Modern Slavery

One of the biggest, most talked about trends in Hollywood today is the issue of celebrities adopting children from poor countries. Angelina Jolie is, of course, the poster mom for this - which you already know unless you live in a cave, in which case tell Osama some people are looking for him.

Why is this trend so controversial? Well, it's inevitable that people will question the genuine concern these celebrities have for the children they pluck from their homelands, and whether they're only doing it for publicity or not. I admit, at first Angelina annoyed the hell out of me because her adoption of little Maddox from Cambodia was on the cover of every tabloid in every store I went in. As time went on, I guess her little i'm-better-than-you-cause-i'm-gonna-save-the-world thing got on my nerves more - and who can be annoyed by Maddox's cool mohawk haircut and adorable clothes?? I moved on. Now Meg Ryan is also adopting, and I wish her luck with that. As long as these people are caring for these children and giving them a chance for a more normal, healthy life with parental figures as their caretakers instead of social workers in some slummy institution, I say it's not that bad of a trend.

HOWEVER, those of us who haven't been in that cave or under a rock have heard by now about the Madonna adoption. There's been some awful controversy surrounding this and most people I hear discussing it can't seem to pinpoint what's so different and wrong about it, than, say, Angelina's adoptions.

Let's take a look at the three main characters that were covered as soon as the story broke: Madonna (obviously), little David from Malawi, and David's father.

Yeah, I said father.

THIS KID IS NOT AN ORPHAN!

The controversy really started when David's father expressed his concerns and regrets about his son being taken to live in another country, which opened the floodgates of investigation into whether Madonna used her money and fame to speed up the adoption process and get past some policies and prerequisites.While David's father wanted a life for David that he could not provide him, he wanted to be sure David would be well taken care of. He didn't understand that Madonna was going to keep his son, either. Why should he have? After all, why would she try to adopt a child who already has parents?


i'll taaaake...that one!
Madonna, the self-proclaimed Material Girl, has money coming out of her ass, let's just face it. If she really cared about David, she could and hopefully would have donated money to David's family and hell, why not even his village? so that they could begin to live a better, healthier life. David HAS a family and just because his father can't afford to care for him the way she presumably can doesn't mean she has the right to buy him up. If you have any leftover reservations about Madonna's intentions, let's take a look at what she did as soon as David was in her custody:
she put him in the care of babysitters, I believe I read, because she was out of the country.

Sounds like she's real eager to get to know her new son. {/sarcasm}

Actually, it sounds like Madonna's about to get away with some modern-day slavery.

A word to the wise: Madonna, I know moving to England probably made your memory of US history a little fuzzy but try to remember - slavery was abolished in 1865. In case your math is fuzzy, too, that means slavery (and the buying and selling of humans) is soooo 141 years ago.