The Declassified Adoptee

Brigid at Feministe wants to know if adoption is a feminist issue.  Brigid asks: How can or should we view adoption as a feminist issue? As a class, race, or disability issue? Whose rights stand to be compromised when adoption is or is not an available option? Does every child have a right to be raised by the people whose genetic material helped create them? Does every genetic parent have a right to raise their genetic children? Do people who are unable (though biology or circumstance), or do not desire, to conceive children have a right to raise children? If you believe adoption is problematic, what circumstances would make it less so? Yes, adoption is a feminist issue. Its structure of power regards one mother as being less worthy to parent than another because of her marital status or her income. Unmarried, pregnant women in the 50′s-70′s were scolded and ushered into maternity homes where their babies were taken from them. See “Wake up Little Susie” by Ricki Solinger and