Adoption does not save us

 

meme circulating on twitter

• For Prism Reports, Kimberly Rooney writes about the political undercurrents of adoption and healing from its impact in tandem with her experiences of sexual violence:

Turning away from the truths of adoption might be easier—for adoptive parents, adoptees, and anyone who doesn’t want to challenge the normative ideas our culture has about family—but it makes it more difficult for adoptees to process our experiences. It denies us the language and narratives in which we can recognize and articulate our own experiences. It minimizes the systemic inequities that tear families apart, the violence of separating a child from their birth family, community, and culture, and the lingering trauma that those children carry into adulthood. 

Following other adoptees online through hashtags like #AdopteeVoices has also introduced me to adoptees who are similarly critical about adoption as a system, who fight for adoption abolition and who connect adoption to other forms of family separation and violations of people’s bodily autonomy. 

Kimberly Rooney 高小荣

Kimberly Rooney 高小荣 is a writer and editor based in Pittsburgh, Pa. They are a copy editor for Prism, and their writing focuses on racial, adoptee, and queer identities. Follow them on Twitter at... More by Kimberly Rooney 高小荣

 

Defending ICWA

The Necessity of the Indian Child Welfare Act HERE

Congress today has substantial and sweeping powers over Native nations and Native people, including the authority to abolish tribes and tribal reservations, and to expand or restrict tribal authority. These powers come from a series of Supreme Court decisions in the late 1800s and early 1900s that were based on racist views about American Indians—that Congress needed virtually unlimited authority over American Indian affairs because Natives were not equipped to govern themselves. The Court reasoned that Natives’ “weakness and helplessness” gave the federal government “broad domain” over them; later cases pointed to Natives’ “condition of tutelage or dependency.” Those decisions gave Congress more power when it comes to Native affairs than it has when it comes to taxing or spending or regulating interstate commerce.

But over time, these cases have come to produce different results. These same decisions have empowered Congress, in recent years, to protect Native families from various new and old forms of discrimination, imperialism, and white supremacy. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit is poised to decide whether that will remain so. It will hear the case later today.

Oral Argument

More articles:

Morongo tribe heading to 5th Circuit Court of Appeals to defend Indian Child Welfare Act  

Cherokee Nation to be present at rehearing of Brackeen case