One day I stumbled down a TikTok rabbit hole and I honestly know that ignorance is bliss because I was not at all happy with what I saw. It was transracial adoption TikTok and it was a whole ass mess.
In a world where a certain demographic claims to not see race, they sure have a whole legion of fans in transracial adoption TikTok. Many of the comments are filled with white women excessively heaping praise on a woman they do not know for adopting a child they do not know. The other side of transracial TikTok is the P.O.V. of actual adoptees and their sentiment is not nearly as praiseworthy to their adoptive parents. Many of them report feeling whitewashed and isolated in their own families, including being subjected to racist behavior from their own parents. There is something so kind on the surface of white people wanting to take care of the Black people whose lives have been negatively impacted by that same white supremacy that makes them think that things like missionary work are noble causes.
This week, news came out that the beloved story of a noble white Christian family—the Tuohys (headed by the matriarch Leanne Tuohy), of adopting a mentally challenged, oversized, dopey and disadvantaged Black boy named Michael Oher—was much more fictionalized than one could have imagined. The Tuohy family’s adoption of Michael, who then went on to play in the NFL, was so fictionalized that he did not even know he was not adopted into the family at all.
In fact, at the ripe old age of 37 years old, Michael discovered that the Tuohys had a conservatorship over him since he was 18 years old, a conservatorship that he did not even need. The movie showed the white evangelical Christian woman, Leanne, spearheading the charge to make sure Michael, who was very much portrayed as mentally delayed, had the proper tutoring and education he needed while living under their roof, but apparently, Michael was actually academically gifted, which is the reason he was even accepted into the private school in the first place. Making matters even worse is that the Tuohys made a percentage of the $300 million dollar box office story, not including an initial payout for using their likenesses. The Tuohy’s two biological children received payouts, but not Michael.
Ain’t that bout a bitch, literally.
Michael is obviously suing the Tuohy’s, and rightfully so. It is not just about the financial damage that these multi-millionaires have done, because that’s kind of what a lot of multi-millionaires do, but imagine the emotional toll taken on him. Clearly, the entire movie is now suspect, but I do think that Michael came from a situation that was at least not ideal, and the Tuohy family saw dollar signs and an Ole Miss championship almost immediately while he was looking for stability and someone he could trust. The type of “trust” that the Tuohys were interested in was quite different.
I’m always amazed at how some white people can praise themselves for correcting their own errors and still err in the entire process.
While so many other white people praise each other for taking on Black problems, including the children, they never fully examine why the problems occurred in the first place. Many of these adoption stories star a white evangelical Christian family who wants to go to heaven but also want to go viral—one a bit more than the other. There is little thought put into the concept of not exposing your children’s trauma for likes and money. Many of these families do little work to address their own subconscious biases and racism, but since they go to church, I’m sure all is right in the eyes of God.
However, without being able to truly examine the root of racism, many of these transracial adoption stories continue to have less than Hollywood ending.
