The XX Factor: What women really think.

Madonna Wants Mercy: Or, Psst, Wanna Buy a Baby?

Here's the problem: Mercy's grandmother wants to bring her home too, according to the London Times, which reports: 

Lucy Chekechiwa, 61, Mercy's grandmother, described Madonna's interest in her granddaughter as "stealing". "Why doesn't this singer pick other children? It is stealing. I want to go to court, I won't let her go," she said. Mercy has been living in an orphanage and Mrs Chekechiwa claimed it had been agreed the child would go to her when she reaches the age of six. Mercy's 18-year-old mother died five days after her birth, according to The Sun.

Orphanage is the confusing word here. Few Westerners understand that in much of Africa and Asia, what we call "orphanages" are actually boarding schools for poor children—places where extremely poor families in temporary distress drop their children off for food, education, and shelter, and then they bring the children home when things get better. Offering to house these children temporarily and then selling them for international adoption (er, "accepting donations" in exchange for adoption) is one of the common ways of defrauding poor birth families out of their children. (Need I say that not all internationally adopted children are illicitly acquired? But hundreds, and more likely thousands, are—and however large or small the proportion of the total, it's too many. Find more documentation on the extent of the problem here.)

Is it OK to swoop into a country and take someone else's child just because you're rich? Is wealth all it takes to have a "better life" ... or might it matter that you get to stay with the family you already know and love? Madonna's not alone in what she's doing, although she is unusual in knowing there's a family that wants Mercy back. Save the Children and other human rights groups want her to back off. She is setting a dangerous example, leading more Westerners into a "humanitarian" mission that is anything but.

Ethica, an American nonprofit that advocates for ethics in adoption, has launched a fundraising campaign to help Mercy stay home with her family. According to Ethica, Malawi's average annual income is $160. Ethica's goal is to raise $2,240—an annual salary for her grandmother until Mercy reaches adulthood—so that she can stay home. You can donate here.

Pajama Jam

Every so often a song appears that is obviously best listened to in pajamas at a slumber party with fake microphone in hand. Kelly Clarkson's "My Life Would Suck Without You" is such a song (it's also the No. 1 single in the country). You've been warned if you decide to put this on in a place where you have to behave like a proper adult because, among other things, it sounds a lot worse when you're sitting still. On the "Like a Prayer" scale (that Madonna song being, at least for a subset of women my age, the track most likely to have inspired juvenile dancing en masse or, in significantly lamer present-day terms, the wedding song most likely to make everyone start hysterically laughing and get on the dance floor), I think it clocks in at about a seven, just a smidge behind Clarkson's "Since U Been Gone." (The two songs sound almost exactly the same. If it ain't broke and all.) Another track off Clarkson's new record, All I Ever Wanted, the awesomely titled "I Do Not Hook Up," is almost as power chord catchy. With this album, Clarkson is burnishing her everygirl cred: Unlike Madonna, but like most everyone else, she tried rebelling and failed. (She released her last record over protestations from music suits who told her the album was a mess—it was, and it flopped.) So she went back to the authority-approved stuff and is now bettering sleepover parties across the nation.

This Doesn't Make Me Want to Vote

Why are pro-voting ads so frequently creepy? When seemingly oblivious celebrities express their views on the candidates themselves, the results can be entertaining or mildly insightful. But for some reason all of the stars' charm and charisma gets lost when they start standing up for our electoral system. These ads for Declare Yourself, which feature a gagged and sobbing Jessica Alba, Christina Aguilera, and Andre 3000 among others, are particularly frightening to look at. By the ads' logic, if I don't vote I'm essentially submitting myself to a brutal vigilante silencing technique, like having my mouth stapled or bolted shut.

Declare Yourself isn't alone in its tendency to threaten and alienate its audience despite better intentions. The "Vote or Die" campaign that began in 2000 promotes its own violent message, particularly when organizer P. Diddy gets aggressive or weirdly personal about the issues. Aguilera is actually a double offender in the scary ad game, having already taped this eerie display (those eyes! that smile!) for Rock the Vote last May. Not that Madonna's original Rock the Vote ads or Gwyneth Paltrow's stilted plug for absentee ballots were any more appropriate or appealing.

It's obviously important to get the MTV set involved in this election, and perhaps there's nothing better than a good shock to get this point across. The Declare Yourself ads' literal "use it or lose it" message is certainly attention-grabbing, but do these violent images really make people want to vote? They just scare the heck out of me.