[ahnasmom]

I haven't had much time to post lately but I hope everyone will take the time to send ABC an email regarding the show they are planning on airing this Friday.

It appears that it will be a 'reality based baby lottery' on 20/20 this Friday. There are 5 couples vying for a Birthmother to choose them to parent her child.

It is sad, disgusting, hurtful to anyone involved in any way with adoption. I don't know how to attach the direct link to ABC, but go to the Guat boards here under the 'disgusting thread' or to General Adoptive Parents here for another thread relating to this.

I sent mine this morning.

[Vicki H]

I think a show like this is a horrible idea. A baby is not a lottery prize. It is making a mockery out of adoption and I personally find this hurtful and offensive after all we had to go through to adopt our son. This is truley sad.

Vicki

[Mezzo1]

I was also shocked and upset to see the teaser for the show!

I'm hoping and praying that since Barbara Walters is an adoptive mother that there is some method to her madness. Maybe there will be more adoption awareness out there because of the show if it is done in a tasteful way (hard to imagine after seeing the teaser!).

Leslie

[Dobby]

I have not seen the teaser, but I went over to the General Adoptive Parent Support and saw the thread there. This is what was originally posted:

"It's an hour that follows a 16-year-old, pregnant girl as she interviews five couples to make the excruciating decision as to which of them will adopt her baby. She wants to play a role in the life of the child, while still giving it up for adoption. You will watch her select parents for her son, and then wrestle with a final decision: with the baby born and in her arms, can she bear to part with it?"

It doesn't sound crass to me. I guess we'll all have to watch it to form an opinion. Again, I qualify this by saying I have not seen the teaser so I don't know how they might be "sensationalizing" it.

[bratgirl]

There is a link to e-mail 20/20 on the Guat forum. I just sent a SCATHING e-mail to 20/20 regading the show. I also sent an e-mail to Barbara's mailbag on the View that was more personalized.

I am shocked and disgusted by the audacity of 20/20 to air such a show. Do they not realize how many ignorant people there are in this country regarding adoption. Do they not realize the damage this show will do to adopted children. Great, one more reason to tease and torment a child on the playground.

What about the "prize" baby. Years and years of therapy will be required to assist the poor child in dealing with his/her adoption story.

[3girls1boy]

On last Friday's 20/20 they called it the ultimate reality show, 5 couple, 4 will lose, 1 will win her baby. I haven't seen any of the other promos but they have been quoted here as like this an worse. Go to the A Child is Waiting website and read the letter from the agency- they are trying to distance themselves from the editting of the show- so something is up. Go to some of the other threads on this. The agency replied to my email and I quoted it on another thread. I have no problem with a show on open adoption, I do have a problem with it being portrayed as a game show or reality show. I am going to watch it, because I really do want to see how it was portrayed. I really do think those of us who are offended with a baby being portrayed this way need to let the adoption agency, ABC and Barbara Walters know how we feel.
Lisa

[kimber413]

I'll be emailing, and I'll send one for my dh, too. I don't think it will do any good, though. Barbara Walters has always been a sensationalist journalist (i.e. all those celebrity interviews that tell "secrets"), so our outrage won't phase her, and I don't see them putting off this episode. Let's face it. Reality shows make money, and one like this will probably draw in lots of people. And that's what television is all about. Making money from advertising.

[ahnasmom]

to email
http://www.abcnews.go.com/sections/...email form.html

to review show contents
http://www.abcnews.go.com/sections/2020/index.html
Disgusting!!!

Hope they work. I think the email is either shut down or overloaded....

I also plan on emailing the sponsors of they show...how SAD!!! for OUR CHILDREN!!!

[boatsun]

I am disgusted about this 20/20 episode also. A couple of weeks ago I posted regarding the Dallas Morning News article about a Russian adoption. The last article ran about a week later and it was focused on the negative side of foreign adoption. An Indian activist said the people that are adopting Indian children do so because they want a servant or a sex slave. She did not think that the adoptive parents could love an adopted child as much as they could love one of their own. A program like this almost seems to be a reality game show where the winner receives a baby. This will not help the worldview of Americans and other Westerners adopting internationally.

When I originally heard the teaser for the show I thought cool, a segment on adoption. After thinking it through, this is not good. Yes, I would like to see a story about how a mother decides to give her child up for adoption and the process the adoptive parents go through, but the way they seem to be doing it is offensive by having five families compete with one another for the chance to adopt. Wouldn't it be better to highlight the idea that adoption is a better alternative than abortion?

[Bcelli]

I will reserve my comments regarding this program until after I have seen the program, but I have to agree that the teaser quoted here is beyond tacky. Is ABC that hard up for ratings? But beyond how they portray the situation, it is a real situation. So many people vying for the opportunity to adopt one unseen, unknown newborn when slightly older children wait and wait and wait around the world.

[KimmieLou]

I also saw the teaser for the show and couldn't believe that they could or would show something like that. It is very disrespectful to adopted children and adoptive parents. There are enough people out there that are completely ignorant to the emotions that are dealt with in adoption. This kind of show can't help things any.

[Kellster]

I think that Ms. Walters should go to work where she belongs- at the National Enquirer. That seems to fit the level of "journalism" she has been offering lately.

Kelly

[Bcelli]

I just went to the 20/20 site and sure enough, the whole story is presented in just as tacky a fashion as the teaser quoted here. Being an adoptive parent herself, you would think Barbara Walters would be a little more sensitive.

[Kasey]

I saw the commercials fopr the episode and was appalled myself. It is being portrayed as a reality TV game, in fact one of the couples on the 20/20 website even joked that they felt they were on the bachelor or bachelorette!
Here is a quote from the 20/20 website for the show:

20/20 cameras were there last October when the competition for Jessica's baby began as the finalists arrived at the agency one by one. Each couple would have less than half an hour to convince Jessica that they should be the parents of her unborn son.

This says is all to me and I personally will not watch.
Kasey

[LilOne]

Just a thought, but on one of the commercials, as well as one of the printvertisements, they are talking of a surprise ending. Could it be that her mother and stepfather had a change of heart, and she decided that she was going to stand up to them and do what she wanted to do in the first place....i.e. not place at all? And that the 6 month update shows her being an awesome mom to her child?


Lisa