Pope Francis calls for universal ban on surrogacy

[shockeditellyou]

https://www.thejournal.ie/pope-francis-calls-for-universal-ban-surrogacy-6267108-Jan2024/

Good for him. Encouragingly, the comments I’ve seen on another site where this was posted are almost entirely supportive of banning surrogacy, which I wasn’t expecting.

No one has a right to a child.

I know gay men who co parent with lesbians. In one family I know a gay man lives with his sister and her partner and the three of them raise their children together. There are lots of ways for gay men to build a family without it having to involve babies being removed from their mothers at birth.

This is just biology....it's why a single woman can get pregnant fairly easily and have a baby to raise alone but a single man can't. It's not discrimination...it's just pure biological fact.

The good old women are either Madonna or a whore trope. Women can’t possibly interested in anything else.

It doesn't justify surrogacy.

Nor does being gay.

Nothing does, no matter how sad for the person who wants a biological child but can't.

Without a surrogate, she won't be able to have her own children. Is that right?

It's not a question of being "right"? It's just a fact.... a very sad one albeit. However, there are many reasons a person may not be able to have a baby... doesn't mean surrogacy is ok

Many people who are in favour of surrogacy think about the parents who end up with a child. They do not think about or have much less thought about the surrogate and the child. This used to be the approach with adoption, the main purpose was to provide a child for a childless couple.

Obviously, research has now shown that the most important person in adoption process is the child being adopted. This is also recognised with egg and sperm donors, so can no longer be anonymous

But surrogacy still seems to be all about producing a child for someone else, and very little consideration for the child.

I assume the Catholic Church has learnt their lesson from the Magdalene Laundries

Just so I understand your viewpoint, are you against adoption too?

This is weird. Adoption and surrogacy are totally different. Adoption is about finding a home and parents for a child who doesn't have one. Surrogacy is about producing a baby because someone wants one.

I think this is about the only time I’ve ever agreed with the Catholic Church - first time for everything, I guess.

Commercial surrogacy does seem to treat both children and the women who bear them like commodities, which isn’t right. People shouldn’t be able to buy people.

I agree with him on this, but in general I think that a man who is lifelong celibate, and spends most of his time with similar men whose life focus is religion, has no business interfering with the reproductive choices of women, or anything whatsoever to do with women’s health.

Surrogates have to have a proven track record - ie they need to have children.

So we want to inflict the Pregnancy and childbirth are savage on your body on someone whose children will bear the cost should it go wrong.

That is number one.

Number two is - when did we decide that it was ok to sell babies?

This is consistant with their beliefs.

They are pro life, so anti abortion, anti death sentence, and so on.

They are very much about the poor, their dignity, and anti the exploitation of the poor either through this issue, climate change, slavery ect.

Surrogacy is not reproductive rights.

Surrogacy is the right to buy a baby.

With o checks and balances.

I'm.very sorry for your daughter, but that doesn't mean surrogacy is ok.

Have you ever seen a rich woman do it for a poor woman?

With surrogace we have "agreed" that it ok to sell babies.

Can my pregnant friend advertise her baby and sell it to a "loving home?"

It’s biology that’s preventing them. That’s just how things go.

It is not discriminatory to say ‘actually no you can’t buy a baby and have it gestated to order’.

I can't have kids, my body cannot cope. It's SO very nice to see this nutjob telling me another woman can't have a baby for me should I choose to be a Mother

The Catholic religion is toxic. Please don't listen to it

Why on earth do you feel that it’s fine to buy a baby and pay another woman to have it for you?

The individualist and consumerist notion of choice is absolutely toxic.

@StragglyTinsel Tell me you were never abused by a Catholic Priest without telling me

The Catholic/Christian religion is vile. And you're all blindly listening to a man who preaches one thing but gives zero damns about Women. Met him once and he totally blanked me in favour for my ex boyfriend

You must be so very lucky to have your own children. I'd give anything to have one of my own

What about situations such as where a woman can't have babies naturally, but a sister offers to do so for her? I can't see why anyone is being exploited in that situation. Plenty of stories like that.

Is it only the financial element that makes it exploitative? Why can't those women choose for themselves if it's something they want to do, heartache and all? If the alternative is something like factory work in poor conditions. I don't see why we should be telling women what to do with their bodies of their own free will.

Actually you know nothing about my history with the Catholic Church.

Whatever the church’s stance on this, the purchase of human infants and exploitation of women’s bodies to produce them is just not OK.

It’s very sad that you cannot have your own children. It doesn’t make surrogacy OK.

You're so close to getting it @Pigeotto. Go back to the bit about how savage it is on the body.

It is not a reproductive choice though.

It is a decision to comission and buy a baby.

It is a decision to exploit the poverty or need of a mother for the endeavour (surrogates have to have a proven track record of child bearing).

It is a decision to put the mother into danger (pregnancy) and as a result, her children.

It is a decision to ignore entirely the rights of the child (to it's mother, not the purchaser).

You are over looking the rights of the child.

You are over looking that you are agreeing to the buying and selling of babies.

Does that sit well with you?

Your position is entirely based on wants/needs/desires of the adult.