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

tuttering fuckwits?

Sobriquet what is the difference between a trafficked baby and one that was bought?

@Broadbeans

I am the biological parent. Have you been asleep through the whole discussion?

To deliberately deny a child the right to know its mother is not altruism, it’s evil.

Can I just ask why it is not evil for a same sex female couple to use an anonymous sperm donor and 'deny their child the right to know its father'? Why is it so different when it is a mother? Is it based on the myth that all mothers are caring and nurturing (which we as feminists know is largely socially constructed to keep women in the private sphere)?

If it's evil to deprive a child of a mum, it's evil to deprive it of a dad, meaning that female couples can't have IVF.

In my view, the true parent is the one raising the child. If people didn't fixate hugely on biological connections, the focus would be on the caring relationship, which is the important one for the child. I don't understand the emphasis on blood ties- the law will sometimes prioritise someone who you hate but share DNA with over someone who you care about deeply but have no legal or biological relationship with.

I also think part of the reason children who are adopted sometimes feel psychologically conflicted is because society makes such a big deal out of the idea of 'real mum' and 'real dad' and seems to imply that only biological mothers can give real maternal love.

I could never ask someone to be a surrogate for me. It seems like a debt that could never be repaid, regardless of money.

I can remember when many parents said an anonymous sperm donor was fine. The donor was not the child's father, the man raising the child was.
Then kids born of sperm donors grew up and many said they did consider the sperm donor one of their dads and wanted to meet him.
That is why the law changed. The truth is what parents want is not always the same as what children need.

peakpants you’ve made an assumption there without asking me.

I extend my condemnation to anyone of any sexual persuasion or marital set up seeking to deny their child (deliberately as opposed to unplanned) a relationship with one parent.

A woman makes a baby - all by herself. Babies know their mothers smell and voice. They haven’t a clue who their fathers are, nor do they care. To remove a newborn from its birth mother is a sinful abomination, an act of pure selfishness.

Sorry, but sometimes it is really not. If you have ever worked in child protection, you will know that sometimes there is no option but to do that and that not all mothers are loving and nurturing. You should not generalise.

There are issues with commercial surrogacy, but if it's so evil and abominable to remove a child from its mother, then altruistic surrogacy must also be wrong, so it could never be okay for e.g. a close friend to carry a baby for an infertile couple.

"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."
What makes you think that?

I extend my condemnation to anyone of any sexual persuasion or marital set up seeking to deny their child (deliberately as opposed to unplanned) a relationship with one parent.

Okay, thanks for clarifying. I actually have more respect for that view (although I don't agree with it) than someone saying it's evil for two gay men to have a baby by surrogate but fine for lesbians to have IVF. But as I say, I don't agree with the viewpoint that every child needs two parents or that the parents a child has must be the biological parents.

peakpants you’re talking nonsense with your anti-biology rant there. Try talking to people who’ve been adopted. Very few of them never give a thought to their birth parents. I think sperm donation is wrong too. I know of two lesbian couples and who have children. The fathers are present in the children’s lives.

There is a difference between removing a baby for safeguarding reasons and the deliberate creation of a baby to be removed from its mother at birth- and for this to be both normalised and celebrated.

@gariguette I've been here emphasising the important of biological parents - plural.

Unless your surrogate has near enough daily, in the flesh interaction with your children, they will almost certainly be suffering the effects of trauma.
These may not be immediately apparent.

We will obviously never agree about this, but I will also never view your selfish actions as forgivable.
I truly and sincerely hope, however, that one day your adult children will.

Luna

To me a trafficked baby, is one where the baby is taken without consent.

Such as women who are forced to give their child up because of being held. Similar to slavery but done in a baby farm type way

Sorry, but sometimes it is really not. If you have ever worked in child protection, you will know that sometimes there is no option but to do that and that not all mothers are loving and nurturing

Oh come off it, you knew exactly what I meant. I almost added a disclaimer that sometimes there might be valid safeguarding reasons for it, but I didn’t because I assumed it didn’t need pointing out.

you’re talking nonsense with your anti-biology rant there. Try talking to people who’ve been adopted. Very few of them never give a thought to their birth parents.

Yes and I think part of that is because society fixates on the importance of biology and it becomes an obsession for adopted parents because they are told that it is so abnormal to not be raised by your biological parents. I think what children need is love and support.

Also, I could say talk to the many millions of people who have been abused by or have absolutely shitty relationships with their biological parents. You can't really generalise about either. Carrying a baby for 9 months doesn't automatically make you supermum- that comes from caring for a child and meeting their needs once they are born. Nor does providing sperm make you a good dad- again that comes from providing care and stability.

Look, anybody who let out even the tiniest whisper of the vile attitudes towards women expressed upthread would be immediately removed from the adoption screening process.

So y'know. Think on. Buying babies because you have sufficient funds? Bad idea.

@peakpants whilst your busy with your conjecture as to why you think adopted people feel the way we do, there are plenty of us on this thread explaining from experience that your assumptions aren't correct.
Or are we all so stupid as to not know our own minds as well as you clearly do?

I wasn't traumatised by societal ideas of "real mother's and fathers". I was traumatised by being denied my biological parents and having to grow up in a household full of people who were very different from me in almost every conceivable way.

This has been proved as highly traumatic time and time again.

Broadbeans I am not saying you don't know your own mind at all. I am just saying that I think part of the reason adopted people struggle is due to societal norms which are very ingrained. That doesn't make the trauma any less real of course.

At the end of the day, there are many people who are completely unfit parents to their biological children. There are also many many wonderful biological parents. There are wonderful adoptive parents and there are not so wonderful ones. It is a difficult question but my view is that biology is not everything in parenting. I fully understand that others disagree about this.

I do believe that surrogacy laws are currently under review in England and Wales.

I wasn't adopted but grew up without my biological mother. I was raised by loving parents but actually love isn't always enough and it is patronising to tell people struggling with these issues that their feelings and experiences aren't valid. I wanted to know how my mother desperately. I wanted to know if she would 'get' me and understand me in a way that I felt nobody else did. I wanted to know what she was like, what her voice sounded like. I wanted to know how it felt to be adored unconditionally in that deep primal 'biological' way, the way I love my children who I gave birth to. I am deeply effected by the loss of my biological mother to this day.

Surrogacy appalls me. When rich women start having babies for poor couples you can ask me to revise my views.

Sorry pressed enter too soon. It's not. Basically I agree with this earlier poster.

It's hot. FFS.

@LunaTrap also posted without reading this. It's a tragedy to knowingly take a child from their biological mother.

@Broadbeans
In many surrogacies, the child is fully genetically-related to the intended parents. Your criticism seems a bit misplaced, and if anything is an argument for surrogacy over adoption.