Surrogate mother wins access to her biological son in landmark case - after gay couple said it was 'homophobic' for her to be involved in their 'motherless family' with 'no vacancy' for a woman

My reading of the judgment was that the mother is granted 4 direct visits per year, so once every 3 months (plus regular indirect contact)?

And the men then put on the court record that they vehemently reject the professional's findings, that he is biased against them and that none of what was stated applies to them, he is a big bad wolf who has simply got it all wrong.

Essentially demonstrating exactly what was stated by being enraged/excluding the perceived threat instead of showing any level of self-reflection or insightfulness. Sounds like the Dr was bang on the money!

This couple have said the quiet part out loud IMO.
They have basically admitted that they are indoctrinating this child to lead a certain lifestyle populated only by certain kinds of people.

It will be interesting (and very telling) to see where this child is in 20 years time.

I doubt they will be a well rounded individual.

We don't have to get rid of the concept of a mother, because under the Law Commission reforms the purchasers (of whatever sex) would be the legal parents from birth. A child doesn't legally have to have a mother - eg in a male same sex adoption or a single male adopter, the child legally doesn't have a mother once the adoption order is made.

The Law Commission reforms to surrogacy are very clearly about making the process better for the purchasers. The link I posted isn't about the early days of surrogacy, it's the current direction of travel - the woman who grows and births the child having no legal relationship to it from birth. The previous set up is as with any child, the woman who gives birth has PR automatically, and it has to be given up by her or taken away by a court.

It's very clear the Law Commission wants to make surrogacy easier for the purchasers, and even disregarded the responses to the consultation which were against legal surrogacy at all. It's like having a consultation about whether we should have the death penalty by hanging or firing squad, and ignoring everyone who says 'no we shouldn't have the death penalty at all '.

It's much like the theft of women's rights to single sex spaces. Do you think we should allow this group of males to count as women, or this group? Shall we allow the sale of babies this way, or this way? with no option to voice that no, none of them. Two different fronts in the same war on women.

Edited typo

@nothingcomestonothing thanks for that information. Wouldn't we have to get rid of mother as a concept, in the UK. It would be very messy, we have a complex language which makes a difference in law. The Nordic model may have been drafted in the earlier days of surrogacy and what would they do about biological mothers who wanted to retain rights before going ahead?

I'm not very sure of my footing with surrogacy but it is an interesting area of women's rights.

GiveMeSpanakopita · Yesterday 13:37

If they'd gone the adoption route than any expressed sentiment along these lines would have seen them booted off the waiting list.

Given the way that SS and the council went to bat for them, I have my doubts on that score.

I am reading the judgement with my jaw on the floor at this couple's misogyny, selfishness and lack of insight.

Surrogacy is selfish and cruel to the child. I hope is banned. Not being able to have kids is not a reason to exploit children and vulnerable women. I am pretty sure the majority of surrogate mothers would have trauma and regret. It is only natural that they would. Why people can’t accept when there is not possibility of having their own kids? Treating it as a commodity is wrong and celebrities should be shunned when doing this for vanity reasons.

Inappropriate relationship 🤯

I bet this particular local council is also the type to withdraw funding from rape crisis organisations which want to provide single sex services to female survivors.

How much of an arsehole do you have to be to repay a woman who has been through pregnancy and childbirth for you, so that you could have a biological child, by treating her like this?

Unfortunately that's not at all what the law reforms do. This is from Nordic model now:

the commissioning parents will automatically become the legal parents at the moment of birth. If the birth mother has second thoughts, her only recourse is to voice her objection within 6 weeks of the birth and then apply to the courts for a parental order. Even if the child was conceived from her own genetic material, the commissioning parents – as the legal parents – will take custody of it. This means she is unlikely to be granted a parental order even if she has the wherewithal to pursue one.

The birth mother would have to apply for a parental order from the courts for the baby she carries and births, the purchasers are the legal parents from birth. The reforms are intended to make buying a baby easier and safer for the purchasers, not for the women involved.

https://nordicmodelnow.org/2023/03/29/most-respondents-to-the-law-commissions-surrogacy-consultation-want-a-total-ban-on-surrogacy-in-the-uk/

I see that the baby was born in September 2020 so the mum went through the pregnancy at the height of covid 🙁 meanwhile in the judgement the dads complain that at times they felt excluded during the pregnancy...

They said they were 'made to feel that the baby we had always dreamed of would never be ours' describing an occasion when they had sat on the nursery floor and cried.

That child deserves to know his mother. That is the primary matter. What on earth do same sex couples say to these children when they realise their father / mother is absent from their lives? Do we know what effect that has on the children? Surely it's devastating for some. Surrogacy should be banned. I also don't think sperms donation should be allowed without an on-going intention of a presence in the child's live.

Big difference between adopting and buying, I don’t think it’s right to suggest that these are equally “narcissistic” things to do.

I'm beginning to think that a lot of the evils of surrogacy, as we see in this case, and trauma from adoption as well, could be avoided if we made a law that recoginsed the importance of the mother / baby dyad. That relationship should only ever be severed after all support to the mother possible has failed or if the baby is in imminent harm from the mother (which is highly unusual).

And to recognise that the mother is the person the baby is born from, and not necessarily the genetic egg donor. Because it is the process of gestation that develops the bond between mother and baby, not genetics.

We are all born from a mother, and it is the first and most important relationship for our thriving. And before the WABTM I'm saying it's not the only important relationship, but it is the first and most important one.

A law to recognise the dyad and uphold it as a legal and highly important relationship.

Such a law could also possibly go some way to stopping abusive men holding the threat of taking children away from their mother via the court system as a way to stop her from leaving a DV situation.

Just a thought.

was that the child was being raised in an ‘LGBTQ environment’

Ummmm...what does that mean exactly?

For those of us who think that sexuality of ANY sort should not be something a child is exposed to until at least adolescence?

If they'd gone the adoption route than any expressed sentiment along these lines would have seen them booted off the waiting list.

I hope that was a very light paraphrasing you used because....hmmm.

@yourhairiswinterfire "The parents had difficulty accepting..."

May I suggest that any adult who has difficulties accepting the facts of human reproduction is not particularly suited to being a parent at all.

Love your username by the way. Ben & Bev 4eva!

Part and parcel of the same pretence as the trans movement: the lie that male and female are simply interchangeable. Here, the insistence on bringing up a child as if he was created without a woman's involvement - as if two fathers were biologically equivalent to a heterosexual couple.

Most of the long term research shows good outcomes into adulthood from same-sex couples however most of the really long term research is from lesbian mums who had a baby in a straight relationship and then got together with their new female partner. Gay couples have been allowed to adopt for much less time and surrogacy is also relatively new en masse (we are adopters with a 12 year old and when we were struggling to have children - 15 years ago - it was mentioned but not as a serious option).

This is my experience also.

You can’t generalise - that way lies madness. And men’s rights activists 😀

I feel a bit sorry for the Dads. They thought they had their own child at last and that they could do a perfectly decent job bringing him up on their own. They are.

It went wrong when reality rolled up in the form of an adult human female. Curse of men everywhere, innit 😀

Dads turned nasty. Possessive to the point of damaging everyone, inc their son. I think they were terrified.

I worry about this idea if children being raised in ‘LGBTQ households/environments’ or whatever. I know of a child locally who has same sex adopted parents. The child is trans. You can’t help but think that being in such an ‘ environment’ has been a factor in the child’s gender confusion.
We’ve moved far away from what is real. At the end of the day this is a child born from this woman’s egg and fed, grown and birthed from her body. She is his biological mother and he will not thank anyone for keeping her away. Look at long lost families, the vast majority of those people you see on there are not looking their dads. They’re looking for their mothers. The mother/ child relationship is the most important and impactful relationship people can experience.