Parasites.
Cambodia attracts them like flies.

Anchor Moy wrote: ↑Sun May 23, 2021 10:54 pm

newkidontheblock wrote: ↑Sun May 23, 2021 9:33 pm

Alex wrote:"It is unknown how many of these children were orphans, or how many were stolen from their families"

... or how many were sold by their families.

Families would like to use the word, stolen, please.

That way they can collect twice.

Once for the selling of their kids.

And a second time for claiming outrage.

How is this any different from the families who sell their daughter to the village auntie who when then ships them to Phnom Penh as born again taxi girls?

Or the ones that ship their kids to some relatives to feed and raise and see them almost never?

Or the orphanages with ‘orphans’ that stay there during the day, during ‘donor hour’ then go home to their nearby families at night?

Sadly, not all families have the same kind of love for their kids as we would like.

A touch judgemental, NKOTB ?
The American woman, Galindo, who set up an organisation buying and selling the poor Cambodian women's babies like they are bitcoins, and who made a fortune, (don't cry for me - US$8M !), from doing this, sent out "baby recruiters" into the Cambodian countryside to exploit the poor and the ignorant, who thought that their kids might have better opportunities for food and education in an 'orphanage' ,instead of starving at home in the village. Many people thought that their kids were going to a type of poor kids' boarding school, much like the pagodas, where they would get fed and would learn to read and write.

According to Jacobs’ research, Galindo used baby recruiters throughout Cambodia who targeted vulnerable families, saying their children would be taken to temporary daycares or orphanages.
Galindo profited nearly $8 million from organizing adoptions. She pleaded guilty to money laundering and visa fraud and was sentenced to 18 months in prison in November 2004, according to ABC News.

Who is the greedy one here ?

She claims her paperwork and record keeping was not up to scratch. Most people running business' would fall foul of western standards of record keeping if they get a very aggressive audit. When they want to find fault, they find fault.

She pleaded guilty to money laundering and visa fraud. Sounds terrible, like organised crime. Moving money from one account to another can be construed as money laundering by an over zealous bureaucrat with prosecutorial powers. If they are out to get you for buying babies and making millions out of the process, the way it works is they threaten you with a 5-15 year prison sentence and then coerce you into a guilty plea with an agreed 18 months sentence (minimum security - out in 7 months - no big fine so you keep the money etc) and the authorities look like they nailed an evil criminal.

As for visa fraud, that's an error on an application they say is deliberate. Can they prove dishonesty? Who cares when you are being blackmailed into a plea deal.

If that's all the authorities got from the prosecution of a child thief who preyed on the credulity of some of the poorest people in the world, and then sold them for $ millions to wholesome unsuspecting all-American families doing something wonderful, then I doubt they had very much at all. Otherwise why settle for such a paltry deal?

Username Taken wrote: ↑Mon May 24, 2021 5:03 am That girl's mother sold her because she loved her.

Then why 'sell' her at all? If you're that desperate and concerned for your child's future, then allow them to adopt free and clear.

Username Taken wrote: ↑Mon May 24, 2021 5:03 amPost script: The beggar woman didn't just take the money and run. She came back to see her child's progress each year, and to thank the girl's new parents.

Are you sure there weren't any subtle requests for money by the "beggar woman" upon each of these "progress" visits?

Another POV on adoption from a Cambodian who was adopted and sent to the US as a baby, and the alienation felt by an adoptee, self-described as a Khmer-American "Trekkie":

Wayward Sons: How Worf Helps Me Navigate Adoption
“Are you the son of Mogh?" "Yes, I am."
BY Matthew Hawkins
/May 26, 2021 5:00 AM PDT

From his first appearances in Star Trek: The Next Generation, Worf is cast as an outsider. He’s the first Klingon in Starfleet, but even more than that, he is a Klingon orphan raised by Humans. He is different and that’s made clear from the beginning. In “Encounter at Farpoint'' Captain Picard orders Worf to take command of the Enterprise-D’s saucer section, to which Worf objects immediately: It’s against the Klingon way to abandon his commanding officer. Picard gives him a stern talking to on duty, and already we can see that Worf is out of place.
Throughout the rest of TNG’s run and later, stationed on Deep Space Nine, Worf grows with and towards his Klingon heritage, eventually finding his own relationship with his dual heritages. And yet, his Klingonness is never really his own. Even in that first “Klingon vs Human'' interaction in “Encounter at Farpoint'' we see that Captain Picard is using Worf’s identity against him.
Picard’s appeal to Worf’s duty goes beyond just that of a Starfleet officer. If Worf were to disobey, he would not just face a probable court martial, but he would be an example of a stereotypical “bad” Klingon in the eyes of those around him.


I, myself, am an adoptee. I was born in Cambodia and when I was 3 months old my mother left me in an orphanage where I was adopted 3 months later and was brought to the United States. Like Worf, I’ve spent most of my life trying to figure out what Cambodianness means to me, if and how it can coexist with my white, American upbringing.
I’ve always identified myself with Worf, but what’s drawn me to Worf above the other “outsider” characters (Odo, Data, Spock, etc.) was the way his identity is informed and dictated by those around him. As a transracial adoptee, my identity is a series of choices I have made to balance — or not balance — what feel like two radically different sides of myself.
I was raised and socialized in white suburbs, which shaped the way I saw the world and myself. I am fortunate enough that most people I encountered weren’t openly hostile or racist towards me, but I also have a vivid memory of looking into the mirror by the front door and knowing that I looked “wrong.”

For most of my life, I chose my adoptive side. When I would make attempts to learn about or connect with my Cambodian past, it felt artificial at best, or at worst, dishonest and ungrateful. The Khmer images and items I had felt like tokens that might as well have been from the Gamma Quadrant. Certainly, at least, they didn’t represent me. Over time, I’ve come to embrace more of my heritage through small items like jewellery, and using the name my mother gave me, but it has been a long and intensely personal process to reach that point.
https://intl.startrek.com/news/wayward- ... e-adoption

Hard to relate to this if you don't have personal experience. There is many reasons why someone would give up their child for adoption.

Where I'm from it's considered quite noble because you are admitting to having a child you can't take care of. Many would give birth in secret and bury it in the back yard to save face for the family.

But if you look at similar investigations into adoptions in other countries like Chile recently you will find a lot of different situations. I imagine same here in Cambodia cause there was money to be made from these western families.

Might not seem like a big deal to some but if you were adopted you'd probably want to know and, if you had an adopted child you'd probably want that child to know you weren't involved in some wicked scheme, or at least you did what you could to make sure you weren't.

Why Angelina Jolie's Adoption Of Son Maddox Is Suddenly Turning Heads
By Julie Fallo/July 16, 2021 2:16 pm EDT

If you're reading this it's unlikely you need an introduction to Angelina Jolie. After all, she has been referred to as "the most famous actress in the world, according to Insider.

Daughter of actor Jon Voight, she went from small films like "Hackers" to being an internationally-respected actress and activist. The transformation from Academy Award-winning actress to world-renowned humanitarian began in Cambodia where she was filming the blockbuster "Lara Croft: Tomb Raider" franchise. Another journey began there in Cambodia: her journey to becoming a mother. Maddox, the "Eternals" star's eldest child, was adopted from an orphanage in Cambodia in 2002, shortly after Jolie had been named UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador for her work with refugees, per UNHCR.

It is much less likely you've heard of Elizabeth Jacobs, though that may soon change. She wasn't a household name in 2002, having been adopted herself from Cambodia in 2000. Now she's a young director whose first feature-length documentary titled "Stolen Children" is making waves (via Daily Mail). The film follows Jacobs' return to Cambodia 21 years later armed with nothing but a desire to, as she told Shoutout LA, "uncover the truth about my adoption and whether or not I was involved in the baby trafficking scandal that happened exactly the same time I was adopted." This is where the Jolie and Jacob's paths intersect, and it appears the superstar may be caught up in the wave created by the young documentarian.

The question of how the two women are connected begins with the adoptions themselves. In 2004 a woman named Lauryn Galindo, who had facilitated adoptions of Cambodian children spanning over a decade, was handed down a prison sentence after pleading guilty to charges of conspiracy to commit visa fraud and money laundering (via ABC News).

The charges stemmed from something much darker, the accusation that she "stole" children from vulnerable women. Allegedly, some women were coerced to give up their child with promises of thousands of dollars from rich American parents but who reportedly received far less including amounts reported to be as low as $15 or even a bag of rice.

Meanwhile, Galindo got rich as the former hula dancer owned multiple homes around the world including a lavish property in Hawaii, as reported by ABC News. Essentially, Galindo put hundreds of Cambodian children in the hands of American parents. Among the trafficked are both Jacobs and allegedly the "Mr. and Mrs. Smith" star's son Maddox, according to The Sun.

There are now questions surrounding the adoption of Maddox

Lauryn Galindo operated in murky waters, the result of which has cast suspicion on all the adoptions she oversaw, reportedly half of all Cambodian adoptions during that time (via Daily Mail).

Despite there being no specific evidence of any wrongdoing by the "Maleficent" actress or the other unsuspecting parents who believed Galindo's stories about the pasts of the children they were adopting, questions remain about the validity of the adoptions themselves (via Radar Online).

This is not the first time questions have been raised specifically about Maddox's adoption. In 2017, Cambodian charity aid director Mounh Sarath told The Sun he had claimed on paper to be Maddox's father to assist the actress saying, "She had to change his name, so the only way was for me to do it. I said he's my son." The Sun reports there is no evidence Angelina Jolie or her then-husband actor Billy Bob Thorton had knowledge of any false paperwork.

The actress has maintained her son's past was researched and that he was not one of the "stolen" children and reportedly has said, "I would never rob a mother of her child. I can only imagine how dreadful that would feel."

Read More: https://www.thelist.com/463460/why-ange ... paign=clip

From the UK tabloid The Daily Mail:

EXCLUSIVE: Angelina Jolie's former friend says he's NOT '100% sure' her adopted son Maddox was an orphan - as filmmaker probes scandal of babies in Cambodia stolen from their families
22 July 2021
Angelina Jolie adopted her son Maddox from a Cambodian orphanage in 2002
But Sarath Mounh, a former friend of the Hollywood star, today says he cannot be certain that both of Maddox's parents were dead when he was adopted
Mr Mounh ran an NGO in Cambodia and became friends with Jolie through his work in the country
He was also involved in the adoption process by signing legal documents stating that he was Maddox's father, which he is not, to help get it approved quicker
His comments come as a new documentary will take a fresh look at babies in Cambodia stolen from their families and put up for adoption
Mr Mounh told MailOnline: 'I'm not 100% sure that Maddox was an orphan. At least one of the parents was possibly alive at the time of his adoption.'
Jolie has said she went to great lengths to verify that Maddox had no living parents
Mr Mounh and Jolie fell out following allegations made against him, which he denies, that he misused funds donated by her
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl ... rphan.html