Friday

there is something very, very wrong here

Journalist Xan Rice digs deeper in to the story BEHIND MADONNA'S ADOPTION of baby David Banda.

If there is any question that the RIGHT thing for multi-billionare Madonna to do would have been to help this baby stay with his loving father, this article answers that question.

Maybe she could have "adopted" both father and son, and moved them both to London, to a better life.

Maybe she could have "adopted" baby David's entire village, building a water treatment plant, a clinic and a school.

But taking this baby was wrong.

And I have to say that I find it really weird that on the day her new "son" arrived in London, Madonna chose to leave him TO HIT HER PILATES CLASS AT THE GYM..

Maybe the exhausted, bewildered baby was sound asleep when she went out, but you couldn't tear most mothers away from their babies' sides on the first day they come home, even if it's just to hold and rock him while he slept or sit next to his bed.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

i too am troubled by the madonna adoption story, although i don't feel like i have enough background to develop a fully-informed critique.

i'm curious about your interest in this story. you suggested once that adoption was not a way you and jon were considering as a family-building option (this before you knew you were still quite fertile!). are africa and international adoption ethics something you have an interest in and have studied? i'm not suggesting that you can't have an opinion about madonna unless you have, i'm just wondering where your interest/critique springs from.

mamamarta
www.thewidetent.blogspot.com

Julie said...

My personal willingness to adopt is colored by a very, very bad adoption experience in my immediate family from my childhood years.

But I can't say I'd never adopt and I think that in general, adoption is a lovely and important way to create a family. One of my dearest friends is the adoptive mother of one of my favorite little girls, Inara, who hails from Azerbaijan and now lives in Tennessee.

As for why this story has caught my interest, well, I'm not really sure. It just has ;-)

Anonymous said...

i actually don't think there's much here. most adopted children are given up by their (living) parents because of poverty--this story is no different. it would be unreasonable for madonna to support one family in africa. why do that when she can effect more people by putting money towards education or healthcare. i know that oprah has "adopted" several children in africa by paying their expenses, but i do think there is more committment to actually caring for and raising said children.

anyway, i agree that a lot of the red tape was probably not gone through in order to make this happen--but frankly, its really no different than adopting a poor child in america.

Anonymous said...

I don't understand why all the press about this adoption and not Jolie-Pitt ones. And yeah, things like this happen all the time - life is hard and every decision we make to solve one problem inevitably causes another, perhaps unintended one.

Anonymous said...

Also, the father was asked permission beforehand and made what seems to be the right decision: "The decision may seem callous to some in the west - a father abandoning his only son. In Malawi, it seems selfless: I'll give up my right to the child to let him have the opportunities he would never otherwise have. He may lose his culture and even his attachment to his biological relatives - but he will have a chance."
What more is there to say? What could have been done differently that would have had better outcomes?

Anonymous said...

Many parents in poor countries, such as China and India, sell their "surplus" children into slavery. At least this little boy won't end up as a child prostitute or working 12 hours a day in horrible conditions. I'm not a Madonna fan, but I doubt she'd do something harmful to a child.

Anonymous said...

good point about the poor kids in America. how many of these people adopting housefuls of foster kids are willing to go to the bio families and put the same amount of time and effort into getting mom or dad into rehab or therapy or whatever they need to get it together so they can raise their own kids? orare they they just happy to be do gooding and "adding to their family" ??
and to be honest since it is in the US helping the whole family would be a lot easier than overseas