surrogacy, Julie Bindel is right, it is human rights abuse

[antimatter]

www.byline.com/project/43/article/820
and
www.byline.com/project/43

I have to say I didn't realise that surrogate clinics existed to provide service to rich foreigners.
It is exploitation on many levels.

Did you bother reading anything else I wrote Parker?

Yes.

Just rather dumbfounded that anyone not a feminist would come to a board for feminists.

Well, it's a board to chat about feminism and topics of interested to feminists.

I'm happy to chat to people who don't identify as feminists if they post interesting things and aren't trying to spoil the board.

You can learn a lot from lurking on boards that aren't addressed directly to you.

I'm neither stylish nor beautiful, but I lurk on S&B all the time.

I dislike the word feminist. I especially dislike the suggestion that unless one declares "I'm a feminist" (probably whilst wearing a cheap sweat shop made T-shirt declaring this is what a feminist looks like) I cannot, despite being a woman, express views on matters such as this.

The UK position on this is morally and ethically correct. It'sbetter raised an interesting point about UK couples traveling abroad.

That's a very good point Matilda I'm not persuaded by the "we can't stop it so why try" argument. You could apply that to just about anything which is morally or ethically questionable.

While I have no doubt that (just like the illegal organ trade) a crack down wouldn't be 100% effective it would certainly not be as ineffective as to not bother.

Surely in most western countries it would be pretty easy to identify people who are doing this? What you would actually do about it would be the tricky part.

Getting back to It'sbetter's point what does happen at UK border control when you leave the UK without a child and return with one?

Lass

Iirc it works similar to over seas adoption which is why it would be incredibly easy to regulate.

Great post, Matilda.

To the poster who presumed that under a British law a generic father would have the same rights as any other father- this is not the case. The husband of the surrogate must is legally the baby's father whether he likes it or not, unless he is able to prove that he was against the surrogacy from the start. This is the rule. Genetics play no part in it.

A woman's husband is legally presumed to be the father of her children, regardless of genetics.

I'm largely OK with that.

I think designing family law around the rare cases of altruistic surrogacy would be a bit strange.

The anomalies that rare situation throws up are not worth creating a legal situation that demands married father's prove their genetic ownership of their children.

Getting back to It'sbetter's point what does happen at UK border control when you leave the UK without a child and return with one?

It depends on the paperwork you have and whether you are related tot he child.

To the poster who presumed that under a British law a generic father would have the same rights as any other father- this is not the case. The husband of the surrogate must is legally the baby's father whether he likes it or not, unless he is able to prove that he was against the surrogacy from the start. This is the rule. Genetics play no part in it.

Pater est quem nuptiae demonstrant.

If the surrogate mother were married and fairly easy to set displace even if she were. In which case the unmarried genetic father is treated as the father.

In true guardian women hating fashion

www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2016/feb/20/childless-uk-couples-forced-abroad-surrogates

Infertility must be absolutely awful, but it's not life and death. Some people die while waiting for a legally donated organ - that doesn't mean we should legalise the organ trade.

Children aren't a commodity, or a right - saying "I really, really want one" doesn't mean you have to have one, as harsh as that may be.

This argument reminds me a bit of the argument that disabled men should have a right to pay for women for sex. Really wanting something, even when it is a basic biological urge, doesn't make it a right.

Or course this doesn't apply to freely given organs, sex or babies in the situation of a sister/friend being a surrogate, or a parent donating a kidney to a child. These things can only be given without coercion, whether physical or economic.

What an awful article.

An aside but how exactly does the UK's stance affect lesbian couples more than it affects heterosexual couples? A heterosexual woman in the UK has a limited right to use a non-commercial surrogate. As far as I know lesbian couples can access sperm donors via regulated clinics. In what way is a lesbian couple placed in any more difficult a situation than a heterosexual woman who wants a surrogate?

Green, I believe you are implying that none of this is her choice?

Hell no, I'm saying that it's a terrible choice that rich people are forcing on her, and that is exploitation.

Trying to couch it all as if by letting these women grow and birth a child for you is doing them a favour is appalling.

The women doing this are not the ones with the power here, it's the rich people buying their bodies who are entirely at fault. If they cared about the women then they would donate to them, and not require anything in return. If they cared about the women's families they would find a way to help them.

They don't care about that, they care that they have found someone poor enough that they can buy that woman's body for 10 months, force it through pregnancy, extract the baby, and feel good about themselves because that woman's sacrifice means that her children can now benefit from the money.

You cannot persuade me that it's not exploitation of a terrible kind.

Supporters of surrogacy claim there is overwhelming support in the UK to remove legal uncertainty over parenthood at the point of birth.

Yeah, it's so hard at a birth to work out who the mother is.

We definitely need laws to clarify this woefully confusing situation

FFS all these people asking for "clarification" are really demanding that genetics, rather than gestation and birth, to define parentage at birth.

They are asking for the rights of rich couples to be privileged over those of poor women.

"Forced" to go abroad to exploit foreign women so you get to buy your baby in the most customer-friendly manner

I was so cross with my son's school that they removed his choice to keep paying his lunch money to his kind friends who said they would smash his head in if they didn't.

He was making a free choice to go without food so they could spend his lunch money on Cornettos.

It kind of reminds me of when the police told me to stop paying protection money on the premises of my shop. Better for me to run my business through the choice of paying to not get kneecapped?

When rich white women make the "choice" to be surrogates at the same rate as poor WOC then I'll believe that it is not exploitation and is all about altruism!

Given that the women in question who are giving birth want this clarification, you sound rather ridiculous bath. Exactly who are you trying to save? Surrogates would appreciate the protection of knowing there would be no expectations of parenthood placed on them by the state.

Our own surrogate deeply resented being asked for medical consent relating to procedures for our newborn son. You would not have been protecting her or her rights to say she couldn't choose not to be associated with our baby.

I think there is a lack of understanding about the mindset of most surrogates on this thread...they are not madonna figures with infants torn from their breasts. Being left holding the baby is their worst nightmare. Go to any surrogacy forum and ask around.

Just to finish that point, surrogates see their legal connection with the baby as a huge area of vulnerability for them. The would see a legal move separating them from the child they were carrying as a protection for all parties. Surrogacy arrangements very rarely go wrong anyway.

I think designing family law around the rare cases of altruistic surrogacy would be a bit strange.

Allowing for what is becoming an increasingly common occurrence is very sensible. At the moment, there are special arrangements but the problem is that they don't really work. If a surrogate had an affair, I believe she and the baby's dad could go and put themselves down on the birth certificate. But this is not allowed in the case of surrogacy.