Quote:
Originally Posted by SeventhFloor
Does NYC even still have orphanages?
|
No, don't think so, nor have been for ages.
Once legal access to modern, safe and reliable birth control came around (by the 1960's or so), coupled with abortion unwanted pregnancies began to decline. This coupled with better sanitation, healthcare and other factors lead to lower mortality rates for adults which meant fewer instances of children being "orphaned".
What children did need putting into care things have largely switched over to the foster care system. This was deemed better for children than "warehousing" them in orphanages which often (but not always) were full of all sorts of abuse. We know that know from the scores of reports of survivors of Catholic orphanages all over USA, Europe and elsewhere (such as Australia) who have come forward with some pretty horrible tales of mental and physical abuse.
Mind you foster care isn't always a little slice of heaven for children. There are stories of abuse there as well. They still haven't found that little kid who ran away from his foster mother (in an attempt to find his real mother) several years ago.
The other shoe that dropped was the lessening of stigma attached to unwed mothers/out of wedlock births.
Late as the 1970's unmarried females who got themselves in a family way were either shoved into marriage. If the baby's daddy couldn't be forced into it, any other guy would do, and he would often be offered inducements for taking "damaged goods". If marriage was off the table (and an abortion legal or not couldn't be had), the girl was pressured to put the kid up for adoption at birth. This could mean a private arrangement done by lawyers to a couple wanting a child, or merely surrendering the infant up to an orphanage which usually were connected to various homes for "unwed mothers".
Recent released film "Three Identical Strangers" deals with the abuses of the Louise Wise adoption agency here in NYC.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7664504/
https://nonprofitquarterly.org/2018/...gency-account/
https://caselaw.findlaw.com/ny-supre...t/1223757.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/12/n...ost-again.html
Sadly what has been true for centuries hasn't changed much; when it comes to children they are treated as chattel to be used or whatever for various adults purposes.
Now of course anyone with enough money can *buy* themselves a baby via surrogacy with little or nil oversight. Straight, LGBT, it doesn't matter; the thing is a private contractual agreement where a woman rents herself out, hands over a baby and that is about far as things go.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
