Many of the folks who have seen my little Blog here in these few hours after its “birth” have come across via two main links. Both Marley Greiner, author of The Daily Bastardette and Antiprincess, author of I Shame the Matriarchy have kindly (and unexpectedly!) blogged little “birth announcements”;

Here on the Daily Bastardette

and here over on I Shame the Matriarchy.

I felt Antiprincess’ (antiprincess’?) blog deserved a response post, so even though it’s posted over in her comments, I thought I’d repost it here as it reflects much of my thinking and is somewhat of a response to someone well versed in repro related issues, but new to the maze that adoptionland can be. I urge you to read her post in its entirety prior to reading my response below.

And again, thanks to you both.

---

Baby Love Child’s comment-
Well, for starters, let me first take a moment to thank antiprincess for blogging the existence of my little corner of the Bastard blogosphere, it was unexpected, and very kind. I appreciate the visitors coming across to my little blog as a result of it.

Naturally, I have a lot to say both about antiprincess’ original post and about comments left here as well.

But I’ll begin with antiprincess’ own post. I think it’s actually pretty interesting that you’ve taken the ‘listen and think first’ stance, as the hardest words for most Americans to say seem to be “I don’t know”. In an age when everyone seems to think they know something about everything, to even begin by saying, “I don’t know, but I’m listening” is a rare trait indeed.

Thank you for that. It’s rare that anyone listens directly to those directly affected. It’s all too easy to label us “adopted children” and thus disregard our authentic voices and autonomous decision making, but that’s not what you did. (I’m working on a language post about Bastards and the other terminology used to both describe us and dismiss us, even as we speak. And naturally, as usual, yes, I have a lot to say.)

But going back to your post, without quoting you at length, allow me to provide an alternate ‘root’ to that “voice”. You identify it as a “Myth-of-Patriarchy voice”, but I tend to disagree.

The “Myth-of-Patriarchy voice as Rickie Solinger has pointed out so clearly in her books, particularly “Wake Up Little Suzie: Single Pregnancy and Race before Roe v. Wade” varies greatly from where any given pregnant womyn sits.

For some, the “Voices of others” (as I’ll relabel it, among other things, it may just as easily be an attitude conveyed by other womyn in a womyn’s life) may say the pregnancy is ‘wrong/bad’ etc, but for others, the “Voices of others” can be just as strongly insisting they bear to term against their will.

We live in the American hypernatalist culture, wherein birth is often (not always) highly valued, and regarded as “good”, particularly for (many) white womyn. The inverse is of course also societally reinforced, that abortion, is often viewed as “bad” (something I have argued against over and over, this being my opus, if you REALLY feel you must.)

In short whether the “Voice” screams “get rid of it” or “you must bear to term” is not universal, if anything, it varies greatly on one’s social status. It can be dependent upon age, on race, on relationships.

The real trick is to get beyond the internalized “Voices of others” and back to authentic and autonomist voice, of each womyn herself- which I think is exactly where antiprincess ended up.

Now our own authentic voices may also say, “I want to continue this pregnancy regardless of what the “Voices of others” scream at me, OR it may (just as validly) say, in the face of my own poverty, my own situation, my own family, birth for me, would be wrong.

The problem comes in when a womyn’s authentic internal voice comes headlong into an impasse with an external situation- a desperate desire to give birth, but the realization that there are simply no resources for her to draw upon to do so. Thus due to external realities womyn feel forced into outcomes, birth or abortion (as adoption is not a reproductive decision, but a “parenting/custody” decision- when consent is taken into account, it sometimes isn’t) that they felt were in violation of their own internal voices.

This is then complicated by the fact that our own internal voices can also change through time, rewrite our own histories after the fact to line up with outcomes, etc. Desires change from day to day, hour to hour.

Add in the ongoing pressures of cultural expectations, such that womyn are not viewed as fully human if they do not participate in the act of motherhood at some point during their reproductive lifespan, and lots of internal authentic voices get overridden. The consequences of a living a lifetime childfree are seen as mine fields of potential regret.

Couple this mother = ‘normal’ human womyn /vs./ childfree = freak underlying sentiment coupled with the mass infertility many couples are facing and the pressure to get *a* child, *any* child and pressures toward particular outcomes become great.

As for parenthood and punishment, shame and ‘erasing the stigmas’ of ‘unwed motherhood’ through the ‘rite’ of adoption, there’s a book in there somewhere. But yes, many still continue to view motherhood as a punishment for sexual activity, just as they simultaneously embrace adoption and the womyn as parent, never to see their offspring as a ‘flip side of the coin’ punishment. (All dependent upon the usual sets of factors such as race/age/etc.)

Without creating an even longer post, let me just briefly add how much I appreciated antiprincess’ paragraph about how many of us Bastards are indeed adults and that the “Bureaucracy Gods” (love the term!) absolutely hold power and potential threat over our lives.

The mere act of blogging about the current state of adoption could potentially be enough to encourage someone at vital statistics to ‘misplace’ any records pertaining to me in the circular file.

But to paraphrase, well behaved Bastards rarely get their records.