Ollie & Gareth Locke & Surrogacy

[Policyschmolicy]

I picked this up in the daily mail, and am frankly appalled. On the one hand I think they seem like nice enough people and want to have a baby, etc … I’ve been a little bit irked about the casual attitude towards surrogates/women in this, but I’m very perturbed by his latest ‘promise’:

• He said: 'As we move forward I will promise I will do everything in my power to try and bring attention to help in changing the British laws to make it easier for people desperately trying to have a family!

'The rules which haven't been reassessed in over 30 years are wildly unfair, currently firmly against gay equality and beyond archaic.

'Why would any government grant equal marriage, but make it so heartbreakingly difficult and frighteningly expensive to have a family, I will do everything in my power to open up the conversation of a modernisation in legislation change!*

What planet are they on?! Of course it’s not equal given that only one group of human beings, i.e. women can actually gestate babies. I mean, what on Earth does he think he can do about that?!

www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-10350235/amp/Made-Chelseas-Ollie-Locke-shares-heartbreaking-baby-news-surrogate-miscarries-six-weeks.html

@Clymene

Sorry posted too soon. That's why I mentioned Cyprus *@OhHolyJesus*

International surrogacy tourism

Oh I didn't know they switched. The Mexican lady couldn't deliver the goods so they found another willing woman. How lucky for them that there isn't a shortage or poor women to service their desires.

Another gay couple, Lance Bass and his husband, I think went through 8 surrogate mothers and also several egg donors over several years before getting the twins they paid for, right on time for Halloween and for the correct star signs they wanted. There is nothing money can't buy.

I suspect they are doing it in Cyprus/Mexico to facilitate sex selection. It’s illegal in the UK for a clinic to disclose the sex of an embryo to its patients. Potentially if they made their embryos in the US & had them sexed, I suspect they cannot be exported to the UK.

@Ifitistobesaid

Their surrogate is British. I watched an interview he gave about it. Their surrogate is British but they used an American egg donor because you get more background info on the donor there. But then due to COVID restrictions they couldn’t travel to the US to do the transfer. So they moved the embryos to a clinic in Mexico and went out there with their surrogate to do the transfer. I think they have since moved the embryos to Cyprus as it wasn’t feasible for them all to keep making multiple trips to Mexico.

I think I get it now, where this suggested discrimination comes from. Apologies for my misinformation in earlier posts.

They are a British gay couple 'using' a British woman, but the problem they have is having used eggs from an American woman the issue is over anonymity as U.K. law (though I'm sure there are workaround) requires clinics to use donated gametes for HFEA rules. Many a same-sex male couple have had babies through surrogacy, in the U.K. and abroad, the discrimination is imaginary.

Locke and husband have not been discriminated against, they just want to prevent any resulting child from finding out who their genetic mother is, and I imagine also who their biological mother is. They want full control. So it's even more about meeting their desires than actually being discriminated against...it's the entitlement of wealth coupled with male entitlement, with some useful historical homophobia thrown in to protect them from criticism and then using that to attempt to affect legal reform.

This Twitter thread is relevant to this discussion.

twitter.com/partwoman/status/1476287958160449539?s=21

Another gay couple, Lance Bass and his husband, I think went through 8 surrogate mothers and also several egg donors over several years before getting the twins they paid for, right on time for Halloween and for the correct star signs they wanted. There is nothing money can't buy.
Did the other 8 women not get pregnant, or where their babies rejected by this couple?

@Bitofachinwag

Another gay couple, Lance Bass and his husband, I think went through 8 surrogate mothers and also several egg donors over several years before getting the twins they paid for, right on time for Halloween and for the correct star signs they wanted. There is nothing money can't buy. Did the other 8 women not get pregnant, or where their babies rejected by this couple?

Pregnant and miscarried mostly I think, there was certainly many different women involved. The twins were their ninth attempt .

"Bass revealed in March 2020 in an Entertainment Tonight interview that their surrogate lost their child to a miscarriage, which was their ninth surrogacy attempt.
'We unfortunately lost him after eight weeks, which happens to pretty much everyone when you’re going through IVF,' Bass said."

www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-10102119/Lance-Bass-shares-photos-newborn-twins-Alexander-James-Violet-Betty.html

A donor conceived organisation suggests it was actually their 10th or 11th attempt.

www.facebook.com/1312783288787259/posts/4081673138564913/?d=n

I'm not sure a new woman was 'used' each time but there were was more than one. I sort of hope there was more than one poor woman being contracted to keep attempting pregnancy (with multiple embryos at a time) in order to get these misogynists together leave her alone. I don't think any woman should have to do this but for one woman to carry that burden would surely result in some serious mental health issues. Though I don't think it's made any better by more and more women being contracted in the same way.

The whole thing, and particularly how their story is shared in the media, reeks of misogyny and entitlement.

To be fair to Ollie, he has mentioned the woman who was pregnant, and referred to her as 'the best person you could ever imagine' on his post about the miscarriage. Not that that makes anything about it right, but it's more than some of these poor women get.

I remember reading an article about Lance Bass and his 'journey' and was absolutely disgusted at the language used, completely erasing and dehumanising the woman doing all that reproductive labour for him. Still, a quick look at his Instagram shows that those twins sure are generating a lot of 'hilarious' content for him, so alls well that ends well eh

@jb7445

Really don't like the suggestion that IVF and surrogacy are the same thing. I paid for my sister to have IVF with her fiance of a decade as time was running out for her (40, so couldn't get any more IVF cycles). I thank fuck I did as he died unexpectedly a month into the pregnancy and now she has a beautiful boy and a part of the love of her life lives on.

That bears no comparison whatsoever with surrogacy - putting a woman in risk in that way (especially in poorer countries like India where other options are limited) and actively choosing to potentially traumatise a baby by taking them away from their mother at birth.

My husband was adopted at birth by his lovely parents - he had a great childhood but he still has serious abandonment/attachment issues and a myriad of other mental health issues. To deliberately put a child (and their mother) through that because you want to be a parent is just wrong.

Of course it's not the same. You sound like an unbelievably nice and lovely sister and very unmumsnetty (spelling?) hugs

And I also remember that gay couple who did the reality TV show and one of them joked that if it were him knowing he was going to be giving birth on TV 'I would have got a wax'. Fuck off.

Interesting point on that Twitter thread about how commercial surrogacy has really been able to thrive since gay men started doing it, as now any criticism can be dismissed as 'homophobia'.

They are two rich men who've been handed everything from their families and never had to work a day in their lives.

They've no idea how the world works.

I just read on that Twitter thread linked to above that often the commissioning parents will use a donor egg and a different woman to carry the baby so that there is no direct link to a mother.

I can’t imagine how hard it’ll be for these babies - growing up and being told they don’t have a mother, that there is no information anywhere on the women who a) provided half their genes and who b) carried them in their uterus.

The surrogate mother who carried them will always have a trace of their cells in her body and these babies will know nothing about them.

@KimikosNightmare Infertility is a recognised medical condition, for which treatment is IVF and other fertility treatments.

Are you also against cancer treatment? If not why not? Those people with cancer who want to be treated to live - just another example of ‘I want so I must get’

Back on Lance Bass briefly and the number of women...

"We're on donor number six right now and we don't even know if that one's gonna work."

He seemed surprised at how long it takes...seems to be a theme.

https://www.gaystarnews.com/article/lance-bass-husband-hopeful-surrogacy/?fbref=DHLYJnYGgR-Facebook&fbclid=IwAR3BG-fuRnifEvrP7aW6Z0SWmhHjLtXJ62sp-WJJ_27HHtrg8Ks9qUL3s8Ww

@YouSetTheTone

I just read on that Twitter thread linked to above that often the commissioning parents will use a donor egg and a different woman to carry the baby so that there is no direct link to a mother.

I can’t imagine how hard it’ll be for these babies - growing up and being told they don’t have a mother, that there is no information anywhere on the women who a) provided half their genes and who b) carried them in their uterus.

The surrogate mother who carried them will always have a trace of their cells in her body and these babies will know nothing about them.

It will 100% cause problems in the future. I know from seeing it in real life that it doesn't matter how much love, attention, everything you give to a child, humans seem to have a deep seated need to know where they came from, and that need can cause major issues.

[quote 5zeds]**@Hopesakiller I maybe wasn't very eloquent with the way I said it, was just trying to highlight IVF can be fantastic and bring joy in ethical ways but one small side step and can be very ethically dubious. a bit like sex then? It’s not a lack of eloquence it’s the fact you are suggesting thousands of couples shouldn’t become parents in case someone uses the technology designed to help them in ways that you think unethical. Insulin can be used to kill, shall we stop treating diabetics?[/quote]
Well said. Some idiotic views on this thread 🙄 I will put it down to a lack of education.

Infertility is a disease of the male or female reproductive system defined by the failure to achieve a pregnancy after 12 months or more of regular unprotected sexual intercourse

What other diseases are you anti treatment @Hopesakiller

Any medications/ medical techniques if used improperly could be harmful. People can overdose on painkillers. Are you against pain relief too? If not why not?

Infertility is a disease of the male or female reproductive system defined by the failure to achieve a pregnancy after 12 months or more of regular unprotected sexual intercourse

By that definition all same-sex sexual inter course, all gay men and lesbians are inferior, by virtue of their sexual orientation.

I would add the word heterosexual after unprotected to make it accurate. It's no one's fault that same sex couples can't get pregnant by themselves, it's just Mother Nature.

*infertile - not inferior. That's a terrible spelling mistake, my apologies.

Unprotected sex between people of the same sex will never result in pregnancy.

@KimikosNightmare

Good god, what a terribly insensitive and awful comment!

While I uphold everyone's right to say what they think no matter how ignorant, I'm a bit peeved that mumsnet allows these unpleasant views on ivf to be posted. I have had many posts removed for the crime of 'misgendering' or pointing out that a man is not a woman. Why is it OK to suggest my ivf conceived child should not exist but I'm not allowed to say a trans woman is a man? Why are men's feelings prioritised over mine by this platform?

To be clear, I just wish I understood. I don't want anyone's posts removed. I like to see all opinions aired as it benefits discussion and understanding.

@Franca123 it’s pure ignorance. Women with no concept of what infertility is spouting their uneducated views. Pontificating their decisions on individuals medical treatments. I agree there is a constant nasty undercurrent about ivf and infertility that seeks to belittle women on this site. Unfortunately mumsnet won’t do anything about it.

Is surrogacy a fertility treatment?