on adopting black children (and children of color) in the united states
I will say upfront that I do not know much about the adoption process (in the united states or elsewhere) and this is just an attempt to express feelings about the politics surrounding adoption of black & brown children.
before my final exam in my class yesterday one of the well meaning white women in class stated that she wanted to adopt “little black babies …so I can learn to do their hair.” in her statement she also said “I mean this is i the least racist way possible.” lately I have laid off talking about race politics with white people but this is something I could not let go because she said it so loudly and so carelessly.
as a black person I was immediately annoyed and irritated at her statement but when she said “I mean this in the least racist way possible” I already knew she was about to say some fuck shit (sorry don’t have time to mince words). at any rate I don’t think she realizes that no matter how she phrases it what she said is inherently rooted in white supremacy, racism, the exotification of black bodies, and the othering of non-white people.
essentially she is adopting black babies because she can, her ability to be a parent will never be questioned under the current legal system because she is rooted in good white [woman] christian values and will also probably marry a white man, and because she wants a black person/child to teach her a lesson. black people (adults and children) exist to do more than teach a lesson and to give you life experience. if you wanted to learn to do black hair you would do just as well to go to beauty school. if that’s the sole reason you want to adopt a black or brown child then you should reevaluate your desire to adopt black and brown children or children in general.
her statement fuels into exotification and othering because she has turned a natural feature of black babies into an object. she has reduced those children down to their hair and nothing more. she has also othered them because they are different from her and will apparently always be (or else there’d be no lesson to learn). if your child is an ‘other’ to you then they will never feel loved and will always feel as an outsider in their own family. your child should be someone that you love unconditionally and here it certainly seems that the love is contingent upon their hair (and skin color). this also completely ignores the fact that there are black and brown children whose hair and features are not that unlike white people so her statement also makes the black experience very one-sided and exclusionary.
her statement is also troubling because black and brown children in the u.s. are much easier to come by and are cheaper to adopt because typically no one wants a little black child. but the real question is how come when they do it’s always for the other person to be challenged and ultimately conquer that challenge and learn something. this also fuels into a white supremacist thought pattern because she is looking at herself as a savior (the white savior complex). her statement was phrased in an extremely patronizing way as though without her these children would be doomed to a shitty life and they need a white (christian no less) to come in and save them in order to be worthy of anything.
finally I wonder has she given this any thought at all past the learning how to do hair thing? honestly I wonder if she’s ever given any thought on how those children will grow up living in white suburbia with her and her perfect white family. has she thought about the fact that she will need to read these children story books with black faces in order for them not to grow up completely self-hating or gulping down the white supremacy kool-aid. does she even have any color in her friend group (she may now but who knows what’ll happen when she gets older). like will this child ever socialize with other children of color? how will she prepare her child for growing up in a world rampant with hate against black and brown people? how will she prepare her black or brown daughter for the constant flow of shit that will be thrown at them by everyone just by existing.
has she given any of this any thought? probably not and some might say I’ve gone too far and she probably hadn’t thought it through and honestly that’s fine. we make mindless statements all the time but that’s precisely the problem because when white people make mindless statements it cause harm to black and brown people. like I have legit thought of nothing else since she made that statement (well not literally nothing else but you get it). and it’s worth noting that black and brown people can never make statements mindlessly because we must always be ready to have a rationale or reasoning behind anything we think. we must because if not some white person (and non-conscious poc’s) will be ready to attack us immediately. I live my life on the defense, always ready but I just couldn’t deal with that yesterday because I was preoccupied with my final. I hoped that my white allies would have or did step up but I have no idea because I shut everyone else out after that.
all I’m saying is we would all do well to think before we make statements but this is especially applicable to white people because they often times are not taught to unpack or think about situations before they comment on them. words are especially important because words can and do hurt. the phrasing of statements and all of that matter and if they didn’t we wouldn’t have so many ways of saying things.
— addison a. evans.
