Radio 4 now - Surrogacy/Gay couples

[twelvecolourfulbirds]

On now. Supposedly focussing on the surrogates rather than the gay couples.

Listening on, she talks about how other surrogates are dropped by the adopting families once the baby has arrived, and how they find that heartbreaking. Presenter chap quick to point out that he and husband didn't do this.

The woman talks about how her previous clients had pulled out after a doctor recommended that she was not a suitable candidate for surrogacy because she had had to have surgery (not specified). This had left her heartbroken and feeling like a failure. However, her "friend" at the agency told her, don't worry, we'll get you a different doctor and another client.

Not at all exploitative

And then she says, it wasn't her egg. You guys provided it. The guys provided the egg? I don't think so. Some other woman did that. The guys provided the sperm. She then says, "So it had nothing to do with me, I'm just the glorified babysitter for 9 months". He says, "I quite like tummy mummy".

Really listen to this and it's horrible.

And then it's back to the contract stuff. What, by contract, she couldn't consume or do. Her agency taken away by threat of legal action/non payment presumably.

I think what chilled me most about this if I heard the programme correctly is that he was discussing a C section ?with medical staff? because the birth seemed to be taking time. I presume her insistence on natural birth was backed by contract. she may have dissassociated more readily because I understand it was not her egg, so basically she was a childminder/incubator. The other thing that struck me is the interviewer's statement it all comes down to trust. Trust your incubator won't drink, survives, that the baby is okay (remember the Oz couple who took the healthy one of two twins leaving the FE mother with one that was less than perfect?) There has been a series in the Times about a woman desperate for a baby who is investigating surrogacy in the States and who has found it hugely problematic for both sides.

Another BBC programme made about this issue some time ago can be found here:

www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0005f2x

I found it really upsetting. Things went wrong and the damage to that woman's life seemed so unacknowledged, even by her. There was plenty of happy veneer plastered over the cracks.

And Crosstalk the control over the birth is something that makes me feel really uncomfortable too. I'm sure I recall hearing on a documentary that the Drewit-Barlows insisted their kids were born by c-section, and one of them said it was because they didn't want to baby to come through a vagina!

Growing a baby has "nothing to do with me."
Keeping myself safe so that the foetus remains safe has "nothing to do with me".
Feeding myself, depriving myself, to grow a healthy baby has "nothing to do with me".
Feeling my body change in ways that it will never recover from has "nothing to do with me".
Enduring tests and other medical procedures has "nothing to do with me".
Enduring the emotions that come with the hormonal changes have "nothing to do with me".
Enduring the pain of childbirth, the damage to my body "has nothing to do with me.
Going through all of that but having no baby at the end of it "has nothing to do with me".
Losing my agency, being told how I shall live for 9 months under threat of legal action, under threat of being dumped with hundreds of thousands of dollars of medical bills if I am disobedient, under threat of losing the money I need, is "nothing to do with me".
Because I am a surrogate, I am just a glorified babysitter, and really, it has "nothing to do with me".

To be fair, Crosstalk, she wanted a natural birth and he and his husband backed her up. The baby was late and it was the doctors who were talking about c-sections.

Isn't there some badge of honour amongst certain gay men that they have never encountered a vagina, even when they are born? I think I read that somewhere.

It really annoys me that women are being closed out of the surrogacy debate around the world by gay men. Gay men have decided that what they want (a baby), a biological impossibility, is what they get and those of us who object to the commodification of women are shut down with the "homophobic" chant.

What is is that people are so afraid of the gay lobby now that they have to tip toe around all of this and be seen as supporting it, even to the detriment of their own sex, their own bodies, their own daughters?

When did we stop saying no to people - you are a gay couple, you can marry, you can live openly as a gay couple but no, you cannot have children. You cannot pay a woman, anywhere in this world, to take your sperm and make you a baby. That's biology.

Oh, and I also feel the same for all other surrogacy, it's just the media focus seems to be on this type.

Here is a really good programme on the subject.

Despite the title being in Spanish, it only has Spanish subtitles.

Very interesting that the programme, having followed the narrative of the surrogate being totally unaffected by the process (because the men were oh so nice to her) and being nothing more than an incubator, said absolutely nothing about the egg and the fact that another woman was exploited to provide to gay men a child they couldn't produce between themselves but see as their right.

So here's the narrative they are creating to change the law: If you don't have to carry your own egg to term and then give it away, you are unaffected. If you carry someone else's egg to term, you are unaffected, because it's not yours to keep anyway and you have no emotional connection and no right to one.

Excellent twitter thread regarding the situation in India where they have passes laws to shut down the international surrogacy trade. (Which then moves on to another impoverished country).

twitter.com/matthewgreenf11/status/1150826082687442944?s=12

SirVixifVixHall

The Cardiff event is one of several public consultation events. I'm expecting to be told how wonderful the brave new world is, it says a chance to discuss but I think you may have to submit questions in advance.

Anyway I have the afternoon off that day and thought I would go along to see and hear. Think I'll wear my "Hands off my rights " T shirt.

OP the non disclosure contracts are interesting. Now you mention it, we have never heard a whisper from the surrogates of the rich and famous as far as I know. They must be pretty draconian and watertight I would think.

Shame privacy and doesn't extend to the mother and child.

www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2018/06/her-name-is-monroe-christine

I think the thing that strikes me particularly with male gay couples is the extent to which it's being implied that opposing this kind of surrogacy is an affront to their right to be a parent, just like straight couples. Sometimes it's said right out, and other times implied. And I've seen the same thing with sperm donation for lesbian couples - if you oppose it, it is homophobic.

I think the reason that it's gained some traction might be because recent marriage equality campaigns have made that language acceptable. It's similar to the love is love idea, it was widely used here and people now are very comfortable with it. And we see it suddenly being used to justify all kinds of weird shit.
In this case, a lot of people have gotten used to thinking, we have to treat gay couples just like straight ones, in marriage and also adoption, and somehow that sense is used to say, we need to allow them to use whatever reproductive tech they need as well.

It's a logical leap, but I have become increasingly depressed about how easy it seems to get people to make these leaps as long as you use the right slogans. It's a clear pattern, establish the slogan, or just the woke idea we all need to believe, and then you can use it for whatever you want.

I don't understand how you can get a lot of joy from an experience that you've also described as not belonging to you

I remember watching an interview with a surrogate who had done it 6 times so. She also claimed to feel totally detached whilst simultaneously describing the joy of the prospective parents. They lavished her with attention during the pregnancy, daily phonecalls, constant reminders that she 'was giving them the best gift ever' massive gratitude, coffee and lunch dates, cards, gifts, personal validation.

It struck me that it was similar in a way to Munchusens. During the pregnancy the surrogate is lavished with attention, including medical attention for those with extra funds. As soon as the baby arrives the empty feeling starts, so they sign up again. No woman would go through all that for strangers unless there was a payoff. I understand in the USA there is financial redress so maybe different, but not in the UK so you have to question their motives and the state of their mental health.

It suits the narrative to say that the woman suffers no harm, that she is doing it altruistically, that she even takes joy from it, but feels no personal pain, be it physical or psychological. To me, it goes hand in hand with the normalisation of sex work.
Yes, it's woman as passive, non-corrosive vessel, like a boat or a vase: I am both unchanged and validated by what you put in me and what you get out of me. There is no sense of something being used up, or requiring maintanance, care, replenishment.
But if you were a casual listener, if you weren't listening to what she is not allowed to say, if you hadn't thought about the issue, then it would be, "Ahh, bless them all." Yes! Aww, babies What's better than woman and baby? Man and baby of course.
Yet a cursory glance at MN will reveal the tumult behind pregnancy, and of course there's the small matter that we're not fully empowered to end our own pregnancy if we want to.

I'm against surrogacy for many of the reasons listed here but I'm also a lesbian parent to children born using donor sperm. For me the desire to have children was so strong that I'd have had them with a man if that was the only way. I'm not saying it would have ended well but that need was far stronger than anything sexual at that point in my life. I didn't have to because I could access other options. So I suppose my point is that if you give people options they will use them. The urge to procreate is very strong.

Excellent post CatherineofAragon

I have thought too how much validation must play a part, not to mention a sprinkle of cast off celebrity fairy dust for surrogates if celebs. Imagine having the Kardashians as your clients.

Also agree about the normalisation of gay's needs being met as you say Goosefoot

Any word of objection is shot down with accusations of homophobia no matter how much you point out an objection to surrogacy for anyone.

Link to more details about the event I plan to go to.

www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/building-families-through-surrogacy-a-new-law-a-consultation-event-cardiff-tickets-64662961659

"After an introduction to our proposals or questions on each topic, there will be time for questions and discussion."

Will have to think of the single most important question as I doubt there will be a chance for two bites of the cherry.

I'm thinking of sticking with impact on the NHS/costs to the state.

Suggestions for questions welcome.

Another impact on the NHS is NICU cot availability. Always in short supply at the best of times, my hospital in SW had to send a baby to Edinburgh a little while ago.

But these pregnancies have a higher rate of twins and higher risk so likely this will be another problem for the NHS to accommodate.

Relevant recent thread:

Carriers v Spurters
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3638362-carriers-v-spurters