Film sparks 'baby box' debate

Pastor Lee Jong-rak removes an infant from a “baby box” attached to a hospice in Gwanak, southwestern Seoul in this April 25 file photo. / Korea Times photo by Shin Sang-soon

By Kim Young-jin

Is the “Baby Box” good or bad?

Pastor Lee Jong-rak, leader of the Jusarang Community Church, has been praised for using this idea to save babies who could otherwise have been forsaken to die.

But a film, titled, “The Drop Box,” about what is seen as the pastor’s Good Samaritan efforts has triggered a backlash from adoptees and their supporters.

The twist is that Pastor Kim Do-hyun, who runs a guesthouse for Korean adoptees visiting their homeland, was misrepresented in the film, according to adoptee activists.

But the controversy appears to be inevitable as the box ties together complicated issues of adoption, single mothers and children’s right to their birth information.

Adoptee activism

Multiple queries to the film’s email account were not answered.

Following a slew of messages supporting Kim, the film’s director, Brian Ivie ― a student from southern California ― acknowledged earlier this month that Kim’s position had been “wrongly represented,” according to a screen capture from the film’s Facebook page. That page, as well as the trailer, was eventually removed from the Internet.

The representation of Kim is “100 percent wrong, the opposite of what he believes,” said Jane Jeong Trenka, head of Truth and Reconciliation for the Adoption Community of Korea (TRACK).

Ivie “came saying he wanted to hear an opposing opinion and then he defamed Pastor Kim and caused him to lose his honor and face in the community,” Trenka said.

According to the film’s website, negotiations are underway with a “major studio to release the film all over the world.” It also won the “Best of Festival” Jubilee Award from the San Antonio Independent Christian Film Festival, a prize worth $101,000.

Critics of baby boxes, including Kim, argue that they encourage people to give up babies without registering them or receiving counseling first.

Ivie sought out Kim because he wanted to interview an opponent of baby boxes, according to multiple accounts. But Trenka claims he did “not offer a release form to Pastor Kim to sign, so the interview proceed(ed) without written consent.”

After seeing the trailer, Kim contacted the film’s email address on May 31, saying he and others were shocked by the portrayal. He requested that all footage of him be removed from the project.

According to Trenka, Ivie promised to replace the trailer within a week, but failed to do so within that timeframe. She also claims that Pastor Kim attended an event in Sinchon, western Seoul on June 22 where Ivie was scheduled to attend, and found “that his footage was still there.”

Birth registration is an important issue for many Korean adoptees, who claim abuses have occurred here in order to facilitate adoptions.

Controversy

Debate over baby boxes is not new, nor limited to Korea.

The roots of the boxes apparently stretch back to medieval Europe, where “founding wheels” allowed people to anonymously relinquish babies.

The number of baby boxes in some European countries, in particularly Germany and Eastern Europe is said to be increasing. In the United States, “safe haven” laws allow babies to be left anonymously in places such as hospitals.

Proponents say the boxes save lives.

Last year, however, the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child said that such boxes encourage parents to give away babies. The U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child stipulates that children have the right to know who their parents are, and their own identity. Critics say the boxes open the door for human trafficking and abandonment of children without the consent of parents.

In Korea, stigmatization and lack of social services have long forced many single mothers to choose between adoption and abortion.

Jeong Young-ran, a preacher who works with the babies abandoned at the box, said she understood Kim’s stance against it, but added that he was “not giving deep thought to the lives of those babies.”

“What pastor Kim is claiming is that because there is a box, so many babies are received.

“Life comes before the law, not the other way around,” she said. “Laws are made so people can follow them. If there’s no life, what is the purpose of laws?”

On the other hand, Shannon Heit, a volunteer coordinator at the Korean Unwed Mothers Families' Association, believes people who operate baby boxes might have good intentions but ultimately the hatches do more harm than good.

“The women who abandon in the baby box have already recognized that it is wrong to abandon on the street because children can die that way. The baby box gives them the in-between option instead of going the route of ethical adoption, which would require them to register their children’s birth information,” she said.

Heit argued that women who relinquish their babies may believe that if they send them away for adoption, it will go on their permanent record. But she said that according to the new law, the information is stricken as soon as an adoption is complete and only accessible to the adoptees themselves.

This eliminates the chance of the parents to find out about their children in the future, Heit said.