Friends surrogacy

[Fatcat00]

Not a particularly close friend, but friend enough for me to be invited to social events etc. has recently told me she is having a baby due in April, I was shocked and congratulated her, she then says “surrogate… obviously”. I was a bit lost for words.

for context friend has recently divorced, they had been trying for a baby for 5 years, had IVF etc. I furthered the conversation and asked if it was her egg. Her response was “nah, I’m not bothered if it’s not my biological baby.. I just want a baby”. Followed by “I can’t be assed putting hormones into my body for the sake of my own egg”. I am just so shocked and speechless, I don’t agree with surrogacy for a number of reasons. Some of them being I don’t agree with the hiring of a woman’s body. I don’t agree with a baby being ripped away from its mother to suit someone else’s needs and the physical and psychological implications to both baby and mother as such. Why not just adopt?? If you don’t care for the child to be your biological anyway, why not adopt a baby who needs a parent?

it’s kind of made me look at her in a different light. She seemed very flippant about it (I’m aware this is just how she has came across I’m sure it’s a lengthy and draining process). She says she was put in touch with this woman through a friend who had used her.

essentially, this surrogate has just got pregnant for the purpose of handing over the baby to someone else in exchange for cash. I think I’d still be a bit 🤔 even if it was her own egg if truth be told.

I just can’t get my head around it. Am I being a bit of a bigot? Aibu to want to distance myself a bit? I don’t like feeling as though someone’s path to parenthood or happiness is “wrong” but it really doesn’t sit right with me and I’m not entirely sure why.

You are full of it. You also said she was buying the baby from another country. You just look a bit silly now.

I think there are few cultures where the separation of mother and baby isn’t driven by economic factors. Legalised surrogacy is encourages this and all the same conundrums exist as do around issues like prostitution which is someone else where the vulnerable are exploited. That there are a minority of prostitutes who may not feel like this does nothing to mitigate the enormity of the abuse that happens to others. Legalised prostitution allows for easier deployment of trafficked women and girls and the same may happen with surrogacy. It has happened in poor countries where surrogacy has been forced and women trafficked into it with these babies appearing on an international market place. Many of these women aren’t white so the othering of mothers from other cultures with the idea that this is ok for them because they are somehow used to this is appalling.

I was responding to a specific poster who said that paying for children abroad and bringing them into the uk, while avoiding the necessary checks, was an ok thing to do.

I did not reference the op’s friend in that post, because it was not about her.

If you think child trafficking is a twisted fantasy of mine, I’m afraid you are beyond reason.

No I didn’t- go back and actually read what I have posted.

I said one thing about the op’s friend, I later responded to a specific post about paying for babies abroad- I made no mention of the op’s friend in that post because she is not buying the baby from abroad.

If you need to fabricate in order to ‘win’, then it’s usually a sign you are on tricky ground.

lol you posted your comment in response to me . There was no indication that you were having a private conversation without another poster about something that has nothing whatsoever to do with the OP.
OP has clarified the situation has nothing to do with child trafficking, so yes, your own twisted fantasy/ take on the situation.

Surrogacy is wrong on every level. Just because she 'wants' a baby doesn't mean she should get one. Dreadful.

Why do you find it so hard to believe that women who have experienced infertility can still be against surrogacy?

Very well said @NotBadConsidering

https://www.ohchr.org/en/special-procedures/sr-sale-of-children/surrogacy

Go back and read it yourself, your comprehension is clearly struggling here.

Unfortunately, your own personal definition of human trafficking is not relevant or useful. If you disagree with the UN's definition, perhaps you might agree with the definitions from Anti-slavery International, Department of Homeland Security, Gov.Uk, The Met, Europol ... except they all share the definition, so maybe not.

Well said.

It is so often privileged (often white) women who tell a ‘victim’ in some way how they should think or feel. So patronising and deeply ironic, as if they need something pointing out and it couldn’t have possibly occurred to them without the saviour’s intervention. Also as if they can possibly relate from their towers.

It is so often privileged (often white) women who tell a ‘victim’ in some way how they should think or feel. So patronising and deeply ironic, as if they need something pointing out and it couldn’t have possibly occurred to them without the saviour’s intervention. Also as if they can possibly relate from their towers

It's a white womans privilege to be against the buying and selling of humans? Absolutely crazy.

It’s not that she is against surrogacy per se, of course it’s possible to be both infertile and against surrogacy, it’s the total lack of sensitivity / insight into the challenge of infertility displayed in her OP.

100%

So that justifies 'buying a baby' does it? Grow up.

The vitriol being aimed at someone for pointing out the legal intricacies of surrogacy in the uk, is daft. You believe it’s fine- surely knowing the legal status is beneficial to you? It’s hardly an irrelevance is it?

Separate to that, I haven’t accused the op’s friend of buying a baby from abroad- why @TeaKitten thinks I can’t comprehend my own posts I don’t know. I’ve just pointed out that people do take part in human trafficking, and I think it’s immoral. @Tandora is free to think it is fine, or it doesn’t exist and is a fantasy I invented for my own entertainment if she wants. It says a lot more about her than me!

Far too many people think ‘I want’ should equal ‘I get’, - it does them no harm to hear that actually, grown up life doesn’t work like that.

https://www.afp.gov.au/crimes/human-trafficking-and-people-smuggling/human-trafficking-and-slavery

Human trafficking and slavery come in many forms, but every form violates human rights and involves the exploitation of people. Human trafficking comprises 2 key elements – movement and control.

People who have been trafficked have been moved from their locations, sometimes internationally. The control their abusers have over them takes many forms and can be difficult to identify. It could look like:

• abduction
• deception
• abuse of power or a position of leadership
• fraud
• paying other people to gain 'consent'
• taking advantage of vulnerability.

This control means ongoing exploitation, which could look like:

• slavery
• servitude
• deceptive recruiting
• debt bondage
• forced labour
• forced marriage
• domestic child trafficking
• trafficking of persons between countries and within Australia
• organ trafficking.

Personally I like the broad definition of the Australian Federal Police which recognises moving humans from one place to another after paying for control of them if a form of human trafficking.

I can’t be assed putting hormones into my body

This doesn't tally with the claim that she's previously had IVF, though.

If this is real, and you aren't just making stuff up as a means of expressing your own distaste for surrogacy, then I'm afraid it's not really any of your business. If you have a strong moral/ethical objection to surrogacy then don't stay in contact with her.

It's obviously very reasonable to be against the practice of surrogacy (I wouldn't say I was entirely against it, but I certainly think the circumstances in which it's justifiable are very limited indeed and I can definitely envisage a lot of harmful possibilities in relation to it). But your friend is presumably acting within the law so there's nothing you can do about this. If you can't support her choice (and there's no reason why you should) then you need to end the friendship rather than carrying on being friends with someone you think has crossed a line for what you consider to be morally acceptable behaviour.

Yes, this

So I’ll ask again what I asked earlier, a modified version:

why is it always either:

a) very poor women, often from poor countries including India or Thailand
b) women who aren’t poor like in India but are just coping and “could do with the money”

and never

c) rich white women with loads of time and money who want to do a nice thing for a financially destitute infertile Indian woman?

Surrogacy as an international trade has a huge discrepancy between rich white women exploiting poor women of colour in their own country or another. Why is that less of a concern to you than supposedly privileged white women here expressing concern for those who are exploited worldwide?

You still have no evidence the surrogacy is being paid or that the child is being exploited – so human trafficking still doesn't wash in this case. By all means, save it for an instance where you do have that evidence.

It also doesn't make much sense that you subscribe to Australia's definition of human trafficking, and yet Australia permits surrogacy in the same boundaries as the UK. If the OP's friend is abiding by UK law, then what is the issue when relating it to Australia's definition of human trafficking or Australia allows this itself?

Your thread has made me think more deeply about the issues around surrogacy and I thank you for that. But you are just a plain rude and condescending to people which is shame - because if you are really passionate about educating people on what the real issues and your concerns around surrogacy - you personally are doing the issue a disservice as you are tainting and distracting any valid points to your argument because people are just going to respond emotionally to your condensing remarks rather than be in a mindset to think intellectually about the issues. In the process of educating yourself on surrogacy, you might want to educate yourself on how to be an effective communicator because its likely your approach to others is spilling into real life.

The Australian definition doesn’t require exploitation. The point is that definitions exist that don’t require that. You are correct that it hasn’t been clarified that expenses are being paid, but it’s highly likely. As such, money is changing hands.

Australia’s surrogacy laws are state-based but many changed surrogacy laws after it was discovered the man at the centre of the Baby Gammie case was a paedophile.

In order to adopt, intended parents need to undergo scrutiny to minimise this. In surrogacy, no such checks take place. So even if there is no expected exploitation of the child, surrogacy is a ripe environment for those who wish to exploit a child to obtain one freely if they have enough money and a woman to exploit also. Are most children born via surrogacy exploited in the legal sense by their new parents? No, of course not. Are there checks and balances in place to ensure the child is not exploited? No, none whatsoever.

So it meets some jurisdictions of human trafficking without the inclusion of exploitation, and by default exploitation of the child is a non-protected outcome of the financial transaction.