why the effing jeffing is there a Surrogacy board on Mumsnet???

[nevertuesday]

I have been on MN for 15 years or so and only just realised via a post in Active Threads, that there is a Surrogacy board on Mumsnet??

I only read a couple of the discussions there, along the lines of can I buy my baby abroad? has anyone else had a baby via Surrogacy?? so, looks to be a chat board to SUPPORT people try to remove babies from their mothers using cash.

huh?? on Mumsnet?

You have an issue with surrogacy?

I appreciate it can be a controversial subject but for some people it’s a legitimate way of having a child. Those people should have somewhere to find support. For instance I have friends who are gay and a woman they knew agreed to be a surrogate for them (no money exchanged hands). I don’t think an arrangement like that can be likened to buying a baby from an impoverished woman abroad.

And I may be wrong but in the UK is it not the case that you dont get paid to be a surrogate you just get reasonable expenses paid?

Probably because surrogacy is legal in the UK. It’s not as though MN is committing a crime, you might not agree with it personally but you can just hide it if you don’t want to see any posts.

No amount of expenses are ever considered unreasonably high though. So in effect, women are paid.

So there should not be a discussion board on anything you don’t agree with?
Get a grip.

Well whatever the expenses are deemed to be that's an arrangement between surrogate and intended parents. Nobody is forced to do anything.

wow that’s also blown my mind, there should be zero advertising for surrogacy in the uk as only not for profit surrogacy is allowed.

I am not going to read the board as had a hard day, and my blood pressure is already raised, but I wonder how carefully moderated it is and hopefully I don’t share a platform with people who also share disgusting ways to exploit women in poorer countries to buy babies.

It sounds like it isn’t that moderated though if people are sharing tips on how to buy babies abroad. Human trafficking is NEVER ok, not is the exploitation of women.

YANBU OP. Surrogacy is human trafficking and unethical. It's cruel for the babies and treats them and the surrogates like commodities rather than people.

But many people will refuse to hear this and will defend it.

I do worry that the majority of surrogacy is basically buying a woman's body in order to traffick a baby.

It is only not for profit surrogacy allowed in the UK. Many reasons why a couple might need another woman to have the pregnancy and birth. Read into it.

You need to learn about informed consent, funny how nobody who isn’t living in basic poverty is putting there hands up to be surrogates.

Lots of babies are “farmed”‘in poorer Eastern European countries. The agencies who arrange it all, keep most of the cash after promising the “mothers” as little as 2k per birth, and they usually don’t even see any of that. As the agencies then add on made up medical fees etc, the “mothers” lives are controlled often having to live in shared accommodation with little autonomy and access to outside spaces. It literally is baby farming.

It's the surrogate's choice.

I have see my PP it’s make me sick to my stomach

I have no idea about other countries I'm talking about surrogacy in the UK. This is UK mumsnet. Plenty well off, middle class people use surrogates. And to be clear I also mean the surrogates themselves come from the same background.

Exactly. Pathetic isn't it? I don't agree with it, therefore it should not exist.

Seriously, some people need to grow up!

Haha you just proved my point, yes I am sure they do and that comes at a massive risk of poorer women, they are very few surrogates in this country, the vast majority of babies trafficked this way are actually born in Eastern Europe or Cyprus.

There is the very occasional case where a sister or relative will offer to carry a baby to term, but it’s exceedingly rare.

@WORKERbeen Are you also against adoption? If not, then you are a hypocrite. Surrogacy is no different to adoption.

You’re not wrong. It’s utterly grotesque and equivalent to having a human trafficking or slavery board imo and it isn’t just about the surrogate(Though that’s a huge issue in itself). There’s a baby being taken from its Mother too.

But there’s hardly any well off, middle class surrogates.
Odd that isn’t it?

I'm not talking about trafficking babies across the globe I'm talking about legal uk surrogacy.

Its not illegal although I feel uncomfortable about it. Theres lots of threads and categories that I dont agree with or like. I dont read them

There are lots of boards on MN that people disagree with, they can't ban them all or there would be no site left.

You replied before I had edited my post.

Surrogacy is completely different to adoption, at least in this country. Adoption is making the best of a bad and difficult situation as most children in the UK are not given up willingly. Surrogacy is deliberately engineering the situation so that a baby can be removed from its Mother while exploiting another woman.