The mother of Tom Daley's child

[Pratchet]

Congratulations on a healthy baby! Hope the birth went safely and that you are recovering well.

I just hate surrogacy in case you can't tell

A comment upthread was, “sadly they were not able to conceive”.

Of course they bloody couldn’t - they’re men !!

@hallie29 my adoptive mother left my father and from the age of 10 I was raised by lesbians.

Would you like to hear how this affected me?

Lass I did address it. I told you I was unaware of where it came from. I considered that it was obvious and therefore didn't need stating that the history makes it a horrible term. I told you why I used it and if it didn't have that history I would be okay with it as a means of differentiating between what I consider to be mother and surrogate using donated eggs . If there is a better term, which isn't 'mother' I'm happy to use it.

When I first became a mum I was so naive and I just didn't really get that I meant the world to my baby, but as time went on, I started to join up the behaviours and see that I really am. It is humbling and profound to realise it.

There's a time I would have thought it wasn't that bad for a baby to be removed from their mum. Now I realise it is actually the worst thing you can do to a child. I was a naive idiot with no real understanding of that bond.

Designer babies are unethical.

Gay men can have co-parenting relationships with female friends too, I don't think anyone is objecting to that. But biology dictates that the process and impact on children is different for lesbian couples and gay couples. That's just life.

@Broadbeans The original comment was that surrogacy was wrong while there were still children available to be adopted instead. Your reply is not in context.

Is IVF wrong in this context? Or, as previously mentioned, couples ttc when there are kids to be adopted?

No, broad, I’m not interested in hearing your homophobia thanks.

Surrogacy is really another form of organ donation, the surrogate hosts a pregnancy to give a child to parents who otherwise wouldn't be able to have a child. Live donors donate kidneys, parts of livers, blood products to enable someone else to lead a normal life, if all parties are happy with the agreement, who are we to question what they have done, it's common in other countries for organ & blood donors to be paid for their donation, why shouldn't the surrogate be paid for putting her life on hold for nine months to give a child to parents who can't have one themselves? Don't forget either Tom Daley or his husband is this baby's father, so this child is still with one natural parent.

With advances in medicine we aren't that far from artificial wombs being used to produce children, babies are already being born to women who have had womb transplants, with the moral & ethical questions artificial wombs & genetic engineering raise, surrogacy is far more natural & ethical.

Margaret equally you could say what about the genetic mother who is denied her baby because the surrogate, who freely entered into an agreement, has decided to withold someone else's baby?

I would argue that the only reasonable outcome is shared custody (unless one or more of the parents turns out to be unfit), just as for any other child where the parents don't live together but both want continued contact. Because, just as in those cases, the child is a person, with rights, not property, so you do what's best for them (nearly always agreed to be shared custody) rather than like a possession that's been sold.

There are plenty of things that you can't legally contract yourself to do. If I sign a contract saying someone can punch me in the face for £50 then they've actually still committed assault, because that's not a legal contract. In this country you can't bindingly promise to give away a baby before you have it. You can sign a bit of paper saying you will, but it doesn't mean anything. Because the law recognises that it's not a reasonable contract.

I doubt very much that Tom Daley and Lance Black chose a woman living in poverty to be their surrogate. Why would they?

The only person who can categorically say whether or not she was exploited is the surrogate. As she CHOSE to do it, and there is zero chance she's living hand to mouth in a trailer, desperate for money, it's highly unlikely that she feels exploited.

Likewise only the woman involved knows whether or not she requested not to be mentioned at all in public. People are making sweeping assumptions and judgements here.

Who is anyone here to JUDGE the CHOICES of this woman? You may not agree with surrogacy, but you don't have the right to criticise a group of individuals for their CHOICES, particularly when you are not privy to any of the information.

Discuss surrogacy all you like, but telling other women they have been exploited when they have made a choice is surely the opposite of feminism?

@hallie29 homophobia?
Not at all.
I love my mother and step-mother very dearly.

You have just made clear you have no interest in feelings and experiences of the children involved, just in adults getting what they want.

I'm actually very balanced, but have found nobody actually ever wants to hear my experiences. Perhaps it scares them.

That would be true if you spoke for all children of lesbians, which you don’t.

You are arrogant and self centred. You think your experiences ring true for everybody. Actually, most children in same sex couples are doing just fine, thanks.

No,broad, I’m not interested in hearing your homophobia thanks.

Oh just shut up.

There is no homophobia.
Men renting a womens body is wrong its got nothing to do with their sexuality.

Report posts you feel break talk guidlines and stop making outragous statements.

@slashlover so IVF with no sperm or egg donors?

It takes a particular type of person to be able to parent a traumatised, adopted child. It's not for everybody, and it's not in the child's best interests for them to be raised by somebody incapable of dealing with a very specific set of problems.

So yes, I would consider IVF involving no donated egg or sperm fine. No trauma to child, that's my concern.

I told you I was unaware of where it came from. I considered that it was obvious and therefore didn't need stating that the history makes it a horrible term. I told you why I used it and if it didn't have that history I would be okay with it as a means of differentiating between what I consider to be mother and surrogate using donated eggs . If there is a better term, which isn't 'mother' I'm happy to use it

You have been given options. You could have genetic mother, birth mother and in this case legal parents.

Even if you did not know the expression has the history behind it reducing a woman to a "gestational carrier" is vile.

It is a horrible concept which apparently you came up with all on your own.

‘Oh, shut up’

That’s mature

It is homophobic to state same sex couples shouldn’t have children.

That’s how it is.

“Discuss surrogacy all you like, but telling other women they have been exploited when they have made a choice is surely the opposite of feminism?”

No. What is the opposite of feminism is telling women that anything they “choose” to do is absolutely fine, is not inluluenced at all by societal norms and expectations and has no impact at all on other women.

I know a lesbian woman whose child has two gay dads. They co-parent between the three of them. Their are other options than surrogacy.
I guess with people objecting to commercial surrogacy and adoption as it is harmful to a child to not have a mother, co parenting is the last option. But many gay couples don't want to 'share' if that makes sense; I don't know many people at all who would be willing to co-parent a child with someone that they have no romantic connection with. Saying that if a gay couple doesn't want to co-parent with another woman then they shouldn't be able to have kids is not on, at least in my opinion. Because for me it suggests that two men are not capable/good enough as a woman to raise a child.

And what a child needs are parents who love him

Were you raised by the woman who gave birth to you Hallie? Or by other adults who 'loved you?' It's not quite as simple as that glib statement for some of us who didn't have our mothers.

It’s like the handmaids tale. Right now women want to do it. They’re volunteering. How long before they’re forced to birth children for men who want children and deprive the babies of their mothers. I find it all very unsettling.

Two men cannot have children together. That is fact not homophobia.

They paid for the use of a womans body again fact not homophobia.

The fact that they are gay men means they cannot be bio dads without involving a woman. That is not me denying them being parents.

Elton John is the same. But I find him vile anyway.

It takes a particular type of person to be able to parent a traumatised, adopted child.

Which is what makes all the "WHY DIDN'T THEY ADOPT?!?!?!" comments particularly frustrating.

It is homophobic to state same sex couples shouldn’t have children

Except that isn't what is being said.

So either

Women and men are the same, a man is as capable as a woman is of raising a child, and so on.

Or

Women are able to raise a child with another woman, but a man can’t raise a child with another man

Or

Same sex couples shouldn’t have children at all.