Some information and history on Chinese Adoption

Background on the One-Child Policy:

* In the 1950's Mao Tse-Tung urged his people to have lots of children to strengthen the country.
* In the 1970's China became worried that she wouldn't be able to feed her people.
* The One Child policy was started in 1979.
* Since boys carry on the ancestral family name, they are more valued than girls.

* Tradition says that children belong to their father's lineages and daughters become part of their husband's family.
* Inheritance laws pass on to sons, and sons are supposed to take care of their aging parents.
* This leads to hundreds of thousands of "missing girls" in China every year. Most of them are abandoned.
* Depending on the numbers and source, the estimates vary between 24 million and 50 million Chinese men who will be unmarried due to lack of Chinese women by 2020.
*Access to health, eduction and social services are based upon one's hukou (or registration) which is inherited. If you are a second born child or born in a rural area, you don't get a hukou that will afford you access to good health care or education.

I have encountered many people who become angry at Chinese people in general for their thinking and beliefs or who say with disgust that Abigail's mother must have been an awful person to abandon her. It is important to remember, however, that when you do that, you are judging someone in another culture using your own culture, biases, beliefs, values and upbringing. These are not the same for everyone in the world and while you might not understand it, it is myopic to condemn it. The traditional thinking is best described in the ancient "Book of Songs" (1000-700 B.C.):

"When a son is born,
Let him sleep on the bed,
Clothe him with fine clothes,
And give him jade to play...
When a daughter is born,
Let her sleep on the ground,
Wrap her in common wrappings,
And give broken tiles to play..."

Citations:
Washington Post, NBC News