CBeebies promoting surrogacy

[agoodrabbit]

On their instagram page this morning, CBeebies has got a post linking to a Hollyoaks actor talking about his "parenting journey". He has twins through surrogacy. CBeebies has hashtagged the post #surrogacyrocks and the article is totally unquestioning about how amazing surrogacy is. The caption under the post says "We'd love to hear your surrogacy stories!"

This isn't OK, right? The BBC is supposed to be impartial, and there are campaigns currently going on to legalise commercial surrogacy, trying to remove women's rights in surrogacy, and feminists opposing it... it's not a settled issue.

I love CBeebies and see it as a safe and inclusive place for families but this doesn't feel very safe or inclusive for the babies being commissioned, bought and sold, or their mothers.

It seems to be part of an LGBTQ month initiative. I don't care about the sexuality of the people who commission babies but it seems to be being used here shield the whole practice from criticism and frame it as some kind of fluffy, harmless diversity exercise.

Here's the instagram post. There are a couple of negative comments on it.

This is the BBC article it links to. The headline is "It's such an amazing thing to do" (talking about surrogacy) and there is no other perspective presented at all:
www.bbc.co.uk/tiny-happy-people/kieron-richardson-surrogacy/ztc4bqt

People told us, ‘don’t let the surrogate bond too much, because it might be very worrying for you’.

I also saw that and found it chilling. How do these baby buyers expect to control the emotions of a woman carrying a baby?
Most surrogacy agencies in USA provide counselling plus peer support from other surrogate mothers to school the woman to ignore her emotions and absorb the message that it isn't her baby, she's just babysitting or whatever until she gets to give it to it's real parents.
Yet encouraging her to bond so the in utero baby feels lives also feels hard - how does she instantly "unbond" when the baby is born and handed to the buyers?

So the baby feels loved that is meant to read.

I was very interested to listen to this podcast, about a woman who was a surrogate mother for her sister.
She found it extremely hard, emotionally and physically and was relieved when it was all over although she is glad her sister is now a mother. Those empty arms need filling and she instantly fell pregnant with a baby of her own, though she will now need a LSCS when her previous births of her own babies had been uncomplicated vaginal births.

It seems to me that the trope of "a gift of love" is in fact a gift of pain. Even in a loving family. Transferring the pain of infertility to the woman who suffers the pain of bearing a baby to give away.

podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/at-your-cervix/id1530617581?i=1000527762344

It's such a clever idea, really, from the surrogacy agencies and campaigners, to deceptively promote surrogacy as a simple "gift" and tie it into the whole toxic "be kind" imperativeExactly, but good to call it out. Last time we 'gifted' humans the slave trade was legal. I'm so sick and tired of this BS language used to cover up what the truth is. BeKind is a Deception Filter for Alternative Facts. And why is it that it's only women who have to be kind with their bodies. Women must let disabled men penetrate them or perform sex acts on them so these men can experience orgasms, or the poor lambs will never be able to. No one ever died from not having an orgasm. (And also there's masturbation.)No one does from not being a parent. (And also there is adoption, if you don't pass stringent measures then maybe there's a good reason for that.) Surrogacy agencies must be non-profit in the U.K. but there are people who are employed like any charity so someone is always benefiting financially from the women and the 'expenses' women are paid could also be seen as a financial benefit. It doesn't cost £15-20k to be pregnant and give birth, especially in the U.K. where we have the NHS.

@Clymene your comment is so apt!

It's such a clever idea, really, from the surrogacy agencies and campaigners, to deceptively promote surrogacy as a simple "gift" and tie it into the whole toxic "be kind" imperative

Exactly, but good to call it out. Last time we 'gifted' humans the slave trade was legal. I'm so sick and tired of this BS language used to cover up what the truth is. BeKind is a Deception Filter for Alternative Facts.

And why is it that it's only women who have to be kind with their bodies. Women must let disabled men penetrate them or perform sex acts on them so these men can experience orgasms, or the poor lambs will never be able to.

No one ever died from not having an orgasm. (And also there's masturbation.)

No one does from not being a parent. (And also there is adoption, if you don't pass stringent measures then maybe there's a good reason for that.)

Surrogacy agencies must be non-profit in the U.K. but there are people who are employed like any charity so someone is always benefiting financially from the women and the 'expenses' women are paid could also be seen as a financial benefit. It doesn't cost £15-20k to be pregnant and give birth, especially in the U.K. where we have the NHS.

(I messed up and requested that my previous comment was deleted but the above is what it said - thought I was on the wrong thread but I wasn't.)

He says that the belief that bonding happens in the womb is a myth. His arranging all those scans is proof of that. He is trying to prove that the maternal experience is also a myth.

I detest CBeebies these days, it’s now crossed the line between inclusivity and didactic dogma imposing.

Even the newer presenters appear to have escaped from some psychedelic stage school!
Bring back Chris, Sid and Pui! M

Surrogacy rocks

Seriously, CBBC??

I think there’s a place for including a family created through surrogacy in a series like My Family which explores many different kinds of families and rightly so to expose children to different ways of being and show solidarity with children whose families might be ‘different’. All children deserve that even if individuals might ‘disapprove’ of surrogacy, or same sex parenting, or whatever.

But I think posting #surrogacyrocks on social media is a totally different thing. Social media is for adults.

Sorry, posted too soon - and #surrogacyrocks posted by the bbc sounds like an editorial line.

Sorry again, the programme I’m thinking of is Our Family on CBeebies

[quote Danikm151]@Clymene there has been another video about a lesbian couple and their parenting. They mentioned a donor.

I don’t agree with surrogacy and the exploitation that surrounds it but the bbc has to be neutral so will show all types.[/quote]
The BBC doesn't show other forms of modern slavery as an act of neutrality so I'd suggest it's within their remit to keep the topic out of CBBs.

This is an issue where I think a lot of people just don't really get that there is a significant controversy. A lot of people think it's the only pro-lgb position as well. So they are shocked, and then nasty, when they see someone is against it. They also tend to think that being against it is basically saying bad things about people's actual children, a la Elton John and D&G.

I am maybe a little cynical about this - I don't really think donating gametes is ok at all, mainly because I think it has unacceptable implications around rights of the child in much the same way surrogacy does, and I've been called some rather foul things here because of it, because obviously it means I hate lesbians. Which is basically the exact same form of argument "if you think this is problematic you must be a bigot". I don't think people are nearly so universally clear-sighted about this kind of thing as they may like to imagine.

This is far too complicated an issue to be showcased to children and teens.

It's grooming young girls to grow up and #BeKind and breed babies for those who can pay.

Remember Law Commission proposals of just 18years old and no requirement to have been through pregnancy previously to be a surrogate mother.

I say it isn't possible to give informed consent to something as huge as surrogate pregnancy and childbirth if you know nothing about motherhood.

Remember Law Commission proposals of just 18years old and no requirement to have been through pregnancy previously to be a surrogate mother.

Wow I somehow missed this. That is shocking.

I do wonder where this recent push (unless I'm just being a bit paranoid) is coming from.

@ScreamingMeMe

Remember Law Commission proposals of just 18years old and no requirement to have been through pregnancy previously to be a surrogate mother.

Wow I somehow missed this. That is shocking.

I do wonder where this recent push (unless I'm just being a bit paranoid) is coming from.

I think it's worse than that.

On GBNews clip here there was talk of there being a question of whether 16 year olds can consent to being a surrogate mother in the evidence sessions.

https://stopsurrogacynowuk.org/public-appearances-media/

Who even thinks that's a reasonable question?

16! Absolutely no fuxking way! That's honestly made me feel a bit sick.

16?! That's both revolting and heart breaking. 16 year olds are legally children! Can't drink or vote but you can sell your babies! Setting them up for a lifetime of trauma. But hey, they are womb-havers so, meh.

Also, what 16 year old apart from one in very dire circumstances would want to do this? Sounds like a safeguarding nightmare.

Why do the BBC keep promoting this shit?

What's weird is that there are a ton of people who think it's crazy to have a baby before age 25 as young people are meant to be wild and irresponsible until then.

@MangyInseam

What's weird is that there are a ton of people who think it's crazy to have a baby before age 25 as young people are meant to be wild and irresponsible until then.

That IS weird. Who is saying that?

Or have you spectacularly missed the point of this thread?

Go check out chat or some place like that, any of the discussions about marrying or having kids under 25. Quite a lot of people think it's terrible, people that young should not be tied down. If you said under 20 I think most would say it was a terrible idea.

The point being that it's a bit weird that viewpoints like that are fairly common, at the same time there is this movement to allow quite young women to be surrogates. Which I would tend to think is something that would be a decision requiring a lot more maturity even if you think it's ok generally.

I'm not sure why you'd think that was missing the point.

@MangyInseam

Go check out chat or some place like that, any of the discussions about marrying or having kids under 25. Quite a lot of people think it's terrible, people that young should not be tied down. If you said under 20 I think most would say it was a terrible idea.

The point being that it's a bit weird that viewpoints like that are fairly common, at the same time there is this movement to allow quite young women to be surrogates. Which I would tend to think is something that would be a decision requiring a lot more maturity even if you think it's ok generally.

I'm not sure why you'd think that was missing the point.

Ah OK I apologise, I didn't get what you meant.

I thought you were saying that plenty of young women want to have babies so why should they be prevented from being surrogates.

I totally agree that becoming a surrogate is a momentous decision and the media and the industry seem to totally downplay/dismiss the potential risks. You can't adopt a child if you are under 21, how on earth could you decide to give a child you had carried away?