Part 2 – Discrimination
Due to space and time constraints, I have chosen to discuss this survey in several parts. You can read the whole survey at www.adoptioninstitute.org/proed/korfindings.html. Any quotes in this blog come from this survey.
The Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute, in conjunction with Holt International Children’s Services, undertook a survey of the participants in The Gathering to gain greater insight into the experiences of Korean adoptees since they began arriving in the U.S. and Europe in 1955…
I found this whole survey to be very interesting because it covered adoptees from 1955-1985. (I was adopted from Korea in 1975. My sister was adopted from Korea in 1984.)
Discrimination is, unfortunately, a fact of life. I have always been lucky. I never had to face the kind of evil hate that you hear about on the television – neo-Nazism or KKK. Mostly, I faced negative stereotypes and ridiculous stereotypes. Growing up in a city where minorities were a true minority, it couldn’t be helped.
The majority of respondents reported that they had experienced some form of discrimination while they were growing up. Race (70%) was cited more often as the basis for discrimination than was adoption (28%).
Little things were often the hardest for me when I was growing up. Curious children can be cruel (without meaning to be) because they tend to point out differences without tact. I took my comfort from my parents though. I always turned to them when I didn’t understand someone’s reaction and they always explained it to me…they didn’t gloss over it or tell me not to worry. I knew, even when I was young, that it was something to worry about.
One of the quotes really struck me on a personal level.
“The only thing that bothered me was that a lot of people asked me if (or assumed) I was Chinese or Japanese;”
So many Korean adoptees are having trouble really understanding who they are and to have someone threaten that tentative hold on identity is very upsetting. To someone of Caucasian descent, this is probably difficult to understand, but a good analogy would be how would you feel if you are a woman and someone constantly called you a man, or vice versa.
Korean children are going to constantly run into prejudice and hate. Unfortunately, for the adopted Korean child, I think it is worse. It’s worse because we don’t feel like we’re Korean, but people are constantly trying to categorize us as Asian. We know that we’re not really Korean (in the strictest sense) and here are people who are not letting us be what we are in our hearts. It kind of leaves us floating with no real identity of our own.
What I learned from the experience is that I did have my own identity. My identity was grounded in the fact that I was not Korean and I was not Caucasian. I was just me and I came to really like me. That’s a point that I really hope my son can come to one day. It’s a nice place to be. I got there because of the support of my parents and, to a lesser degree, my extended family and friends. I can’t stress how important love is in the whole equation. I just wish it worked out that way for everyone.
