Case (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
case) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
fandomsecrets2013-02-21 06:09 pm
case) wrote in fandomsecrets2013-02-21 06:09 pm
[ SECRET POST #2242 ]
⌈ Secret Post #2242 ⌋
Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.
01.
__________________________________________________
02.
__________________________________________________
03.
__________________________________________________
04.
__________________________________________________
05.
__________________________________________________
06.
__________________________________________________
07.
__________________________________________________
08.
__________________________________________________
09.
__________________________________________________
10.
__________________________________________________
11.
__________________________________________________
12.
__________________________________________________
13.
__________________________________________________
14.
__________________________________________________
15.
__________________________________________________
16.
__________________________________________________
17.
__________________________________________________
18.
__________________________________________________
19.
__________________________________________________
20.
__________________________________________________
Notes:
Secrets Left to Post: 01 pages, 022 secrets from Secret Submission Post #320.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.
no subject
(Anonymous) 2013-02-22 02:33 am (UTC)(link)I said that I wasn't arguing for Regina to be Henry's mother again. I was saying that Emma most certainly was not Henry's mother. And that I didn't appreciate TPTB making it seem like as soon as a biological mother meets her offspring they form a connection. A connection which causes the biological mother to want to claim the child, causes the bio mom to love the child totally and completely, and causes the bio mom to be the perfect person to have the child. No.
no subject
(Anonymous) 2013-02-22 04:41 am (UTC)(link)Not every biological parent on the show forms some kind of magical unbreakable bond with their offspring. Look at Archie and his parents, or, again, Cora and Regina. I think the reason Emma forms a bond with Henry is that, in the pilot, she's desperately lonely, and so is Henry. Henry gloms onto her because she's an alternative to Regina. So they do have a bond, but it's not necessarily healthy. Just healthier than Henry's relationship with Regina. And Emma doesn't initially mean to take Henry from Regina--she only seriously entertains the idea when she starts realizing how cruel and manipulative Regina is.
no subject
(Anonymous) 2013-02-22 05:34 am (UTC)(link)I actually think that in a case like this, Emma should have the chance to parent Henry if she wants
And that is where you and I vastly disagree. No. She should not. She intended to give Henry up for adoption, she did give Henry up for adoption, and she doesn't get to decide to change her mind a decade later.
I'm absolutely certain Baelfire never signed over his rights to Henry, since he never knew he existed.
So Baelfire has a claim. That has nothing to do with a potential claim for Emma.
why are adoption laws suddenly sacrosanct?
Obviously they aren't. As TPTB seem to think they shouldn't be. But this is one of the issues I have with the show. Because our life where we view this is related to what TPTB do/draws on it/reflects it. They are not writing in a vacuum. And supposedly the Storybrooke stuff is supposed to be RL. At least to an extent. And the views TPTB have been showing from the start is that adoption means nothing next to the connection "true love" from a biological mother can bring.
But acting like Emma and Henry's connection somehow spits in the face of adopted families everywhere weirds me out.
You really have no problems with the "instabond" just because they share genes and Emma is not socially well-adjusted enough to have any relationships of her own when Henry finds her? (Henry gets a break on that, considering his circumstances.)
It's not that I think that they are invalidating adoption, necessarily. It's the way the Emma/Henry relationship is set up that bothers me. (I mean how many adoptive kids have a fantasy that their real parents are princes/princesses who will swoop in and save them so they don't have to deal with things like being grounded by their meanie adoptive parents? More than a couple. And this plays into that childish fantasy. And I dislike it. A lot.)
I think the reason Emma forms a bond with Henry is that, in the pilot, she's desperately lonely, and so is Henry. ... So they do have a bond, but it's not necessarily healthy.
But it is being presented as healthy. Emma's true love for Henry after barely knowing him is what saves him. No other alternative is really considered other than that she would be the perfect mother for Henry. Everyone acknowledges that this is the perfect idea and she should totally be his mother, no questions asked. It isn't healthy. It shouldn't be seen as healthy. Yet it is.
no subject
(Anonymous) 2013-02-22 06:36 am (UTC)(link)Henry wasn't dealing with a mother who grounded him. Regina sent him to therapy for noticing that he was the only person who aged in a town where no one ever left, to try and convince him that he was crazy. As for what Baelfire has to do with Emma, if they end up together and Bae becomes (what passes for legally) Henry's father, what happens to Henry? For that matter, what alternative did Henry have but to seek Emma's help? Regina and Jefferson are, so far as we know, the only people in Storybrooke who know the curse is a real thing until Emma shows up. Until Emma shows up, Jefferson is housebound (and nuts). Henry can't just take a bus to the next nearest city, walk into a CPS office, and claim that his mother is abusing him by making him live in a town where nothing changes and no-one ages.
And I guess the biggest difference between us is that I'm looking Once Upon a Time as an interesting story that's playing around with fairytale tropes in a fun way (including tropes about Real Family which are skeevy when applied to the real world), where you're looking at it as a story that perpetuates harmful stereotypes about adoption. If it's any consolation, unless it's proven otherwise I have a sneaking suspicion that Rumpelstiltskin, arguably the most fanatically devoted parent on the show, isn't actually Bae's biological father.
SPOILER FOR "Manhattan"
SPOILER
"Manhattan" nicely sets up a symbolic parallel between Emma and Rumple as parents. Both think they're doing the right thing, but end up breaking their childrens' faith as a result of their own actions.
no subject
(Anonymous) 2013-02-23 02:22 am (UTC)(link)Here's the problem: Neal (Baelfire) has to be legally identified as the father to have any legal rights. An unmarried woman in the US can easily give her child up without the father's permission if she says she can't identify him. If the adoption process went about legally, Emma would have to state in court that she could not identify the father and explain the circumstances of her pregnancy. The judge would then terminate the father's rights.
Now Neal is obviously unaware of Henry and Mr. Gold appears to be unaware that Neal is Henry's father, meaning we can assume that Emma did NOT identify Neal as the father when she gave Henry up. Why would Mr. Gold, had he known Neal was Henry's father, not have used Henry to lure Neal to him? I think we can assume that Emma relinquished Neal's paternal rights by refusing to identify him.