Wow! Where do I start?
Well, I think I'm just going to dive in at random, and maybe come back a few times to update my response.
This caught my eye, Roger:
contend the baby is capable of bonding with his true parent, alt-Clark, without suffering psychological damage due to separation anxiety primarily because he won't remember L&C. I, for one, can't remember anything at all before the age of four. If the child was much older, perhaps that is not the case but an infant would suffer, at most, short term trauma.
I'm not so sure. Just because you can't recall anything before a certain age doesn't mean it didn't have an effect on you. Also, I saw a TV programme last week which discussed the issue of intersex children (kids born with some features from both sexes). For a long time, science was persuaded by a landmark study from a well-respected physician that for the first two years of life, children were mentally asexual - you could imprint either sex on them so long as you did it within 24 months of birth. So doctors did (and still do) convert such children to one sex, and then they're raised as that sex. For children who'd probably suffer immeasurable trauma if left as they were born, this is considered the best choice. However, this doctor took things further with one child, and converted a completely normal boy to a girl (they didn't spell the reasons out as to why, although I have a strong hunch). At first, everything seemed to be going well for the child, and the doctor published his findings accordingly. This was taken as further evidence that infants are a 'blank canvas'. However, when medical science finally turned their attention back to the girl (now a young adult), they discovered that 'she' was living as a man and had undergone surgery to convert himself back. The case that had underpinned medical practice for umpteen years was thus completely discredited. The boy said he'd been miserable for most of his life, and never, ever wanted to be treated as a girl again. He's now married with kids.
Now, I realise that this isn't the same as taking a child from one set of parents and raising him with another set, but I think it demonstrates that infants are not as reprogrammable as we might think.
Yvonne
(back for more when I've got the time)
