John Sonne Responds

Ms. Murphy criticizes my discussion of birth mothers as containing “a degree of misogyny that is as obfuscatory as it is troubling.” Using her own words, not mine, she claims that I have defined birth mothers as “narcissistic and irresponsible.” Again, using her own words, not mine, she also faults me for, as she sees it, setting up a dichotomy between the “ideal of the loving, legitimate mother” and the “voracious beast, tossing the products of her fornication at the doorstep of the nearest orphanage, her self-interest is all that drives her and it drives her to break that holiest of all natural bonds, that of mother love. She is literally a freak of nature, a monster.” Referring to my defense of the adoptee, that he or she should not be seen as a “potential law breaker who is out to harm others,” or “bad luck,” in which I point out that if anyone were to be viewed that way it would be the mothers who oppose their adoptees' right to know, not the adoptees who want to know, Ms. Murphy faults me for setting up what she sees as an unhelpful, polarizing and guilt-inducing dichotomy between birth mothers and adoptees. As it currently stands, the dichotomy is not of my making; it is a fact, and it is more than a dichotomy. It is a one-sided conformation, with most of the power currently held by certain birth mothers—and obviously the men who support them—who oppose adoptees' right to know who their biological parents are. It is not a matter, as Ms. Murphy defines it, of “recirculation of guilt and misogyny.” These opposing mothers, who represent a minority of birth mothers, although literally law abiding, are in essence “breaking the law” of truth. Make no mistake about it, they are adamant and unrelenting, as witness the current opposition to changing the law in Tennessee. Their position has to be equally strongly attacked and discredited, and this point must be driven home to our legislators.

I don't know whether or not Ms. Murphy has attended legislative hearings, met