You knew it was just a matter of time until O had to stick her fingers into the Toby Dawson birth family reunion pie. Thanks to my friend K, I was able to tune in to everyone’s favorite Original Black Woman yesterday in time to see TD talking about his experiences growing up as a transracial Korean adoptee in Colorado, and his (very, very public) recent reunion with his abeoji in Korea.
Although it was great to see “one of our own” on the tube telling his story — one that many others among us can relate to and find validation in — I think O overstepped her boundaries in a misstep almost as large as her ego.
I know O is beloved by many, and I’m not knocking her role model potential, or denying that her show has the power to bring many important issues to light where they might otherwise go unnoticed.
My beef with the almighty O is that — in addition to behaving as if she personally discovered race, oppression and books — she took the liberty on yesterday’s show of flying TD’s abeoji to Chicago to “surprise” TD and his parents, both of whom were in the audience. And neither of whom had previously met their son’s Korean father.
Typical. Because now she gets to take credit for playing a role in introducing TD’s parents to his Korean father for the first time. With cameras rolling. On her show. Named after herself. Featuring all the magical things she does to make the world a more Oprah place.
But it makes for great TV, doesn’t it?
After Toby’s father walked out on stage, to the audience’s applause, O turned to Toby’s mom and dad in the front row and said, “So you’ve never met.” (Obviously.) “Wonderful. Wonderful.”
And I got the feeling that the “Wonderfuls” weren’t so much about whatever emotions the Dawsons and Toby’s abeoji were cycling through, but about congratulating herself for how wonderful she is, to orchestrate such riveting television.
Check yourself, O. Adoptees have the right to determine their own boundaries and, post-reunion, decide if, when and how to introduce their families to one another. Nobody else should own this decision. Not even the almighty O.
Are you serious. Wow, that’s…special. That kind of meeting is definitely not something you can go “SURPRISE!!!!!!!” with; preparation needs to take place. Damn. That was nothing but a TV dream coming true.
I like Oprah. But I have to agree with you, that is over stepping your boundries. Is it so hard to ask someone’s persmission ahead of time?
Wow, I can’t believe she did that. It must have been a killer moment. You are so right – adoptees should be the ones initiating or not initiating that kind of connection. It certainly isn’t for an outsider to decide.
Amen to that, sista. Sadly, I missed this …do you think it’ll be on YouTube or something? I gotta see this episode for myself.
It really irks me when people like O (people who have talk shows) take credit for those “Great Moments in TV” that really, in retrospect, weren’t such “great” moments at all. They were all pretty lousy and uncomfortable…and this is definitely no exception.
God, I can’t imagine what TD’s reaction was. Did they pan to show his emotional reaction to it? He tends to stay pretty calm but I think I would go ballistic if the O did that to me.
I felt awful watching it. T and his family looked severely uncomfortable and awkward, and you’re absolutely right: she crossed a line, and the only one who benefited was the O show ratings. Ugh.
Lurker de-lurking…I’ve hated O for a long time..now its just another reason to add to the bunch. She is so self-serving it is sickening. So many people see all the great things she does…but I think at the root of most of what she does feeds her own ego. I mean…its great that she built a school in Africa but she also hand selected the girls that go there. I wonder why. And if she was really just doing it for the people there…then why does she make a fricking TV special about every little thing she does?
Oprah is a huge figure in today’s media. Who really knows if that gives her the right to bring such matters onto national television, but the fact that she did it anyways speaks alot about her.
I don’t watch Oprah’s show much but you gotta admit her involvement in the Big Red program did attract alot of attention to AIDS though, whereas if some other unknown figurehead would’ve tried to bring the matter to television, it would’ve gone largely unnoticed.
Ooof, that makes me so mad. Those are very personal moments and the choice should have never been taken away from Toby and his abeoji. Did she even consider how they might feel? Probably not.
Does O stand for “Oops?” Years ago, I and what felt like a lot of people in my miniscule world at the time were emailing the big O constantly to encourage her to have a show devoted to International adoption, Korean adoption in particular. Her response at the time from what I hear was that she needed to believe enough people had interest in the topic in order to do a show. Then she goes and flies TD’s abeoji to her show? Proof that she only cares about the ratings, not the heart of an issue.
Finally! A place where I’m free to say it!
“I DO NOT LIKE OPRAH!”
Ahh… that felt good.
I felt horrible watching the “reunion” too…looking at toby’s face and that of his parents. they didn’t look thrilled, they looked downright terrified. i honestly think those tears that they shed weren’t tears of joy, they were shock–like, dude couldn’t someone have clued us in to this?
and not to be a total snob to “monie yang” up there, but i dont agree that giving oprah credit for bringing awareness to certain issues atones for her stupidness in this situation. Oprah screwed up and broke adoptee protocol (actually i think thats just breaking the perimeters of COMMON SENSE, but thats another story).
there’s just no excuse for her insensitive, self serving attitude and her past “wonderful deeds” DONT make up for it.
(and by the way, that “wonderfulness” is also a matter of opinion and can be seen as an attempt to boost her public image, not just out of the goodness of her heart)
Oh, Oprah~
Ji-In,
As an adoptive mom who does want to meet and get to know my son’s birthfamily, you are so right that Oprah’s way is NOT the right way!!
Shame on her!! She obviously does not know anything about the stresses that reunions put on all parties – a TV show surprise is not that appropriate venue!
She is more Geraldo in this case….and that is stooping pretty low for ratings…
I’m an adoptee who found his birthmother at 30 years of age. This is an incredibly sensitive subject which deals of decades (sometimes) of guilt feelings and trauma.
Oprah is WAY out of line.
She has NO IDEA what she might have done.
CHeap ratings stunt. Appalling.
Jesus T. Christ. I rarely watch Oprah, because there’s only so much of her I can take at one time. I don’t whether to be happy or upset that I missed this.
Her ambush on Dawson and his family is insensitive on so many levels—to adoptees, to adoptive parents, to Asian Americans, and to people of color in general. But that’s the story of O ain’t it?—intruding on people’s intimate lives for ratings. Every other week there’s a show about all the good works that Ms. Winfrey is doing for poor unfortunate brown people, perfectly edited so that viewers at home get that old warm-and-fuzzy feeling. Her benevolence reaps huge rewards from her mostly white middle-class audience, while flesh-and-blood POC are left holding the bag.
By the way, I think that school in South Africa was a bad idea. According to the students’ parents, the damn place is a fortress where they must pass intensive security checkpoints to see their own daughters. Does anybody here think it’s okay for an American to run an institution like this on South African soil? I sure don’t.
I found you via Manuela and can now be found on my knees, bowing to your fabulousness all the way from the armpit of Europe (Portugal). I think Oprah does amazing things and we all know she could have long ago retired to her private planet. The woman does NOT need to work. And yet, I feel more and more that a lot of what she does is about power, raw power, regardless of her good intentions (which I also believe she does have). She has taken a definite regal posture and it absolutely rubs me the wrong way. Makes me fear the whole private planet scenario might not be that farfetched. I still think that, along with the practical ways in which she effectively changes people’s lives, she infuses millions with hope. There is a difference between doing good deeds and trying to re-shape the world into Oprahdom though. The Oprahdom bit, ever so palpable, makes my kidneys try to exit through my navel.
Also? You’re an absolutely brilliant writer, and I read you and nod like one of those silly dog-heads my fellow Porties are so fond of glueing to their rear car window. Nod nod nod. Between Manuela and you, my education will be sound. And between you and the Unapologectic Mexican, my little heart has found more love than it knows what to do with.
Monie Yang… the point isn’t whether or not O has the right to bring this issue into the spotlight. It’s whether or not she had a right to MEDDLE in a very, very personal family situation and play GODDESS over the whole thing. She could EASILY have brought the issue to light in a fashion that would have left me applauding her. Instead, I feel absolutely sick to my stomache at what she’s done to this poor family WITHOUT THEIR CONSENT.
THAT is wrong. Plain wrong. It’s about as black and white (no pun intended) as it gets. I’m surprised she pulled such a Jerry Springer stunt. Shaking head.
I am an adult adoptee, and while I was adopted through domestic channels I cannot imagine being suddenly faced with my birth family in front of my parents.
I wholeheartedly agree that the issue of searching for one’s roots is plagued with boundaries and more boundaries. Not only how far the adoptee and birth family wish to take a reunion but also who else to “invite to the party” so to speak.
Blessings
Mama Kelly
Oh, but the great “O” will pay your airfare, and put everyone up for the reunion.
I do not watch Oprah because she grates on my nerves and I cannot believe that she would take such a personal moment as this and exploit it in such a way. TB and his parents should be the ones to decide the time and place for such a reunion. Family reunions are planned by families and Oprah is not their family so she should have minded her own business. However, it is just one more thing that she can add to her self-aggrandizing personality. Her schools in South Africa is another and don’t get me started on positive thinking and The Secret that she felt she had to reveal to the world to make it a better place.
On another note, I may have to start using “chaps my hide”…I like that.
This is not a comment on the big ‘O’ but on you TTR. Did you notice you made it into today’s TOP BLOGS on WordPress. Congratulations!
I love reading your posts and all the comments you get. A great and insightful blog. Keep up the good work!
I was also annoyed at Oprah for the “reunion”, it was clearly tasteless in Western Culture. However, I’m African and in my culture her behavior (in terms of building a school), or even the reunion itself, is not a big deal. We have far bigger concerns, that “reunions” such as the one she featured, are practically irrelevant. Hardly anyone would have time to complain about it, instead they would be grateful. And, please stop bashing her school, how many South Africans have you met who had a problem with it? I was private school educated in Africa, and Oprah’s school is the only private school I’ve ever heard of, in Africa, whose entrance is based on merit alone. She’s giving poor people a chance to receive the quality of education that I received, and she was trying to show people in her “special” how grateful and diligent the South African students are. About the strictness, her school is no more strict than my private boarding school was. I’m sure private boarding schools are the same all over the world, so I don’t get what the big deal is?
Uma….Oprah.
Oprah…..Uma.
Wonderful….
I get the slight feeling that she was wringing her hands like some evil wizard about to hatch a plan of dastardly destruction.
She’s always on my naughty list as you know.
You have got to be kidding me. Now I am glad I didn’t watch. Sigh…
Appalling. Utterly appalling.
That picture is really scary – it’s like O is this blinding electrified being, and Toby is being electrocuted by touching her.
And I agree with everyone who says this is so extremely inappropriate. I wonder if Toby will every speak out about this experience, and knock some sense into her.
Susan, actually, that’s Tom Cruise … http://tcruiseko.ytmnd.com/
I felt that it was an appropriate visual aid, given the way I feel about O.
OK, now it’s an even scarier picture. Ugh.
OMGosh. I caught just the TD piece of this show. As a mom via adoption to a precious 4yo DD from Korea I just cringed when O brought TD’s birthfather out. The Dawsons already looked uncomfortable sitting next to each other in the audience (aren’t they divorced?)…then O is orchestrating this whole union of families without the key parties’ involvement??? Then, as if that wasn’t bad enough…like wouldn’t you think maybe they would be escorted to a nice private room to actually talk or something (ANYthing to help smooth over this whole awkward scene)?…no, they’re all sitting there in the audience (probably) forced to watch the rest of the O Show (which was a totally unrelated topic). They looked absolutely stone-faced, sitting there afterward.
So, yes…as much as I would love for my DD to meet her birth family (if that’s what SHE wants, too)…and as much as I would also like to meet her birth family, my hope is that it is as much on DDs terms as possible.
(big sigh…)
BTW, thank you, TTR, for blogging and for opening my eyes, sometimes, to new perspectives. You rock!
TTR – I enjoyed your article in KQ. It led me to your blog and this post. I’d also read about TD’s recent reunion in Korea (more controlled & no ambush) with his Korean father and brother. In the KQ article, Toby talked about how he was SLOWLY getting to know his father. Oprah’s totally lost touch – zero empathy for one who claims she’s the people’s advocate. I feel so bad for Toby and his parents.
Well, I must disagree with you all.
Oprah and her crew do not operate in the coniving way described here or she would have many lawsuits on her hands…. she simply cannot make those kinds of mistakes…
But having said that, what is “perceived” is sometimes more important for TV than is “what actually happens”. Don’t forget she has a huge editing team that “makes is appear” to be special when it is actually a well staged event.
To me it seemd like a well orchatrated event that was a Hallmark moment and yes, may have taken longer to happen if O had not intervined. There may have been suprise elements, but trust me O did nothing without consulting her lawyers first.
It did make good TV though and yes she does, at times, come accross as medling.
I completely agree that she overstepped BIG time. I have a great deal of respect for Toby and how he has dealt with the media during his journey. I have to wonder though if he didn’t have some idea this could happen. Any TV talk show I have ever seen that has to do with reunion always has the “long awaited/reunited” sitting in the green room. SURPRISE!!!!!! ugh.
It doesn’t excuse her behavior. I just know that I would not go on TV and talk about my reunion if I wasn’t prepared to have all parts of it exposed. This is always a sad possibility when dealing with people like O. Ratings will always be her number one concern.
(
Word to that, MIa
Who didn’t see it coming? I mean, if you decide to put yoursefl on Oprah, you deserve what you get… And all of them, TD, his parent’s, his biological father made the decision to air their lives on television. and they all held up much better than anyone I know would have under that microscope.
Not to be hard on TD… I admire him and his family for how they’ve held up. but I also don’t understand how they couldn’t see this coming. (they probably did) I also think the only people who ought to sit in judgment of what happened are the affected parties. At the very least, awareness has been heightened, people will now have one more consideration to make, the country got to talking, and Oprah is going to keep doing whatever the hell she wants. (Excuse me while I go cut off my fingers for typing such tripe) Let me rephrase that last bit: It’s ALWAYS a bad idea to go on TV with a personal story if your not promoting the biography to go with it.
And bytheway, Oprah has always chapped my hide. thanks for finally giving me the vocabulary to express exactly that feeling I get whenever I see her or listen to my family go on about her. Not to say she’s a bad person, I just can’t stand her show. The world does need a few nutty billionaires doing what they want.
jD
Thanks, Kyong! I haven’t received my copy of KQ yet, thanks to the slooooowness of trans-Pacific bulk mail. I’ll be interested to read the article about Toby.
To others — I am not convinced that Toby should have or could have seen the on-air surprise reunion coming. His experience was enough of a public event in itself, that it would have made for more than enough fodder for a spot on Oprah. But unless they told him ahead of time that O had a surprise for him, why would he have reason to anticipate his abeoji being flown to Chicago in secret? Good lord, at least she didn’t take the liberty of outing his Korean mother, too!
Sure, TD is an adult, and he can obviously handle the attention that comes along with the fishbowl, or he wouldn’t be willing to step up and talk about it. No, we don’t know how he and his family felt about the surprise reunion on O. But I can say this: You can never be 100% prepared for a birth family reunion, even when you dictate the whole thing yourself. Imagine having such a significant part of your reunion sprung on you. On Oprah.
He has a lot of experience with the media running away with what should be his decisions, so it’s clear he can roll with the punches. Nonetheless, I still think it was disappointing that O had to add on another layer for dramatic effect.
(As an aside, It was also incredibly irritating, the way O talked over Mr. Kim’s head — to the translator instead of directly to him and just letting the translator do his thing. “Ask him …” “Did he think …”)
True, I don’t think O has any malicious intent in orchestrating the events that she does. But I still don’t think that excuses the impact that results from the liberties she takes in matters like this. And I don’t think it matters if it’s a big or a small issue on the global stage, or if the Dawsons or whoever are supposed to be “grateful” to O or not, so I’m not going to debate that.
Me thinks you are protraying this O show in a one-sided, lopsided manner, if I may speak freely because I think you erase all my comments. This is just between us and it is ok with me, very ok.
TOBY, or whatever his name is, did, of his own free will, go on her show! Everyone knows that this show ‘represents’ America. Whether you want to admit it or not, Oprah is American, living the American dream, and panders to the white American population…..with a splatter of black specks here and there. Many do not like Oprah, for whatever preconceived reasons they might have. O is a self-made woman and has achieved what many could never achieve in 100 lives. I am sure she must constantly be watching ‘her back’ because they are those out there just waiting for her to stumble so they can get their turn to ‘maul’ her. I am sure that special K organisation is just waiting and so she panders to a race of people so that she may survive in the true sense of the word.
I do not live in America, nor am I American. I live in Europe and have recently of my own free will taken on the nationality of the country in which I live. This I did for 1 reason only. So that I could have the right to vote. Nothing else. It embarrasses me to show this passport at the airport, but it is something I will learn to live with.
I am a black woman living in a very white European country.
I don’t know if I could do what O does to achieve success, from where I am sitting she is one helluva woman in her own way, and has carved out her own terrain so those who willingly go into her playing ground will get ‘mauled’ for TV and white america.
On another topic:
I cannot begin to express the shock I felt as I read about your experiences…at that pit-stop on your way to Florida with those red-necks etc. I think my life is tough as it is but your experiences are terrible.
I have written before on my experiences while I lived and travelled in Asia. I loved it there, but and this is a big BUT,
whenever I see Asians here in Europe, I get the impression that they try so very hard to be accepted As and BY whites. I feel very ashamed when I watch the senarios playing themselves out.
I don’t have an Indian friend and would very much like to meet an Indian woman to share a friendship but I think they have a very racists attitude towards blacks and I do not have the time or the desire to try and change such views.
I am female, btw.
Have a good evening.
Heather, I don’t recall erasing any previous comments from you, but I see that you use a dial-up IP, which I think has given other people problems when they try to comment. Or perhaps you have been zapped as spam.
We all have different opinions of Oprah, and I stated mine. Everyone is free to agree or disagree, both or neither. It’s true — we all have our survival tactics, and as Oprah is a billionaire with a poweful media empire, she’d have a long way to fall. Like I said, I’m not questioning her potential as a role model as a successful, self-made business woman. Obviously, she does what is best for her business and her ratings.
I still do not concede that Toby had it coming, though, or that it was part of the bargain of coming on the show. For adoptees, birth family relationships are often extremely fragile — as they often are with their adoptive families as well. As is illustrated often in the news media and popular media, however, adoptees are expected to be nothing but “grateful” to both parties. This leaves very little room for the more nuanced human emotions that come along with adoption and birth family reunions. I still think it was cheap of O to slap Toby and his parents on the show for 10 minutes, “surprise” them with his Korean father, and then fade out to the applause and praise of the audience. This is not the sensitive and thought-provoking coverage she enjoys lavishing on other causes and issues deemed Oprah-worthy.
On another topic:
Thanks for your comments, Heather. Just a quick note to everyone, however: I do not write about my racialized experiences with the intent of comparing my experiences to others’, or to imply that mine were “worse than” the next person’s.
Heather, regarding your “BUT” statement, I am not sure if you are ashamed of the Asian people of whom you speak, or ashamed of the white measuring stick against which people of color are measured in white nations. I think that for many people of color — perhaps Asians especially — trying to be accepted as/by whites is also a survival tactic. Certainly many of my transracially adopted Asian friends agree. Although it is no longer my method of choice, most of us have at one time or another used it so that we may survive in the truest sense of the word. I think it becomes a problem for Asians, however, when the endeavor to cover ethnicity and pass as white alienates us as a minority group from other people of color, where we could potentially find much strength and solidarity in many ways.
As for your wish to meet an Indian woman to befriend, is there a reason you have targeted Indian women? I don’t think that all Indians or Indian women are racist toward blacks. There is absolutely a great deal of racism among people of color toward other POC; racism isn’t merely a white trait, to be sure. However, if I got the impression that another person was trying to befriend me because s/he was looking for a Korean friend, I’d probably be rather wary of that person.