MetaFilter posts tagged with orphans

Won't Someone Think of the Parents?!

grapefruitmoon — Sun, 10 May 2009 07:43:05 -0800

International Adoption may not necessarily be helping the disadvantaged in Third World countries as advertised. In some countries, like Guatemala and India, children are simply stolen from their families. The Hague Convention governs the rules for International Adoptions, but like all rules, they aren't always followed. Many adoptive parents believe that their children have been given up, but in some countries, "orphanage" doesn't mean what you think it means. Even in China, where girls have been legitimately abandoned due to the "one child" policy, the demand for adoptable children has simply outstripped the supply, leading to stealing babies. In other cases, parents are offered incentives to sell their children to orphanages.

One of the most depressing videos you will ever see

TochterAusElysium — Sun, 16 Mar 2008 16:49:26 -0800

Bulgaria's abandoned children. This heartrending BBC documentary visits a home for abandoned children in Bulgaria; they are left there by parents who can't - or won't - take care of "defective" children. But poor nutrition and uncaring workers have turned it into a hell on earth for the poor kids as they waste away; some are never taken off their toilets, some are left in bed until their limbs atrophy. Many cannot speak. Only one can write. Most just sit and rock for hours because of the lack of stimulus. Very hard to watch.

Imagine if this was the life we were living

[expletive deleted] — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 16:17:46 -0800

Reading the news, the violence in Kenya can feel distant. For Mission in Action/Nakuru Baby Orphanage, located in the heart of the Rift Valley, the violence is all to near, and extremely troubling. (the last link contains images that may be very disturbing) In the interest of full disclosure, I feel I should mention that this website was being updated by a former co-worker of my girlfriend[pdf], who left Whistler to volunteer at this orphanage for a second time. When she left, in early December, there was no hint of the violence to come. Kenya was widely considered stable and MIA had every reason to be optimistic about the future for the children in their care. Since then, so much has changed. The orphanage has now committed itself to helping those forced from their homes by the violence, which has emptied the nearby town of Nakuru. The children at this orphanage, some of whom have come to them severely malnourished, abused and HIV positive, were lucky enough to find rescue in a country unable to provide them with a social safety net. Now, if the situation continues to deteriorate, they may have no future.

Zoe's Ark: Charity or Kidnapping?

Sticherbeast — Thu, 01 Nov 2007 10:15:33 -0800

So, apparently some of those Sudanese orphans were neither Sudanese nor orphans. The organization Zoe's Ark may have fucked the fuck up.

Go West, Young Orphans

amyms — Sat, 22 Sep 2007 22:00:25 -0800

Orphan Trains of Kansas. A collection of histories, personal stories, newspaper accounts, pictures and other references. Beginning in 1854, charitable institutions in New York City began sending orphans on trains to the west to find new families, feeling that the children would fare better out west than on the streets of New York. Orphan trains arrived in Kansas between 1867 and 1930, and some 5000-6000 children were placed in Kansas homes.

The orphan train era

Brian B. — Fri, 16 Mar 2007 19:23:32 -0800

Orphan trains. From 1853 to 1929 an ambitious relocation adoption program run by the Children's Aid Society, founded by Charles Loring Brace, sent kids from urban slums and orphanages out to live on Midwestern farms, with mixed results. Some became state governors, others suffered abuse or servitude. Even though we use the name Orphan Train, few of these children were true orphans. Some were half-orphans, having lost one parent to disease or accident. Some had both parents but had run away do to abuse or neglect. By 1910, CAS had "placed out" over 106,000 children and the program ran for another 19 years. Also, similar programs were run by the New York Foundling Home (called Baby Trains), New York Juvenile Asylum, and the Boston Home for Little Wanderers. In all, at least, 200,000 children found themselves moved from the city to small towns and farms across the Nation.

Orphaned technology or technology orphans?

GuyZero — Fri, 08 Dec 2006 13:59:20 -0800

Where once geeks' biggest worry was orphaned technology, now it's technology orphans.

For the Iraqi orphans

exhilaration — Fri, 25 Mar 2005 08:41:11 -0800

A foundation has been established to help the Iraqi orphans that survived the January shooting (earlier Mefi thread) by American forces. There's also more recent information about the shooting in this Newsweek article. Check out this BoingBoing post to read an e-mail from the photographer that witnessed the shooting and is now establishing this foundation.

The FDA's for Losers.

schroedinger — Thu, 02 Dec 2004 14:55:10 -0800

New York's HIV Experiment. Need test subjects for your highly experimental, possibly lethal drugs but don't want to deal with consent issues? Don't worry, New York City's Association for Children's Services has got you covered! Just ask GlaxoSmithKline about its continuing antiretroviral drug trials. Not only does the ACS provide it and other pharmaceutical companies with high-quality HIV-positive orphans and foster children, but it administers the drugs to them as well! Kids not willing to take the pills? The ACS will stick peg-tubes in their stomachs. Foster parents refusing to give kids the drugs? The ACS will charge them with abuse and put the kids somewhere else. Wondering about Tuskegee comparisons or how the combination of side-effects like diarrhea and swollen joints with no evidence of benefits fits into a cost-benefit analysis? Why? This is the ACS! They can do whatever they want.

Hidden Lives Revealed

plep — Tue, 06 Jul 2004 00:37:39 -0800

Hidden Lives Revealed. 'Hidden Lives Revealed provides an intriguing encounter with children who were in the care of The Children's Society in late Victorian and early 20th Century Britain. ' Via the 24 Hour Museum.

Orphans used for experimental HIV drug tests.

The God Complex — Sat, 03 Apr 2004 22:59:40 -0800

"Orphans and babies as young as three months old have been used as guinea pigs in potentially dangerous medical experiments sponsored by pharmaceutical companies, an Observer investigation has revealed.

"British drug giant GlaxoSmithKline is embroiled in the scandal. The firm sponsored experiments on the children from Incarnation Children's Centre, a New York care home that specialises in treating HIV sufferers and is run by Catholic charities." [link]

The Lost Boys Come to America

jonson — Fri, 03 Jan 2003 20:33:11 -0800

The Lost Boys of the Sudan are a group of nearly 17,000 orphans whose parents were murdered and whose homes were destroyed by a government miltary turned against them. They marched on foot, without food or water, under attack from hungry predators & occasional strafing miltary fire for several years until settling in a squalid refugee camp in Kenya; nearly a decade later, the U.S. began a humanitarian policy of importing them, a few at a time, and resettling the lucky few in cities such as Chicago, Atlanta, and even Fargo, N.D. (NYTimes, reg req'd)

prozaction — Mon, 04 Feb 2002 14:31:17 -0800

The American Academy of Pediatrics announces its support of adoption by same-sex parents. "...a new AAP policy statement, "Coparent or Second-Parent Adoption by Same-Sex Parents" supports legal and legislative efforts that provide for the possibility of adoption of those children by the second parent or coparent in same-sex relationships."

bunnyfire — Sat, 01 Dec 2001 15:58:51 -0800

What is best for AIDS orphans? For many children around the globe, not only do they face a life without one or more parents because of AIDS/HIV, they also face the stigma of carrying the virus themselves.....