Gay Man rejects Surrogacy

[OhHolyJesus]

I hear Not All Men a lot so this is a 'Not All Gay Men' thread. Not all gay men approve of, and want to participate in, surrogacy because "Surrogacy is a serious human rights violation, and no amount of rainbow-washing will ever alter that fact."

I love this bold statement:

"Commercial surrogacy is being gradually rainbow-washed, and Big Fertility is galloping into western statute books on the coat-tails of an aggressive and misogynistic LGBT+ lobby that no-one is allowed to offend, upset or even question."

and this...

"Yet there exists no universal human right to be a parent, any more than there is a universal human right to buy a human organ from a living donor. Can you imagine the outrage if Lady Hale had awarded a six-figure sum so that an individual could travel to Iran to buy a kidney from a lower-income donor who needs to pay off his debts?"

lesbianandgaynews.com/2021/03/gary-powell-why-we-should-say-no-to-surrogacy/

Gary Powell has written on the Lady Hale judgement which I think has been posted before.

www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2020/06/63958/

[TheRabbitOfCaerbannog]

That's an excellent article, thanks for sharing OhHoly

[OhHolyJesus]

Isn't he fab! Such a breath of fresh air, cutting through the crap.

Would love to see more of this POV in the mainstream but I'm resigned to the same old fluff week in week out.

[SmokedDuck]

I think there are lots of gay men who don't accept the surrogacy argument. I remember a few years ago when Dolce and Gabbana were in all kinds of trouble for saying, more or less, that sometimes you just have to accept the confines of nature, even when the technology was available.

The wider problem is that across many areas now there is a tendency to say "this group of people have an unequal outcome because of some basic factor of reality like biology, therefore we have a moral obligation to use science and the law to create equality of outcome. Questioning the legal or technological actions required is then seen, in and of itself, as bigoted.

So long as that kind of argument is accepted at face value you will see it used with surrogacy.

[FlyPassed]

He was on the Venus Rising podcast. He's fab

open.spotify.com/episode/12YZ400d1AM4TQVIEd8Wu5?si=8Nt8qVPKS-mEmgAWFHR0nw&utm_source=copy-link

[PandorasMailbox]

Really excellent piece @OhHolyJesus. Thank you for posting

[BlackWaveComing]

I'm really enjoying what I've read so far from Lesbian and Gay news.

[Nonmaquillee]

Really informative. I agree with everything he's written here. Thank you for posting this.

[FannyCann]

I've heard him speak on a couple of webinars and he is a fantastic speaker. Full of passion and real anger.

[OhHolyJesus]

It's refreshing to read his perspective - it's like the Ollie Locke antidote!

From the podcast I can believe him being called homophobic for having this view which is beyond ironic.

A child is not a human right and hitching surrogacy to the gay rights bandwagon at the expense of women will not end well. So glad to see this published, just wish it was more present in the mainstream but we are where we are. For now.

[EmbarrassingAdmissions]

That Public Discourse piece has shocked me. That judgement has profound implications for the NHS and more widely, I can't believe it has such little visibility.

[FannyCann]

It was an appalling judgement EmbarrassingAdmissions

Wrong on so many levels. Very depressing.

[OhHolyJesus]

It's shocking isn't it? Some days I feel this board is the only place that hasn't lost its grip on reality.

The XX ruling it largely responsible for the Padraig Creavan case in Ireland I think. It's opened Pandora's box.

Will dig out the link...

[OhHolyJesus]

Here's the thread on Padraig Creavan

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/4183102-Disturbing-Surrogacy-Front-pager-from-Ireland-this-afternoon

and a puff peice from a law firm about the XX case:

www.irwinmitchell.com/client-stories/2017/october/woman-receives-compensation-for-surrogacy-costs-after-cancer-misdiagnosis-left-her-infertile

"Anne Kavanagh, a specialist medical negligence solicitor from our London office, represented XX. She said: “This was a case where multiple failings by the Trust led to our client facing infertility and lifelong pelvic radiation injuries at the age of 30. Her only means of achieving a family is through surrogacy either in the UK or the US. “The impact of this was devastating for her but she has held on to the prospect that however complicated, she could regain the life she had expected if she could pursue surrogacy to have her family."

Her only means? Not true, they should be more accurate. "Her only means of having a biological family" (through her frozen harvested eggs) would be closer to the truth.

[lucylucky1977]

I wonder if it will be gay men who turn the tide on this - my best friend who is gay is the one who first alerted me to this all of this stuff about two years ago after he was accused of being a nazi for not being into vaginas.
Artie Mortie is a decent man too and very vocal about it.
I have faith in gay men to start calling this out -see the other thread also about Mr Gay England.

[jessstan2]

I think that is very good.

Nobody has a right to a child just because they feel as though they would like one.

[ArabellaScott]

"Yet there exists no universal human right to be a parent, any more than there is a universal human right to buy a human organ from a living donor. Can you imagine the outrage if Lady Hale had awarded a six-figure sum so that an individual could travel to Iran to buy a kidney from a lower-income donor who needs to pay off his debts?"

Applause for Gary Powell.

[jessstan2]

That is a really good quotation, thanks for posting it.

[SadlyMissTaken]

As soon as gay men started showing an interest in surrogacy in numbers things started moving in terms of liberalising the law. When broke infertile couples were the main clients nobody was that interested. Now wealthy men are an increasingly large portion of the client base and that has inevitably changed the narrative but also excited those with financial interests that want a share of the cash. Women's interests will as usual be subordinate to everybody and everything else.

[Delphinium20]

I've heard stories (and known a family) where a gay man who desires parenthood shares custody w/ a lesbian couple. I'm sure not all situations like this will work out perfectly, just like not all heterosexual couples parenting partnerships work out, but no woman's body is being commodified, is it?

[RabbitOfCaerbannog]

I am very close to a situation like this and it is as harmonious as it can be, I do believe it's in huge part to the individuals responsible for bringing a life into the world being very closely connected, having genuine respect for each other and committing to maintaining relationships amicably for the sake of the child they've had together.