Tuesday, September 10, 2013

Reuters Investigates: Adopted Children Traded Online

I just read an incredibly disturbing 4-part series about "re-homing" or the practice of finding a new home for the adopted child you no longer want to or care to raise.

Did you know that you could go online and give away your kid like he or she is a pound puppy? It's true.

Reuters interviewed a few parents who actually allowed themselves to be photographed and interviewed for this story. Personally, I'd be hiding my face in shame if this were me but they felt justified in their actions. She was too hard to manage. Or, therapy was too expensive and inconvenient, or better yet, the state told me that if I gave her to foster care, I'd still have to financially support her. So they all found a complete stranger on the Internet to take their children. Yeah, that makes sense.

I do understand what it's like to raise a traumatized child. And as a foster parent, I know what I'm getting into. We foster parents receive tons of training, social worker support and background information on the children. Even armed with all that though, still between 10-25% of foster adoptions disrupt (according state records).

It's true that with an international adoption, people receive no training, no state services or support and very little information on the child's history. They are sometimes ill-equipped to handle a difficult kid with behavioral issues and they decide, hey this isn't what I signed up for.

But it's wrong to give your kid away to strangers on the Internet. I don't care what the reason.

What's even worse is that states are not doing anything about it. It's apparently completely legal to give your adopted children to a registered sex offender, as some people interviewed in the story did.

What? He was a pedophile? I didn't know!

Yeah you didn't know because you couldn't be bothered to check him out.

You know, I am far from being a perfect parent. But if something were ever to happen to me (God forbid) my son would go to live with a loving family member...not a stranger on the Internet. Just sayin'.

Want to read this insane story for yourself? Check it out here.

No comments:

Post a Comment