Adopt villages, not pet children

Adoption by itself is a genuine human need and a noble action that gives a child to a childless person and a good home, comfort and a future to an orphan or poverty-stricken child. Needy children however are everywhere: they are in America as they are in Africa and Asia. But why do the celebrities not adopt American children instead of going overseas to adopt African or Asian children.

The answer is there are no children for sale in America. Anyone who wants to adopt goes through years of gruelling procedure to qualify for child adoption. Over there, children are human beings and cannot be bought as toys, playmates or pets for celebrities’ children. But in Africa, people are still sold in exchange for beads, tobacco and petty cash. And as a Malawian journalist said, “We are showing to the world that our poverty has extended to the brain”.

One may ask, however, what if these celebrities are really honest about their feelings to help poor African and Asian children? No doubt sometimes the most honest feelings could be misrepresented by the means with which they are fulfilled. Changing child adoption into child shopping is a grotesque representation of a noble gesture. But with such big hearts and philanthropic feeling to save the children of the world, the celebrities can do a better job and save more children from poverty if they adopt whole villages in Africa and Asia instead of only one or two children.

By providing whole villages with schools, clinics and water wells, we will have thousands of young Zaharas and David Bandas owing their welfare and future to celebrities’ charity. Africa would reap large revenues as curious visitors throng to see and learn from the Angelina Jolie and Madonna villages. It would make a drastic change to the way we do charity and foreign aid and would embody the epitome of western altruism and philanthropy. The Colombian singer Shakira is already leading the way in this trend and it is a trend that is worth emulating.