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As I will never get tired of explaining - the fact that something is racist doesn't make it wrong or false.
The implication that a "ghetto boy" is a member of a "virulent invasive species" is both literally false, and metaphorically wrong.
I shouldn't have to explain why it's literally false.
The metaphor is wrong because in the typical understanding, the actions we should take against "invasive species" should be extreme, up to and including eradicating them from the "invaded" area.
You can make a nature/nurture point just fine without bringing these kind of implications into it.
The metaphor is specifically telling you not to put yourself in a position where you would have to take extreme measures to remove the invasive species. Have you ever read an account of an adoption gone wrong? In the worst cases, it sounds like the stuff that makes family annihilations seem understandable. And just to get ahead of the obvious criticism, the worst such story I've ever come across involved adopting a pair of Eastern European girls, who proved to be violently uncontrollable wrecking balls on the lives of their adoptive parents.
The difference is with kids is that someone has to raise them. We don't eradicate them like we do knotweed or whatever. For the good of the kid and society efforts must be made to get them to adulthood. A group home is unlikely to do as good a job as a family with resources. It may well be horrible and difficult for that family, but it must be done by someone. Which is why we don't force people to adopt or foster generally. It's going to be tough in a lot of ways.
It's supererogatory work, so it's not very helpful to talk about these kids as invasive species. In addition the whole rant about nature vs nurture is flawed. by the time a kid is an infant in need of adoption from a poor area like a ghetto, almost always nature has been confounded by maternal alcohol or drug use, maternal or infant malnutrition, you have lead exposure in pipes, a high stress environment for the mother, quite probable early birth and low birth weight. Likely lack of doctor's care and feeding post-birth. Possible neglect and abuse post-birth. Because if they had those things or were looked after properly, they are unlikely to be put up for adoption in the first place. May not make their behavior as they age any better for the parents of course. But it isn't possible to declare it nature and therefore the behavior of an invasive species.
The Khmer Rogue disagree.
The Khmer Rogue can get back to disarming traps, we're paying him to get us into the Zhentarim vault, not for his opinions on child rearing.
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