Surrogacy Bill In Ireland

[myflightiscancelled]

Anyone else following?

The whole media narrative around the Dowling/Gurounlion (sp?) surrogacy is completely 100% positive. Not a dissenting voice to be heard.

I think with only positive media spin the public will just agree.

Personally I disagree now that I have babies and know how deep the bond is between mother and child but having found it a bit difficult to have children I can understand how people turn to surrogacy. And that's the only viewpoint (the latter) that's being trumpeted in the media right now

So someone holding an alternative view is obviously fed a narrative? Or maybe just maybe their view just differs because they have a different perspective,🤷‍♀️

Sadly the ignorant bigots don't leave the families alone, both Arthur and Brian have spoken about the vile hate they have experienced about their family.

The surrogacy was with a sister, a well informed and independent individual who made her very generous choice. The hate they have experienced has been disgusting.

I would (if younger and wanted) do the same for my siblings and yes I have children. But I see the bond of a child with a parent as being bigger than the person who carried them.

How can people argue that without insulting every adoptive family? I completely wouldn't hesitate to hand the child to their loving parents. Parents and families come in all shapes and sizes.

Surrogacy is exploitation, whether altruistic or commercial. Altruistic surrogacy puts the mother's life at risk. In the past week we have had 3 maternal deaths. Using donor eggs, which will be the case in a high percentage of altruistic surrogacies, puts the mother at much higher risk than a pregnancy with her own egg. None of that seems to be discussed in the news stories.

Maybe they have sympathy for a woman who had 14 miscarriages.

Also, regarding your concern for the woman who gave birth to the child, Rosanna Davison had her and her family brought to Ireland from Kherson and set her up with an apartment and a job in Ireland when the war broke out.

Exactly. You would think that our not so long past history of the sale of babies would make us extra careful about other forms of baby industry.

(Incidentally, I lived in the UK for decades and all my adopter friends are British and adopted domestically, apart from two Ireland-based people I know, both of whom adopted from China some time back, so I know very little about Ireland and adoption. Am I right in thinking that the tiny numbers of domestic adoptions in Ireland are down to both birth parents being required to consent, and that this is in some sense a response to Ireland's history of largescale forced adoption in Mother and Baby Homes and laundries?)

In your opinion. I disagree the risks of all medical procedures are discussed at length and consent is secured. I would happily take that tiny risk.

Why should you it anyone decide a choice I make with my body? Short answer you don't.

@Liripipe yea less than 100 and a significant number of those may be a step parent or other close family relative. It is exceptionally rare and when family explored it they were told statistically virtually 1 in a few million chance.

Inter country adoption is also very expensive and challenging family spent close to a hundred thousand and a decade of their lives building their family.

I said it was not discussed in news stories, not that it was not discussed by those involved. Given the lack of legislation in this area up to now, you have no way of knowing how much discussion is the norm.

If you remove step-parents from the equation it's roughly 40 domestic adoptions a year. Fewer than 10 infants are available for adoption each year (it was 10 in 2022 but is usually around 6-8).

I just don't think that surrogacy is 100% positive and the fact that there is 100% praise is ignoring the fact that these babies have been taken away from their mother.

Surrogacy and Adoption differ in that one surrogacy the child is created in order to be given up by the mother. And wouldn't it be wonderful if every child had loving parents who were in a position to care for them and there was no need for adoption and the subsequent (separation) trauma to the child

I myself am not 100% against it. I just am finding it interesting that there's a spate of gushing news articles and nothing offering an alternative viewpoint

I've watched and listened for years to gushing, uncritical puff pieces on RTE focusing on individual stories in a very celebratory way and wondered am I going mad. These self same producers and presenters would be the first to do major sad face at any story to do with Magdalene laundries and the adoption industry in Irelands past. Equally, I have very educated and intelligent friends who don't see a problem with it at all or more to the point, just don't think any of it through. The sad fact is that critical thinking is not common. Ireland is an especially sentimental and soft headed culture, where people are very easily swayed by the individual sad story of the lovely lady who couldn't have a baby but didn't a lovely woman in Ulraine have it for her, isn't it great!

i am on the fence re family surrogacy but what I find really disturbing about Dowling and his partner is their relentless media presence. I’m sure they love their babies to bits but clearly they are also a fantastic PR opportunity for them and I think this shows a complete disregard for the babies right to privacy or their existence as individuals. The two of them are like kids showing off their new toys. In their case the sister is very involved so that is a good thing for the baby but what about her? How could you ask your sister to risk her health and potentially her life (unlikely I know but it happens) to get you what you want? We all know what pregnancy does to your body and more so the more babies you have. I can’t reconcile the selfishness of doing this to any woman, but your sister? Also does she not want to have her own life, her own partner, family rather than being enmeshed with that pair for the rest of her life?

Did you mean to insult a whole country's culture in full sweep?

I love how if people hold different opinions, people you acknowledge are highly educated, they must lack critical thinking skills. No acknowledgement that individuals form opinions based on their perspectives.

In my opinion, any intelligent person who looks at this issue in depth and takes into account the historical context, the potential for exploitation, the class and gender issues, etc should at the very least question the wisdom of it and not uncritically consider it a good thing. They may not be actively against it as I am, but they should surely see that it complex and potentially problematic.

And as an Irish person who has lived my whole life in Ireland, I think my observations about our sentimentality are perfectly valid for me to express. Most of the time, it's a good and positive thing but occasionally, as here, it is not because it prioritises the wishes of people to have children over a whole host of other ethical and moral considerations which are easier to not think about because the rubber meets the road in Ukraine or India or somewhere out of sight.

So yet again you figure a way to say if they don't agree with you they don't understand it., patronising much?

Plenty of people are well into the depths of this subject and don't agree.

In my opinion people who fail to understand that people of equal intelligence can hold opposing view are rather ignorant.

I can't see how any intelligent person could approve of surrogacy in any form , it's exploitation pure and simple and the welfare of the baby is hardly considered .

Yet another person baffled that intelligent people hold a different view.

So me deciding to carry my sister's baby should be banned because of your say so?

So woman's autonomy is restricted then again?

Someone other than you and your sister is involved here.

Yes her child delivered by her aunt 😁

Would your brother in law be the child's father ? Can you not see how messy for the child and the great family dynamic that the child knows that you had a baby with her dad then gave her away to your sister ? How would your own kids feel?

The biological father is the father. All the children are all perfectly fully functioning well adjusted. Not messy at all.

The baby was always theirs. We discuss it as the very first babysitter. The only ones with issues are those whose business it isn't.

"A perfectly fully functioning well adjusted" child does not guarantee a teen or an adult who will feel the same way. We know enough about human psychology (assisted by experiments in adoption and assisted reproduction) to know that you cannot know how a person will respond to these situations and our relationships with the people who make and raise us can be deeply complicated. Maybe in family based surrogacy there's a higher chance of a happy outcome (?) but a child's perspective is not a guarantee of an adult feeling the same way. I'm not sure a child could articulate any concerns they have and challenging parents and parental choices is not always easy. A lot of kids go along with the adult discourse - until they develop the critical skills, maturity and independence to challenge it.

I can see why people think family based surrogacy is different but there have been some high profile cases here where it is not at all clear that there isn't unreasonable pressure being brought to bear. I would worry about that aspect. Families are not above coercion and manipulation.

It is in some ways different to the buying of women's bodies for reproduction as no money changes hands, but ultimately you still remove the baby from the woman whose body created that child (what we used to call the mother) and that is not without impact at a physical level even before you get into the longer term narrative and how the child receives it as a child and ultimately as an adult.