On behalf of the subaltern, you don’t even know them, bruh.
Three years ago, I decided to live in Baja, Mexico in small town called Carmen Serdan at an orphanage called La Mision. I couldn’t tell you why I did only because, in hindsight, I’m still not entirely sure. Perhaps it was from wanting to get away from my comfort zone or some cliché like that. But I could tell you that it was definitely a great learning experience due to the fact that my main duties involved being a caretaker for handicap orphans. True story.
These weren’t the high-functioning type of handicap orphans either, they were mostly 100% dependent on care — like being showered and yes, even having their diapers changed. Their conditions varied from severe Down’s Syndrome, Cerebral Palsy, low-functioning Autism and even some with a mixture of all of these. See, most of them were unwanted and abandoned by their parents since an early age. There were local hospitals and orphanages that work together sort of like a fraternity and assess amongst themselves which orphanage would be the best fit for each orphaned child.
As it turns out, some of the abandoned come from a diasporic background from as far south as Chile and El Salvador meaning that their parents went through great lengths to forsake their responsibility as parents to abandon them. I also don’t want to sound misleading by calling them orphans because it implies that they are all around the age of adolescence, which they are not. There’s many that are much older, such as the 45-year-old Juan Carlos that loves punching himself in the chin in frustration if he can’t have his beloved sweets.
The reason why I am mentioning my brief history is to summon the reader’s attention to Exhibit A: Tonito. Toni is the youngest orphan on campus and arguably the “most normal” (although I do question his normality, which I’ll explain in a bit). The administrative staff at La Mision first found Toni as they responded to a call about a child that was allegedly left for dead but was remarkably still alive. At the time, Toni and his biological mother were living with her abusive boyfriend that hit Toni a lot. This particular time, he beat him senseless and threw him against a wall paralyzing Toni in the process. Fast forward a few years and you’ll find me stepping onto their campus for the first time as well as Toni miraculously walking again.
Living on La Mision was not the healthiest environment for Toni, in my honest opinion, due to the sensitive time of his age because he learns steadily from his environment. Just to give you an idea, whenever Toni would get angry he would also punch himself in the chin in the same likeness as Juan Carlos. You can say that he was sponging at a “super-absorbing” rate.
What really got me thinking about Toni was how his identity (you can also say, his normality) was visibly shaken as he lived from home to home, learning one family’s values then having to unlearn those values for a fresh set of new values as he transitioned to another family. His sense of culture, community and family was constantly in a state of flux as he moved into different homes of people claiming to love him and resetting his inner system.
What really grinds my gears about his situation is the fact that the people who consider adopting Toni run a trial version — or a “probationary period” — to see if he’s a right fit. In the process, they decide their own variations of what is best for the child and, effectively, I get to witness his confusion pile up. Seeing Toni internalize these social compulsions makes me feel like a bystander that witnesses a horrific tragedy unfold, like someone getting hit by a bus or getting robbed. In this case, I can’t help but feel like Tonito’s identity is the thing that’s being metaphorically struck and his volition is simultaneously being robbed. It makes me wonder about the point of view of what Spivak calls, the Subaltern:
The same class which was dominant in one area could be among the dominated in another. This could and did create many ambiguities and contradictions in attitudes… especially among the lowest strata of the rural gentry.. of those who belonged to the category of “subaltern classes.”
Toni, as well as all the other orphans, have a disability. It’s not necessarily their physical condition but their lack of ability to speak for themselves. I don’t question the adopters’ intention in trying to do well, but I do wonder how much of their ideology is being imposed onto the orphans, especially when the orphans can’t even articulate their own struggle and defend themselves. I hate to sound existential, but I can’t help but wonder if our understanding of the subaltern are not understandings at all, but mere assumptions. How much, if at all, of these assumptions are accurate and how much can it upset them? How could one get to know another if not by spending quality time with them? You don’t even know! I’ve found it personally true that there is much to learn when spending personal time with subaltern communities. I have learned is that even though I had the intention of lending a hand to help, I found that, ironically, I was the one receiving it.
