[notch656a]

If you don't want your kids are you saying it's better off to keep them? Isn't adopting them out a way to make sure they have someone they can depend on?

Seems to me it's more "disrespectful/weird/cowardly/inconsiderate" to make some kid suffer for years living in a home where they're unwanted.

[TameAntelope]

Not wanting your kids isn’t really a feeling you should act on, nor is it a feeling society ought to let you indulge.

[thrixton]

"...a feeling society ought to let you indulge."

Everyone has a limit, until you've been pushed past it (and even after), you don't know exactly where it is, and of course it can change.

Every child will have a different impact on your limits, I can certainly understand how a person could be pushed past their limits, by their own child and more-so a relatively unknown child, and I have a lot of sympathy for people in those situations (even the most horrific ones).

As for "society", "they", give parents very little support, it may be different for foster parents but without researching much, I don't have much faith.

Whether society "ought" to be setup this way, that's a hard one, make it too easy and we self-select for a bunch of massive families with an endless bill of support.

My feel is we're erring too much on the side of a lack of support, especially less "social" (e.g. scandinavian countries) focused countries such as USA, UK, AU.

[notch656a]

If "society" feels responsible for the welfare of these kids, then society should recognize a kid is better off in a home where they are wanted. This is so obvious I don't understand why it even needs explained.

[TameAntelope]

A kid is not better off in a home where they are wanted, necessarily.

Continuity may be more important, and the state of “wanting” a child in your home is not some simple boolean value. It’s intellectually dishonest to pretend it is.

[notch656a]

If you simply go by the metric of putting a kid in the home where they are best off, then we can dispense with saying the biological or adopted parents are "necessarily" where the kid should be. We now know you don't think children are "necessarily" better off where they are wanted. Instead perhaps we can use your metric, and assign child to a home where they're "better off" after birth rather than to their biological parents or the person who wants to adopt them. This system could mean assigning the child to an entirely different country and culture at birth "in the interest of the child."

>Continuity may be more important

Continuity is not the only factor at play here. Continuity can turn into a bad thing where you're continuously somewhere where you aren't wanted.

> and the state of “wanting” a child in your home is not some simple boolean value. It’s intellectually dishonest to pretend it is.

The article is about families "un-adopt" a child. It's intellectually dishonest, and ignorant, to make this statement in the context of an article where it's so incredibly into the boolean "false" state of wanting.

[TameAntelope]

Shuffling kids around based on whichever home would be “best” for them according to an evolving situation is a terrible idea.

Two parents, ideally their parents, is best. Absent that, continuity is the next best thing. Moving kids out of homes they’re not in danger in is a bad idea, as the article explains.

[notch656a]

I reject the notion continuity with an unwanting parent is always the "best thing" and I've read quite a few anecdotes from people raised in such a situation that they wished the parents who didn't want them would yield to someone who did. Sure anecdotes don't prove it's always the case, but it shows it's not never the case either. Once again, continuity can turn into a bad thing if the continuous state is "unwanted." I'd rather spend at least _some_ time with people that want me than all my time with people that don't.

>>A kid is not better off...

>Shuffling kids around based on whichever home would be “best” for them according to an evolving situation is a terrible idea.

You're now contradicting yourself. Earlier you were worried about the kid being where they were better off. Now you say that's a terrible idea. You lack continuity.

[tenuousemphasis]

Given the number of children in foster care or worse, the choice isn't between being in a home where you're wanted and one where you're not wanted, it's being in a home where you're not wanted or not in a home. Which do you think is worse for a child?

[notch656a]

False dichotomy. The unwanting family could seek a willing party to adopt the child.

[tenuousemphasis]

If there are SO MANY willing parties, why are the foster and adoption systems overloaded with children? Where are all these good Christian families who want to adopt these children!?

[notch656a]

If it's so hard to find people to adopt, why on earth would we limit the pool even further by ensuring people can be 100% sure they can handle and integrate whatever random child they end up with? That's an impossible task, and would vastly reduce the potential adopter pool even further.

Sometimes adoption process fails, and the family can't handle the kid, perhaps even after years in that family. You can't just shut them in together like trapped rats with no escape hatch to seek another family to adopt so the kid has some chance of being with a family that wants them.