 2:22 PM on December 29, 2017
posted by the agents of KAOS at 2:22 PM on December 29, 2017
Dysk, I'm also confused by your reading. Is your point that Mr. Sandberg presumably signed the adoption papers without asking the child's race, and now he needs his wife's approval to put the child up for adoption again? Or that Mrs. Sandberg should be permitted to adopt children without her husband's approval?
The first one seems at least technically defensible, although I don't know enough about 1970 Illinois family law to discuss the technical merits of that argument.
The second seems completely indefensible. You say, "put up with a child or leave," but Mr. Sandberg actually didn't have the second option. Illinois didn't get no-fault divorce until 1977, and I assume Mrs. Sandberg wasn't cheating on him or abusing him or anything else that would give him grounds to divorce her for fault. It would be very odd if one's wife could unilaterally adopt children and force one to raise them.
I'm curious, would you still defend the adoption if the genders were switched, and Mr. Sandberg were bringing home children his wife didn't want?
posted by d. z. wang at 4:58 PM on December 29, 2017
The first one seems at least technically defensible, although I don't know enough about 1970 Illinois family law to discuss the technical merits of that argument.
The second seems completely indefensible. You say, "put up with a child or leave," but Mr. Sandberg actually didn't have the second option. Illinois didn't get no-fault divorce until 1977, and I assume Mrs. Sandberg wasn't cheating on him or abusing him or anything else that would give him grounds to divorce her for fault. It would be very odd if one's wife could unilaterally adopt children and force one to raise them.
I'm curious, would you still defend the adoption if the genders were switched, and Mr. Sandberg were bringing home children his wife didn't want?
posted by d. z. wang at 4:58 PM on December 29, 2017
If you make a decision, you make a decision quickly. Like, same day or tomorrow quickly. Allowing attachments to form and then changing your mind, putting emotional wounds in people that they carry until they die, that's awful, regardless of the genders involved.
posted by Dysk at 9:44 PM on December 29, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by Dysk at 9:44 PM on December 29, 2017 [1 favorite]
I'm assuming that the lack of no fault divorce didn't mean Mr Sandberg couldn't like, literally leave.
posted by Dysk at 9:45 PM on December 29, 2017
posted by Dysk at 9:45 PM on December 29, 2017
I've personally seen something very similar happen with one of the other couples that was adopting at the same time af my parents. Not because of race, but because of a child being deaf. Within a week, it was literally returned, traded in for a "normal", "healthy" child. One parent was very happy with this state of affairs. One was a little unsure. They aren't together any more, funnily enough.
It's not that I want parents forced to take kids they don't want. It's parents that don't want certain kids, certain types of kids, it's them that I don't want.
posted by Dysk at 9:57 PM on December 29, 2017 [1 favorite]
It's not that I want parents forced to take kids they don't want. It's parents that don't want certain kids, certain types of kids, it's them that I don't want.
posted by Dysk at 9:57 PM on December 29, 2017 [1 favorite]
And like, I'm sure if you interviewed him today, that man would spin a great, selfless story about how it was all about the child's best interests (and in fact, I know this is exactly what he did when talking to the adoption authorities to arrange the trade-in). But I watched him go through the series of emotions that led to that point, and it fundamentally started (and ended) with disappointment, anger, and rejection, not care and concern.
posted by Dysk at 10:09 PM on December 29, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by Dysk at 10:09 PM on December 29, 2017 [1 favorite]
Dysk, like, I get it. I'm here, I'm holding your hand. Well, such as one can via text box.
posted by mwhybark at 1:17 AM on December 30, 2017
posted by mwhybark at 1:17 AM on December 30, 2017
Huh, did it give a timeline somewhere besides saying he made the decision "immediately"? Or are you saying that sounds too slow? Perhaps he should have mentioned before the baby arrived that if it was black they couldn't keep her?
posted by the agents of KAOS at 12:06 AM on December 31, 2017
posted by the agents of KAOS at 12:06 AM on December 31, 2017
« Older A brief history of the petroleum business in Texas... | Oh my God, I can’t wait to see his face. Newer »
This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments
posted by k8t at 7:46 AM on December 25, 2017