Tragic, really

I mostly opt not to write about whether or not I agree with China's decisions regarding . . . well, just about anything. As the lucky recipient of their generosity in sharing one of their nation's richest resources (their children), I mainly choose to feel grateful and keep my mouth shut. Okay, it's true that I kind of defended China when that one guy wrote about how they are selling their babies to Americans and setting unreasonable requirements to qualify. But this is a little different.

You see, from what we know, China places between 400 and 700 children each month in homes outside their country. We don't know how many children are in orphanages in China. But we do know that there are many, many, many waiting families around the world-- just longing to be matched with their children.

It seems like if China wanted to, they could place more children with families abroad. If they wanted to. They like to keep the number to a certain range, though. And I suppose that's their sovereign right. As is the one-child rule in the first place. But the fact that the wait for a Chinese adoption has grown so dramatically in the past couple years makes this story(Cases of Forced Abortion Surface in China) from NPR all the more tragic.

Here's a brief summary of the article, which you can listen to at the above-link:
Chinese law prohibits births to unmarried couples. It also sometimes allows families to have a second child if they pay the hefty fine to do so. But recently, in one area that is over quota on its birth statistics, officials have been cracking down and literally forcing women to have abortions-- late, late, late in pregnancy. At the seven-month-mark and beyond.

Now, I've never carried a baby to term or anything. I don't know what it feels like to have something wiggling around inside me. To feel that life grow. But I imagine if I had, I would be horrified to have someone literally rip the child out of me against my wishes. Whether or not you are pro-choice or pro-life, I think we could all agree that when a woman chooses to carry a baby to term, she should be able to. I know that these are examples of women who wanted to keep and parent their children. But if I were a betting woman, I'd venture to bet that those women, given the choice of a forced late-term abortion or placing those children in stable, loving homes-- well, they'd choose the latter. And I guess that what seems particularly sad to me about all this is that it's a lose-lose-lose. The baby loses. The baby's mother loses. And families anxious to have additional members lose.

Call me judgmental, but I think it's just tragic, really.