I’m not so sure why I would be surprised that a major media outlet like the NYT is blocking some voices from being heard. Certainly that’s always the way it has been. Somebody once asked me about the “minority agenda” and I responded by asking about the white agenda.
Because clearly there is an agenda that supports privilege.
We’ve seen it before when the voices of people of color are suppressed. When the majority opinion is brayed forcefully in the media, and the dissenting voice is written off as radical. Or angry. Or bitter. Just those people playing the race card again.
Nobody ever mentions how the deck has been stacked.
So when people who are “othered” in more than one sense–because they are people of color and because they were adopted–are silenced, it shouldn’t surprise me at all. We all know who holds the power in adoptive relationships. It isn’t Willow Janowitz.
But I am surprised.
Because what this tells me is that adoptive parents don’t want their children to have a voice. They negate the voices of people of color and adoptees and adoptees of color. And in so doing, they teach their children that these voices are unimportant. Parents teach their children that the children can and should be silenced.
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November 16, 2007 at 4:13 pm
Patricia
Please edit that last paragraph to say “some adoptive parents”!
I have been reading everything I can over the last four years to make sure my son grows up strong in his identity as a black man and an international adoptee…
I too abhor those people who try to shut down voices they do not agree with or want to worry their comfortable heads about…
November 16, 2007 at 4:30 pm
resistance
Because … why? Because you need to be acknowledged?
November 16, 2007 at 9:53 pm
Patricia
Because I respect you highly for your activism against stereotypes and “isms” but in this case, you are quick to paint all adoptive parents with one brush. And with that you silence my voice too.
November 16, 2007 at 9:58 pm
Patricia
and by the way I meant figuratively edit – not literally!!
November 16, 2007 at 10:00 pm
resistance
Oh, you mean like reverse racism.
November 16, 2007 at 10:50 pm
Sue
It sucks to be invisible as one of the “good ones”.
Doesn’t happen that often though. I am usually praised and patronized for my adoptions. The rare times it does happen, when I feel unfairly painted with a single brush stroke, I try to remember that my kids and will experience these feelings, repeatedly, throughout their lives. Right now they are “cute, lucky orphans”. One day they will just be brown and vulnerable to everything from stereotypes to tasers.
Resistance: was it the comments or the censorship that surprised you? The comments do not surprise me at all. The failure to print dissenting responses does. Dissent happens in journalism and unless there were threats or profanity, I don’t understand why it would be squelched.
I’d like to know whom they are protecting? Janowitz as a darling writer? Adoptive parents as a darling mass market? Certainly not the children, the only ones in need of protection and lacking the same.
November 17, 2007 at 12:10 am
multiracialsky
Similar to Patricia’s relaction here, I remember bristling at the title of the “Why I Hate Adoptive Parents” series of posts–even though they were all reasons that *I* really dislike some adoptive parents as well–and I am one.
I’ve had to really check myself and my assumptions about what I’m *due* as a (White-appearing) individual. I think all people are should receive the same respect (regardless of race, gender, sexuality, socio-economic class, etc.) but that is simply not how people are treated in the U.S. today.
In my opinion, Resist Racism is first and foremost a safe and protected place for People of Color. As a parent of 4 multiracial children (2 of whom are visibly of color), my sensitivities lie with my children–and how they are going to be perceived and treated in this country and world.
What I’m trying to say is, Patricia, I was with you just a few months back–but I’ve been helped to open my eyes a little bit wider. Sometimes it’s not about me *at all*.
November 17, 2007 at 1:26 am
Winters Wrath
To the adoptive parents in the room:
If you knew, deep down inside, that you weren’t silencing your adopted children, you wouldn’t have felt the need to respond.
November 18, 2007 at 3:04 am
sinoangle
Sue wrote:
“Dissent happens in journalism and unless there were threats or profanity, I don’t understand why it would be squelched.”
As a regular writer of letters to the paper (not the NYT, but my local papers), none of which have been published, and none of which include threats or profanity, I have come to believe that dissent doesn’t happen in journalism at all.
Newspapers have an editorial line, and those who point out flaws in that line don’t get published. Occasionally they’ll let a lone voice say something on a subject they really don’t care much about, but when they’ve done a big spread or a headline or a recurring feature on something, the reader doesn’t get to say anything against it unless it’s some inconsequential witticism, a correction of facts or a point of information.
I’m not the first to say it, but “free press” is something of a contradiction in terms. All evidence points to the fact that the press, in general, supports the status quo (consider the case of the anti-islamic cartoons of a couple years ago) and privilege.
November 18, 2007 at 4:25 am
Patricia
Winters Wrath,
or perhaps my son is lucky to have an adoptive mom who “resists racism” and resists letting me or him be stereotyped by anyone…
November 18, 2007 at 2:46 pm
margaret
Winter’s Wraith….that just isn’t true. You can believe that if you want.
Patricia….I’m an amom and I understand your point. We can be sensitive about how our children are treated AND sensitive about how we are treated. In this case I’m not sure resistance was trying to paint all of us with that same broad brush though. It’s been established that there were adoptive parent voices (mine included) that were silenced in the instance of which this post speaks (NYTimes “Relative Choices”). Did you read Tama Janowitz’s essay? They published the “agreeing” voices of more than 100 aparents, yet wouldn’t let at least a dozen dissenting adoptee voices (and some aparents who dissented) be published.
November 18, 2007 at 3:51 pm
Winters Wrath
Just keep patting yourself on the back, Patricia.
Second, I’m not stereotyping: I’m paying attention. On racism blogs, the real white allies don’t continually ask the blogger to hedge statements with “some white people.” Instead, the allies know that they’re working hard to resist racism. Consequently, when the blogger makes comments about white people, the white allies know that the blogger is referring to the subset of white people who are plagued with white liberal guilt and/or a strong belief in colorblindness. (Or, in rarer circumstances, the white people who are so comfortable with their racism they don’t even bother to use “states’ rights” or “immigration” codes.)
This explains it pretty well. Even though it’s about race and not the triad, I’ve noticed the same dynamics at work in the triad. Only here the White Liberal Guilt is compounded by Adoptive Parent Guilt.
Finally, even if the post had mentioned you specifically, your response was not appropriate. It’s like what Mandolin has said: if you’re white and accused of racism by someone who’s black, say “excuse me” and move on. Like race, someone in your position of power cannot truly determine whether your actions effectively prevent your adoptive children from being silenced. Only your children can — and even then, only when they’re old enough to thoughtfully question and examine their adoption experiences.
November 19, 2007 at 12:29 am
Patricia
point taken…
November 19, 2007 at 1:41 am
kattycake
Hi Patricia,
If you are looking
If you are hoping for validation, well, you just won’t find that here either.
If you are willing to challenge yourself and all of your beliefs, well, good luck, because you might not find that here either.
I notice that your last reply is “point taken” but for me, that’s not enough either.
November 19, 2007 at 3:23 am
Sue
Sinoangle, I really appreciate your well-spoken and thoughtful replies to my comments. I realize that I have a rather naive and overly-optimistic viewpoint, based on a liberal white upbringing.
I have written letters to the editor that were published but again, duh, they were within the “editorial line”. Our local paper is accused of being too liberal by conservatives and too conservative by liberals precisely because they stick to the dead center. I have never written a letter that went too far over the liberal edge for them.
Apparently objecting to racist stereotyping, particularly as related to adoption rhetoric is just too radical.