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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Surrogate dies in childbirth, leaves behind two of her own kids

676 replies

ConfessionsOfTeenageDramaQueen · 18/01/2020 07:31

"According to the post, Michelle and Chris decided to help another family who wasn't able to have children after they were done having kids of their own.

Michelle was on her second surrogacy for the same family when she lost her life.

Like any other pregnancy, surrogate pregnancies involve the same medical risks of carrying a child and giving birth."

This makes me really angry. Link below.

www.foxla.com/news/california-mother-of-two-dies-giving-another-family-the-gift-of-life?fbclid=IwAR2RgBrXZnWZa1DES4PQWDYMifkY7YCpLy6WVEOoHj6cD145L9Xof1Iy4mI

OP posts:
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13
hambledon · 18/01/2020 08:33

CatfromJapan that is a really great post. It's great in relation to this issue and soooo many others that come up on MN.

Beerincomechampagnetastes · 18/01/2020 08:40

Thank you cat you have said everything I feel and think and articulated it in a way I never could.
Excellent post.

ArabellaDoreenFig · 18/01/2020 08:47

thecatfromjapan

Fantastic post, articulates so well the problem with the phrase ‘her body her choice’ which is increasingly becoming a catch all to ensure women stay in their place and keep the cogs of the patriarchy moving.

Scientific advancements around IVF have muddied the waters around how we view parenthood and children, having a baby is not a human right.

YouJustDoYou · 18/01/2020 08:51

'Choice' isn't an either/or: in capitalism, it's a sliding scale. 'Choice' is shaded by compulsion and coercion more times than not - explicit, overt, implicit, hidden, fiscal, societal ...

'It was her choice' is one of the most vacuous phrases to be wheeled out in contemporary politics. It's intended as a hammer to bring thinking on a political issue to a close, to assert finality and closure forcefully

FANTASTICALLY fucking worded cat.

BeardyButton · 18/01/2020 08:51

Awful. People should not be able to buy babies. People should not be able to buy wombs. Tragic that rampant inequality and the myth of 'personal respobsibility, personal choice' allows this to happen.

Bezalelle · 18/01/2020 08:55

The "choice" thing is only ever wheeled out when it's women who are up against the wall.

thecatfromjapan · 18/01/2020 08:58

Oh, I find myself raging about the contemporary madness over 'choice'.

I have thoughts about it.

I reckon you can trace a history of its current usage, and I actually think a seminal moment in the U.K. was the publication of Natasha Walter's first book - which has implications way beyond those she might ever have foreseen, and popularising an ultimately damaging tendency in progressive thinking.

It's roots lie in the post-68 critique of Sartrean Marxism.

But the point is, we need to stop, or at least give space for deeper reflection - because it's more hindrance than help.

Political arguments, narratives to describe, empower and change, are not hewn in tablets of stone. They are human creations - intended to have traction and incite action in the material world.

We need to start working on this contemporary madness around the word 'choice'. We need to face up squarely to instances where people (we, us) misrecognise our best interests (yes, we do that sometimes - though often we have help doing that,) or act in situations where we really aren't thrilling with joy in the full unleashing of a replete agency and autonomy.

How can we have reached the point where it is anathema to say this? When it's a fundamental fact of most of our lived experience?

It's completely bonkers. A vast tranche of progressive politics seems to have chosen to gaslight themselves about the reality of our lives.

It's just baffling.

FixTheBone · 18/01/2020 08:58

I suppose everyone with children who has ever participated in high risk sports etc is also massively selfish????

It's a balanced risk / benefit decision, I can imagine it brings about a huge sense of achievement and pride being able and willing to do this for a family who cant have children themselves....

thecatfromjapan · 18/01/2020 08:59

@Bezalelle Pretty much.

Grrrrrr. 😡

JonnyPocketRocket · 18/01/2020 08:59

Just joining the chorus of approval for @thecatfromjapan Probably the best post I've ever read on here👌🙌

Lovemusic33 · 18/01/2020 09:06

She knew the risks the same as she did when she carried her own children, the risk isn’t very high, it’s pretty rare now for women to die during child birth.

No one knows if she was getting paid or not. People donate kidneys as living donors knowing that there’s a risk they could develop problems with their healthy remaining kidney and die?

It’s a sad story for the kids she left behind and it’s a risk I wouldn’t take unless being a surrogate to my own children’s child but I don’t think it should be illegal to carry a child for someone else.

lowlandLucky · 18/01/2020 09:07

Wether she was being kind, making money or pushed into it is niether here nor there, the fact is 3 children are left Motherless. It is not a persons right to have a baby, sometimes you need to accept that it is not possible for you to bring a child into this world. Just because we can do certain things medically doesnt mean we should. There is always adoption

thecatfromjapan · 18/01/2020 09:09

FixtheBone

' ...Brings about feelings of pride...'

This, right here, is a place to start thinking, not stop thinking.

  • Are emotions private or social?
  • Can emotions be said to even exist in a social vacuum?
  • In what sense might we understand emotions as socially constructed?
  • Can 'individual' emotions be coerced, 'grown'?
  • Are there rewards for some emotions and not others?
  • Are some emotions gendered? In fact, given the prevailing rhetoric that emotions are natural, immediate, individual, bodily, do we have a fantasy - as a society - that some emotions actually confer gender?

Just a list of questions, off the top of my head.

Not exhaustive.

But, as you can see, all this nonsense about 'natural choice' actually precludes these questions.

It naturalises things that are perhaps not natural at all.

It pins our feet to the ground.

Nails and hammers have their place in thinking.

But right now, we women need to paint wings on our feet - not turn words into nails - because we have vast distances to travel, we have words swelling up inside our stomachs like wild birds, longing to fly - and we have only short lives in which to undertake all that.

Judgybitch · 18/01/2020 09:11

I hate the 'it's a woman's choice to have children's line of thinking. Society doesn't have a choice but to have children but women do? If say half of the women who could otherwise have children chose not to. It would not be many years before society as we know it would have to fundamentally change. First half the midwives out of work then the nursery workers then the schools due to lack of children, teaching is one of the most common jobs in the country, if there was No one to teach many of them would leave work. Post 16 the lack of workers would kick in etc etc etc.

Soontobe60 · 18/01/2020 09:13

'Choice' isn't an either/or: in capitalism, it's a sliding scale. 'Choice' is shaded by compulsion and coercion more times than not - explicit, overt, implicit, hidden, fiscal, societal

👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻
@thecatfromjapan
I'm off to read any other posts you may have written. You've managed to articulate my thoughts and feelings about the misnomer 'choice' that's bandied about all too often.
I 'chose' to leave home at 16 because my parents moved away.
I 'chose' to leave college because I had no money and needed to work.
I 'chose' to marry a very unsuitable man because he could provide me with somewhere nice to live.
I 'chose' not to have any more children because I couldn't afford to.

This woman 'chose' to carry a child for another woman because ?????
Absolutely fucking tragic and wrong.

AnotherEmma · 18/01/2020 09:16

"I suppose everyone with children who has ever participated in high risk sports etc is also massively selfish????"

Well it depends how high risk.
Rock climbing without ropes, yes hugely selfish and irresponsible.
Some sports may have a high risk of injury but a low risk of death.
But I didn't bring a child into the world only to take big risks with my life just for thrills.

Dangerfloof · 18/01/2020 09:19

but some jobs carry some risks
Is there an equivalent to the HSE in California? Where at least employers will be fined for letting their employee die.
Also calling it a job is a slippery slope, can you imagine a future where all unemployed women of an age to carry and birth children would be forced for benefits to do just that?
Similar to calling prostitution a job, unless you want the job centre to insist you go for an interview should you ever become unemployed, and your mother and your daughter.
Words matter, and something becoming common parlance could matter in future.

TheTigersBride · 18/01/2020 09:20

Some very odd posts. Personally I think all surrogacy,, whether commercial or altruistic should be banned.

More like renting. She was selling her effort and her time - literally her labour. Same as a an office worker or a Brickie or a prostitute

Commercial surrogacy is comparable to. prostitution but prostitution is not just a job like any other. Ridiculous comment.

Nemosnemsis · 18/01/2020 09:22

Ok @thecatfromjapan that’s a fair point, but who gets to decide what is an acceptable amount of risk for a person to take for financial compensation? Not all jobs are safe, desk jobs like yours. As an example, my sister works as an exercise rider for a large racing yard. She’s often obliged to get on potentially dangerous horses because that is her job. She’s suffered several serious injuries. It’s extremely high risk, but it’s her choice. There is no protective legislation to stop her from doing this, nor would I expect there to be.

TheTigersBride · 18/01/2020 09:23

It is not a persons right to have a baby, sometimes you need to accept that it is not possible for you to bring a child into this world. Just because we can do certain things medically doesnt mean we should

This - 100%

Aesopfable · 18/01/2020 09:25

She knew the risks the same as she did when she carried her own children, the risk isn’t very high, it’s pretty rare now for women to die during child birth.

The fact that she carried two of her children does not mean she understood the risk. Moreover, the fact that she did not suffer an adverse outcome in her three previous pregnancies may well have distorted her understanding of that risk; ‘I didn’t role a six the last three times ergo I don’t role sixes’

Nemosnemsis · 18/01/2020 09:25

To add - sister is self employed. So no employer to take the flack if she is injured or killed.

Aesopfable · 18/01/2020 09:26

*roll

RedToothBrush · 18/01/2020 09:27

'Choice' isn't an either/or: in capitalism, it's a sliding scale. 'Choice' is shaded by compulsion and coercion more times than not - explicit, overt, implicit, hidden, fiscal, societal ...

'It was her choice' is one of the most vacuous phrases to be wheeled out in contemporary politics. It's intended as a hammer to bring thinking on a political issue to a close, to assert finality and closure forcefully.

But it's meaningless.

Choice is something that is understood by middle classes in a way which is different to working classes

Choice is something that is understood by men differently to women.

If you fail to understand this as a politician or decision maker you are missing a fundamental part of the way the world works.

NotBadConsidering · 18/01/2020 09:28

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, it is not possible to formulate a surrogacy agreement without one of the three parties involved giving up rights.

So when people say “choice” what they are actually saying is that this woman “chose” to sacrifice rights, gambling that it wouldn’t go wrong. But it did.