An Untraditional Family, An Unconditional Love
Back in the "bleeding-heart liberal" days of the early 1970's, good-hearted folks like the Bates family, writer J. Douglas and his wife Gloria, wanting to have another child without having another baby, chose to adopt a daughter -- one, and then a second -- without any conditions or preferences with regard to race. They could not forsee how their kind-hearted, thoughtful decision could affect them, their two sons, and the young women their daughters would become. Lynn and Liska, two girls of color who never understood their place in this white family, both saw their situations in mirror images of the love that the Bates family shone on them -- while the Bateses showered them with affection, it only served to increase their fears that one day, for some reason, for no reason, they would be sent away.
Back in the "bleeding-heart liberal" days of the early 1970's, good-hearted folks like the Bates family, writer J. Douglas and his wife Gloria, wanting to have another child without having another baby, chose to adopt a daughter -- one, and then a second -- without any conditions or preferences with regard to race. They could not forsee how their kind-hearted, thoughtful decision could affect them, their two sons, and the young women their daughters would become. Lynn and Liska, two girls of color who never understood their place in this white family, both saw their situations in mirror images of the love that the Bates family shone on them -- while the Bateses showered them with affection, it only served to increase their fears that one day, for some reason, for no reason, they would be sent away.
Their lives, especially their teen years, were spent in a perpetual game of "chicken," wondering just how far they could push their parents before the guillotine would drop and sever them from their family. In fact, while Liska was adopted to give Lynn a sister who looked like her, it only emphasized to Lynn that she could be easily replaced, and by a younger, cuter, more pliant child, with better hair.
Both grow up to be young women caught in a trap of unstable, dangerous relationships and out-of-wedlock children. But the Bateses never quite gave up on their daughters, and when faced with challenges that they never expected, reflectively wonder how they could have adopted black children without ever having had a relationship (or even a conversation) with any black person.
When in 1972 when the National Association of Black Social Workers took a strong stand against transracial adoption, the Bateses were shocked, but unwavering in their belief that they had done the right thing. And contrary to the words of Spike Lee, the right thing for this family to do was to create an untraditional family, held together by an unconditional love.
February 8, 2008
This review was orginally published on www.Amazon.com.
February 8, 2008
This review was orginally published on www.Amazon.com.
1 comment:
I am a bi-racial woman that was adopted in 1974 by a white couple. I am very anxious to read "Gift Children" by DougBates. It almost sounds like my story. Althoughvery educated and liberal both of my parents had very little contact with African Americans before and during my upbringing.They adopted myself at age 4, my brother as an infant from Cambodia, and had two biolgical children of their own. we were raised primarily in a mi-sized town in Northern California where our surroundings were predominantly White. Though they made mistakes as ANY parents make they raised all of us with unconditional love. As a grown woman with children of my own I realize what a selfless committment they made so many years ago.
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