On one of my email lists, an adoptive parent who already has one Asian child, voiced concerns about now adopting an African-American child. Her concern was that her Asian daughter gets a great deal of attention when out in public for being “beautiful”, and she was worried that society in general does not see African-American children as attractive, and she did not want her black child to grow up feeling less beautiful than her Asian child. The woman was worried about one child feeling inferior to another because of racial issues.

I think what the real issue here is, is the sort of “hierarchy” that seems to exist in the adoption world. White kids are the top tier. Asian, Hispanic or biracial kids are in the middle, and black kids are the bottom of the barrel. It sounds horrible, and to be honest it even makes me sick to my stomach to type it, but it’s a real mentality that exists, (not with every one of course, but it does exist).

I have heard time and time again from adoptive parents or prospective adoptive parents that they would be “o.k.” with adopting an Asian or Hispanic child, but that they wouldn’t feel comfortable adopting an African American child. Now I fully embrace the fact that everyone needs to do what is right and should not adopt any child that they do not feel 100% confident that they can love and parent, and yet I think that any parent who really feels that Asian or Hispanic or bi-racial is ok but black is not, has some serious soul-searching to do.

I have heard of this hierarchy of sorts from adoption agencies as well. The domestic agency we used to get our son told us that they had long waiting lists of couples wanting to adopt a Caucasian infant, a fairly even number of bi-racial infants and parents wanting to adopt them, and that they often had African American babies available without any parents waiting. This “demand” for lighter-skinned children is also often reflected in the fact that many agencies have higher fees for Caucasian babies, lower fees for bi-racial babies and even lower fees for black kids. I understand that when agencies lower their fees that they are trying to attract more parents to consider harder to place children (for age, special needs or skin color reasons) and make it easier for these children to find forever families (and we have been grateful for these lower fees with several of our adoptions), and yet, what message does that send? That darker-skinned children are a bargain...a discounted price?? Ick.

To me, this is one illustration that racism is alive and well in our country. It makes me sad to think that some of my children would be more desirable than others to other adoptive families. In my eyes they are all invaluable in heart, soul, potential, love and eternal worth.

So, to the family that is concerned about how society will treat their African American child compared to the way that their Asian child is treated, I don’t really know what to say. The reality is that Asian people, African American people, Hispanic people and Caucasian people are still treated differently in our society. Our African American baby boy is frequently told that he is darling, gorgeous, handsome, cute, etc. when we are out in public (and it is all true), but I know that society’s perception of him will change as he turns into a black teenage boy and a black adult male in the U.S. and that is something that we will have to deal with and prepare for.

So what do you do? I certainly would not tell this family not to adopt an AA child because of these realities. I would encourage them to adopt the children that they feel are right for their family, educate themselves as best as possible and do the best they can to raise their children to feel loved, valuable and equal to the other members of their family.

We can’t change society all at once, but one person at a time, one experience at a time, we can make a difference. At least in our homes, our children can be equal in love, rights, opportunities, self-worth, beauty, etc. My husband and I plan to try and raise all of our children to have high-self esteems, self-confidence, self-respect and pride in who they are and where they come from, and combine that with a lion’s share of love. We’ll educate ourselves and our family on racial issues and prepare all of our children the best we can to help them be happy, confident, successful adults.

And hopefully with all of that, it won’t matter quite as much what society thinks.