On Roe v Wade: I am not your political talking point
Pro-life or pro-choice, keep me out of your mouth
Like many people throughout the United States, I’ve been left reeling after Roe v Wade was repealed by the Supreme Court. I have my own stance on the subject (which is pro-choice) but wading into the debate often becomes an offensive and tiresome exercise given the way people like me are dragged into the discussion from either side.
I’ll tell you what it is not fun to be when abortion comes up and that is an adopted child. It seems that adoption is dragged into the discussion by one side or the other and in some of the most absurd and offensive ways possible.
Pro-Life
The pro-life talking points are obvious. They claim that adoption is a good alternative to abortion. They fail to take into account the process of pregnancy and childbirth, both of which can permanently alter a woman’s body or even place her life at risk. If you just ignore 9 months of pregnancy and a likely laborious child-birth then you can see adoption as an alternative.
The experiences of the mother are completely erased from the discussion which creates an incomplete view of the process. This approach lacks compassion and humanity, it treats women as nothing more than incubators and is often spouted by people who have never adopted a child, let alone a disabled child, themselves.
What if your birth-mother aborted you?
Thank you for asking, Susan. For a start, I wouldn’t have to have this ridiculous discussion with you.
If my birth mother aborted me I would not have had the neural capacity to even form an opinion on the matter. The life of a few people in my immediate social circle would be changed (not necessarily for the better or worse, as that is unknowable) but other than that I am an average person and the world would most certainly keep spinning if I never graced it with my presence.
What kind of answer do people expect me to reply to this? “Society would collapse as we know it and the world would end in a cataclysmic event. The only thing preventing this was me being born. You’re welcome.”
My sister’s, niece’s, brother’s, uncle’s cousin is adopted so I do have experience with adoption
The question was “how many children have you adopted?” If the answer is “none”, then do not presume to speak about how easy an alternative adoption is to abortion. If you’ve had no experience with it, you cannot profess to speak to its ease. Thank you.
But there are so many loving couples waiting to adopt a baby!
Sign up to be a surrogate then, I hear you even get paid. What? You don’t want to put yourself through pregnancy and childbirth just to give these couples a baby? Then maybe don’t sign other, disenfranchised women up to do it for you.
Pro-Choice
The pro-choice crowd tend to miss the forest for the trees. They know that adoption is not a good alternative to abortion. But rather than bringing up the relevant refutations they just devolve into insulting adopted children, undermining our lives or displaying ignorance about how adoption works. Bonus points for all three!
Oh, you just want them to wallow in foster care then!
No one wants that, Carl, because “adoption” and “foster care” are not synonymous with one another. It is highly unlikely that a woman who is choosing adoption instead of abortion would place her child in foster care. More than likely she would work with an adoption agency to meet prospective adoptive couples and that couple would then support her throughout her pregnancy. The baby would go home with the adoptive parents from the hospital. Children placed through private adoption agencies usually are adopted before they turn 1 year old and they have good outcomes.
People who jump immediately from “place baby to adoption” to “but foster care is terrible!” show their ignorance. There are three different types of adoption (private, foster care and international) and they have markedly different experiences and outcomes.
Oh sure, so the kid can have issues for life
The number of times I have seen some pro-choicer, who I was supporting in an abortion debate turn around and dehumanize me and people like me is alarming. It’s an offensive and unacceptable stigma.
Adopted children fare very well in the United States. Most of us know that we are adopted. It is true that adopted children have higher rates of some mental health disorders such as depression and anxiety. However, that should not be summed up as “having issues”. And it is a mistake to assume that adoption plays a causative factor. If a child has to be seized from an abusive household and placed into state custody until they are adopted, do we lay the “cause” of their depression on the adoption, or on the abuse? How do we even quantify such a thing?
In addition, adopted children tend to have greater access to medical healthcare than the average. It is possible that adoptive parents are simply more likely to take an adoptive child to a psychologist when they notice behavioral problems, both due to their higher-income status and the fact that their child is adopted. Adopted children may simply be more likely to be assessed and diagnosed than the average population.
To put it another way, adopted children in the US have better outcomes than the children of single parents. Are you similarly arguing that single moms shouldn’t raise their children because then their kids will “have issues” or is that just something you reserved for adoptees?
Oh, so it’s not okay to have an abortion but it’s okay to abandon a baby?
No, Carl. Because placing a child for adoption is not abandonment. There are currently more couples waiting to adopt a baby than there are babies available. Birth mothers meeting and selecting adoptive parents are not “abandoning” their children. In many cases, they are making a selfless decision. Insulting birth mothers to get one over on pro-lifers is incredibly low.
Considerations
There are welfare concerns that pertain to adoption. Disabled and neurodivergent children are much less likely to be adopted. Black babies are less adoptable as well. These are important fears when predicting how the end of Roe can impact foster care and adoption.
However, it is not lost on me that many people do not seem to consider this an important talking point right up until it is time to own a pro-lifer on the internet. Then suddenly, the problems with adoption must become front and center and preferably made to sound as dire as possible. But we in the adoption community never otherwise receive your support, your interest or even your concern. You’re silent until you need to speak poorly of us.
What is a far more relevant point is that adoption cannot address the desire to avoid pregnancy and childbirth. When you look at the most common reasons for abortion, you can easily see that adoption fails to address these concerns in any meaningful way. Pregnancy is expensive, childbirth is expensive. It will take away time from your education, career or other children.
It’s very common that adoptees like myself dread it when adoption comes up during abortion debates. It results in some of the most dehumanizing and insulting arguments about the lives of real people. One side wants to use you as a stick to beat and guilt-trip desperate women into submission. The other side wants to turn your life into a sob story even when it isn’t true.
TLDR: Adoptees are people. We have varied views, opinions, and experiences and we don’t need to be used as pawns in an abortion debate.
