I will not buy... (revised)

The movie "JUNO."

As a Birth Mother and Mom I hated the movie. Many people gave such rave reviews of the movie ~ that it's the greatest picture of sacrificial love and bunkity, bunkity, bunk. What sacrifice is there when a young woman doesn't want to be pregnant...places a baby for adoption just because she doesn't want to be a mom, and rarely throughout the entire movie shows any connection or affection for the life living in her? It made me rather sick to watch it instead of hopeful for the message being given about what adoption really means. As a Birth Mother who placed her daughter for adoption not because I didn't want to be a Mom, but because I wanted the very best for her ~ out of a heart full of love and an action full of long-term pain knowing she wouldn't be "my" daughter ~ I placed her in the arms of a beautiful couple to be raised as their own. Watching this movie was an insult, a slap in the face, and an offense to Birth Mothers everywhere.

Maybe to someone who hasn't had "the opportunity" to place a child for adoption the movie seems like a great movie ~ afterall (spoiler ahead for those who haven't seen the movie...stop here if you really hate it when someone spoils the end for you.....)






instead of keeping the child and being a young single mother who had to rely on who knows who to help her raise the baby she decides to still go through with the adoption after the couple she chose filed for divorce before the baby was born. Now...to someone who hasn't seen the movie it may seem a logical choice ~ she wanted the baby to be taken care of so why wouldn't she still place it for adoption with a loving and responsible couple? Of course that's a good move! Well, you're right....IF she had chosen another couple. Instead she continued to go through with the placement to the NOW SINGLE woman from the original adoption plan. Can someone explain to me how simply offering an older ...BUT STILL SINGLE...woman a child is any different than a young woman keeping her child and mothering it herself? PLEASE! Explain....

The moral of this movie is "if you get pregnant don't worry about the child's future...worry about your own. If you're a teenager and you get pregnant because you chose to "see what sex was like" you should just find some "good person" and give your baby to them because really, it's the fact that you're a teenager that would make you a hard case for motherhood. So take care of yourself first and just get rid of the kid."

One other thing ~ I was really looking forward to this movie as a possible catalyst for a discussion with my oldest son about his 1/2 sister, Sophie, and why she doesn't live with us. The language alone would have kept me from being able to watch it with him...and the flippant attitude of sex before marriage as a "normal" thing to do and accept would have kept us from watching it if the language didn't first.

I hated this movie...and I won't recommend it to anyone I know. Now or ever.

*note: the original post was written on May 3, 2008...updates made were to the first paragraph, and adding the second to last.