I saw this story about Korean adoptees in the NY Times. The story had a special resonance with me–Oregon is home to many Korean adoptees due to the fact that Holt (mentioned in the article) is here, and some of my best friends are Korean adoptees (yes, it sounds hokey, but it’s true).
I knew the stigma of adoption in Korea was bad, but I had no idea it was this bad. From the very first paragraph,
Daunted by the stigma surrounding adoption here, Cho Joong-bae and Kim In-soon delayed expanding their family for years. When they finally did six years ago, Mr. Cho chose to tell his elderly parents that the child was the result of an affair, rather than admit she was adopted.
They even have companies who make pillows designed to fake pregnancies in order to hide adoptions:
So when the couple decided to adopt three years ago, they chose to fake a pregnancy, as many adoptive parents here do. The couple moved, and the husband, now 43 and a real estate agent, switched jobs.
The wife, an employee at a telecommunications company, began wearing maternity clothes over a special pillow, made by a company recommended by the couple’s adoption agency.
I’m glad Korea is taking steps to get rid of the stigma. As you can probably tell from the final few paragraphs, issues like this rarely have easy solutions. But if people work hard at it, perhaps they can make things better than they currently are.
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