Attachment Parenting International (API) has issued a press release to draw attention to their letter of protest (PDF) sent to NBC Studios.
API makes reference to the United Nations Declaration of the Rights of the Child of 1959. More recently, the U.N.'s 1990 Convention on the Rights of the Child reiterates a key point: "In all actions concerning children, whether undertaken by public or private social welfare institutions … the best interests of the child shall be a primary consideration" (Article 3). NBC's role with regard to the "borrowed" children is closest to that of "a private social welfare institution." It has utterly failed to take the best interests of the "borrowed" children into consideration.
I have used the provocative epithet "The Baby Kidnappers" to highlight the effects of the experience from the child's point of view. From the point of view of the parents, who have given permission and who are right next door, there is no kidnapping involved. To these parents, who obviously love their children, the arrangement is no different that hiring a babysitter — safer, even, since they can supervise and intervene at any time. But young children are not able to understand any of that. They don't know their parents are nearby. They only know that their parents have disappeared and that suddenly they are in the care of total strangers. To a baby, this is exactly the same as being kidnapped.
The "borrowed" babies have no choice in the matter. Their lives are being manipulated by adults, who are placing them in a terrifying situation — a situation that does these children no good. NBC has created a situation uniformly harmful to young children, placing their interests last.
API rightfully protests this program, and so should the rest of the informed public.
