Adoptive Parents Say: Boys Are Too Much Trouble

When I researched an article for Babblebaby on gender pre-determination awhile back, I heard a laundry list of reasons parents were choosing one sex over the other. This I never heard: "boys are too much trouble." WTF? According to an article in this weekend's Independent, boys in Britain wait twice as long to be adopted. 

The London newspaper cites research by the British Association of Adoption and Fostering, surmising, "most people believe that frequent coverage in the media of boys as
knife-wielding, cannabis-smoking gang members may fuel the reluctance
to adopt them." 

A strong believer in nurture over nature, I wonder what prospective parents are planning to do with these children in the years after adoption if these are the thoughts foremost on their minds. Do they not plan on being the sort of involved parent who works to keep their kids off drugs and out of gangs? The sort of parent who teaches their kids about kindness and generosity? The sort who works to raise a law-abiding little citizen?

On the flip side, have they watched any movies lately? Heathers, maybe, or Monster? As the mother of a little girl, I can admit I'm biased, but I look at some of the high school girls walking around the mall and grit my teeth. That, I pledge, will never be my daughter. And if, by some chance, she turns out to be the shoplifting, rabble-rousing, too-much-make-up/too-little-clothes-wearing teenage freak I see all too often (and somehow these British parents have blinded themselves to), she'll be spending a lot more time in her room, "thinking about her actions." 

Because, ultimately, parenting has to weigh out. The experts paraphrased in the Independent say parents think girls will be "easier to control." An adult who walks into parenting worried about "control" needs to sit down and re-evaluate whether they really understand what they're about to do. It isn't about who controls who so much as it is how a family unit works together and grows together. 

Whether they can help a girl grow into a woman or a boy grow into a man, they need to start on the same page.

Image: Amazon