Adoption means to ‘take as one’s own.’ People use the word in a more general meaning like adopt a law, adopt a highway, adopt an animal. I think most people when they use it about a person mean a legal, go to court process but not all. I never refer to my daughter as ‘my adopted daughter’ but sometimes (only if required for meaning) say ‘my daughter, who is adopted’.
But I know people who have kids, like Michael Oher, who came to sleep on the couch and never left and they refer to those kids as ‘my son’ or ‘my bonus kid’ or some other way that include the kids in the family. My friend explained hers to me as ‘the kid I pay for but can’t deduct on my taxes.’ The Tuohys needed something more official. I think the calling him adopted online (and in the book/movie) probably came later as the relationship developed during his senior year.
I know a lot of blended families that do not distinguish between full siblings, adopted, step, half etc. My kids never refer to each other as anything other than sisters and don’t care if others think that term should only be used for biological relationships.
I learned from a podcast today that the Tuohys used the word “adopted” or “adoption” 30 times in THEIR book, and specifically said that it was a legal confirmation of what they were already feeling.
That’s flat-out deceptive to me. Yes, in conversation, we use the word “adopt” to describe all kinds of informal relationships. And journalists’ subjects are not responsible for sloppy language by another author. But these are educated businesspeople using the word “adopt” to describe a legal process in a book THEY wrote. They wanted the public narrative of adoption without the reality, for whatever reason.
Maybe you’re not familiar with how big time college sports work, but the Tuohys were well known Ole Miss boosters–they have an athletic building with their name on it. Knowing what I know about D1 college recruiting, it would be a huge shock if the Tuohys placed all the offers before Oher, weighed the pluses and minuses, etc. Their goal had to be to deliver him to their beloved alma mater. That’s how cut-throat college recruiting works.
I mean, this is what boosters do, getting their toes as close to the line of propriety without going over it (or going over it and hope nobody notices).
ADMIN: I clicked on the gear at the bottom of the post–have no idea what that does or if I initiated the launch sequence of something horrible–I apologize!!
The Tuohy’s donation in 2014 precipitated the basketball arena named in their honor. Well after Michael Oher went to Ole Miss and joined the NFL.
The Tuohys and Michael Oher, at the time, saw him as part of the family. Most families want their kids to go to their alma mater. Neither the Tuohys nor Michael knew what success was going to be for him. I do think for a kid who had so much instability for so long going to a familiar school made a lot of sense for him. It definitely turned out to be a great opportunity for him.
Michael Oher knew football before he knew and lived with the Tuohy family. And he was not dumb or illiterate, despite what the book and movie narrative imply. He started living with them in 2004. He was already lineman of the year in 2003 , First team all state, and considered a 5 star recruit . I think they had an inkling he was a top prospect! And would be beneficial to Ole Miss.
I merely asked if Oher ever said anything about being ‘steered to Ole Miss’. Simple question. And yes, for the record I’ve worked for a number of years directly with HS athletes seeking to be recruited.
No matter how good a player is in HS, or what physical gifts they have, they are a very.long.way from the NFL, or being a ‘sure thing’. No guarantees, ever.
Layer in a sub 1.0 cumulative GPA after soph year like Oher had, and that’s a big project to get the kid NCAA eligible.
The timeline is a little fuzzy here. At some point during the 2003-2004 school year, Oher started living with the Tuohys full time instead of rotating among other teammates’ families. That same year, college coaches converged on Briarcrest to court what they all, according to Michael Lewis, recognized as a “future NFL left tackle.”
When scout Tom Lemming came to visit Oher because he thought he was the next Orlando Pace, Oher “not only had no handlers; he didn’t appear to exist outside of school. He had no home; he didn’t even have a phone number. Or so said the Briarcrest Christian School when Lemming called looking for Michael Oher.” That doesn’t sound like the Tuohys had already moved him in before his talent was recognized.
Exactly. I keep hearing people saying he was “part of their family,” except he wasn’t, seemingly quite purposely given that even if you want to use the excuse that the conservatorship was more expedient, they had years after the formalize adoption if that was a goal or intent on their part. It’s reasonable to conclude they never intended him to be a family member.
Yet Michael Lewis, friend of Sean Tuohy was given the impression that Micheal was made an heir:
(The NCAA) had opened an investigation and voiced the suspicion that the Tuohys had become Michael’s guardians and put him into their wills as an equal of their own children only so that he might play left tackle for their alma mater.
So it wasn’t just Oher who was fooled.
As to your question, the movie has Oher saying he went to Ole Miss because it was where his family goes to school and had always gone to school.
It would seem odd to adopt someone at the age of say 21 unless you expected to provide a similar level of financial support to them to your other kids. By that point it was clear that Oher was likely to earn millions of dollars (he ultimately earned tens of millions) and there was little reason to commingle their respective finances.
If he’d had a serious injury in college and never played professionally, do you think the Tuohys would have washed their hands of him, or continued to provide support, perhaps even including adoption? The answer to that question may crystallize the different positions of various posters in this thread.
I think some here just aren’t aware of how ruthless and dirty the whole business of high level college sports is. If you are an elite player, colleges find a way regardless of the rules and the athlete’s transcript. Universities have been caught running classes that athletes never attended, and yet received grades for. A college basketball recruiter told blue chip athletes don’t go to College A–their coach is dying of cancer (this was many years ago, and the coach in question is still alive!).
The rules for “regular” students and athletes are vastly different. Athletes have graduated from universities and were also functionally illiterate.
I don’t want to use the word “naïve”, but I think some are commenting and have no idea of how cut-throat the world of college athletics is.
One final story—15 yrs ago we were at an info session at an elite New England LAC. Someone asked what SAT would be generally required to have a good chance at admissions. The admissions counselor very candidly said “700’s—but if you can play football, 600’s, if you can play hockey, 500’s”. The crowd started buzzing, and the guy added “Hey–the alumni like winning teams!”. And this was Division III!
Anyone can become an heir, equal to your birth children or with a different percentage -nieces, nephews, inlaws, the mailman, or you can leave off your children and give it all to someone or something else like a college, church, charity. And any legally adopted child can be excluded from the estate. If the parents die intestate, then yes, an adopted child will be treated as an equal to ‘natural born’ children by most state intestate laws, but do we really think the Tuohys don’t have an estate plan, a will, a trust?
From the reports, it appears the Tuohys split the royalties by 5, each person taking a share and Michael getting an equal share with the Tuohy children. He seems to have rejected his share so they put it into a trust for him.
Yes anyone can become an heir. I simply meant that in TN, an adopted child and biological child are treated the same when it comes to inheriting from their parents, barring other pronouncements in the wills. Someone under a conservatorship has no inheritance rights unless specified in the will. Just one difference between the two choices it seems like the Tuohys had, which has been oft cited in the press since Oher filed his petition.
Not coming out of HS…the colleges have no access nor control over HS transcripts. College coaches can’t magically make a student NCAA eligible. Are there things at the margins they can do, yes. But, there is no way a college coach can snap their fingers and make a HS athlete with a GPA less than 1.0 NCAA eligible. Cheating can happen as I mentioned above…involving others taking classes or tests for the athlete for example. We all just lived thru the Varsity Blues scandal.
Of course many things have happened and continue to happen once the athletes are in college wrt academics…not going to class, others taking tests or writing papers for athletes, etc. We all have read the stories. Sadly I agree that there are athletes playing that have low literacy levels.
Many schools are transparent about this. Of course at most schools, test scores are a non-issue for athletes now.