‘Our Baby: A Modern Miracle’ C4 10pm tonight

[Haveastock]

The story of Jake Graf and Hannah Winterbourne’s surrogacy journey. They’re the photogenic transgender power couple who are patrons of Mermaid.

Their surrogate was an Irish woman and I followed Jake on Instagram during the whole drama of the birth happening amidst a pandemic. I actually shed a tear when I saw a photo of the baby in their arms and thought about a nameless woman in the background having to deal with the post-birth pain and bleeding without a baby to hold.

I’ve just watched a trailer where Jake said they were hoping for a boy first (they used their own eggs and donor sperm) as they knew how to handle boys - throw them around, be boisterous etc. and werevmore familiar with that then girls who, as far as they were concerned mainly played with glitter and dolls!!! Yes, they laughingly admitted they’re were as prone to gender stereotypes as the next man, woman etc.! How we laughed!?

I’m sure it will be an interesting programme and the baby is so gorgeous. As I’ve said before, I wish them all well. The baby won’t be short on love. But by championing Mermaids and their push for the affirmation model, no matter how young, Jake is indirectly encouraging a generation of young kids to start on a treatment pathway that will end up in depriving them of any chance of a biological child of their own. I find that absolutely tragic.

(Am sure they’re a bit frustrated that their programme is airing during the 48 hour Twitter blackout)

Hope no one minds me posting about it on this board. Am sure there will be a thread in Telly Addicts too. I imagine they’ll get a lot of positive feedback.

They definitely play into their new gender roles in the relationship.

Yep, I have noticed transgender people take their new gender stereotype to the extreme.

Yep, I have noticed transgender people take their new gender stereotype to the extreme.

I guess that's because they are playing a role. Theres probably also am element of trying too hard. They're probably paranoid as coming off as their biological sex, so act in the stereotypical way of their chosen gender more.

@nauticant

Jake can't bear to be a woman (for Jake there is something inherently bad about being a woman) and Hannah can't bear to be a man (because men can't be gentle and feminine and wear feminine clothes).

I do sometimes wonder whether some girls and women are running away from being females while some boys and men are running towards a feminine identity. A repulsion vs an attraction.

I am continually struck by the fact that MTF and FTM are not mirror images of each other. They are quite different things.

To add to this - often it is also a move away from sexual attention (FTM) and a move towards sexual attention/ "getting some" (MTF). Especially obvious when you look at transition rates of young girls, who just don't want to be pornified, and "incels" who use transitioning to finally get sex partners, or older men who are such oversexualised versions of "women".

Then of course the LGBT surrogacy lobby have been working very hard to reframe the concept of surrogacy as a civil right for all LGBT people almost as an addendum to marriage equality.

In Scotland gay men have already had surrogacy paid for by the NHS. They had to find surrogate themselves (and pay her expenses?) but all the proceedures have been at the cost of NHS Scotland. The couple in the article baulked at the cost of surrogacy paid fro entirely by themselves and reckon they deserve something out of the NHS since they pay in.

The CoVid pandemic has shown up how appalling the baby factories in the Ukraine and elsewhere are. Last year I read an article about gay couples in Israel (who go abroad for surrogates) who are lobbying for "more and greater access to wombs" at home. That said it all to me, women walking wombs, there for the convience of men.Chilling.

It seems like no one is actually able to look into the psychology of transgenderisum and the different types.

We have to just accept the narrative of gender spirit or sole or essence not matching your biological sex.

It's clear some people are born with a deep feeling that they should be the oppersite sex and have the wrong biology. But there are so many out there that seem to have been influenced by their environment or sexualality.

Sorry, link to Scottish couple
www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/scotlands-first-gay-couple-access-21968033

Fertility Equality is the catch phrase.
Totally ignoring that this can only be achieved through the blood, sweat, tears and occasional death of women via reproductive exploitation.

"The Fight for Fertility Equality
A movement has formed around the idea that one’s ability to build a family should not be determined by wealth, sexuality, gender or biology."

www.nytimes.com/2020/07/22/style/lgbtq-fertility-surrogacy-coverage.html

It's the exact same argument as prostitution and pornography isn't it? Women 'choose' to be surrogates ergo it's not exploitation.

Fertility Equality is the catch phrase. Totally ignoring that this can only be achieved through the blood, sweat, tears and occasional death of women via reproductive exploitation.

Exactly this. A lot of so-called ‘equality’ seems to mean men and women should have equal use of women’s bodies.

The Fight for Fertility Equality
A movement has formed around the idea that one’s ability to build a family should not be determined by wealth, sexuality, gender or biology."

But wealth is an exclusion. Surrogacy is only for the rich. Pro surrogacy people shout about how it needs to be legal and commercial so gay men and infertile or single people can have babies - but apparently the right to have a baby through those means is only important for people with a spare £45k knocking about.

Plus there is no true equality in life and never can be. Some people can't have kids, it's not nice but life's not fair like that. Some people are born with duff hearts, doesn't give them the right to buy someone else's heart.

No one has a right to children. If you're lucky enough to have them then great. But you shouldn't be able to have them at the expense of others. Egg harvesting and surrogacy need to be banned.

Yeah, how is it 'equality' when you are using someone else's body and putting them in danger in order to gain that equality?

I would be interested in how many black women are surrogates in America. There has been a lot recently about how pregnancy and birth is particularly dangerous for black women?

I agree it is exploitative and ethically unjustifiable.

I imagine they will try to compare it to organ donation etc.

It's a good point King - I think I remember a surrogate mother called Toni discussing this with Jennifer Lahl on her you tube channel

The point being that it was almost promoted as a money earning venture for women living in poverty when the Bill in NYC was proposed or passed.

Toni also mentions the racism element as the commissioning parents weren't black.

Have just been having a look. Kim Kardashian's surrogate was a black woman. She featured on Keeping Up with the Kardashian but her face was blurred out.

She was reportedly 'only' paid $45,000 because apparently any more than that would attract women to it 'for the wrong reasons' ie. They would only be doing it for the money. Yeah, because $45,000 is peanuts

I wonder how many other black women in America are surrogates?

But wealth is an exclusion. Surrogacy is only for the rich.

This is why there is a push to get surrogacy fully paid for on the NHS.

The Scottish couple referenced above have had all their costs including the surrogate mothers fee/expenses paid in full by the NHS.

I await with interest the answer to this FOI that I noticed the other day, it seems someone else is looking into these expenses.

https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/fundingforrbuildingfamiliessth

That video

There is a disturbing push, not to say conspiracy to get this fully funded by the NHS.

It seems the Law Commission had a planning document for the consultation regarding new surrogacy law which listed SurrogacyUK as a "key influencer".

SurrogacyUK produced a document

"Further evidence for reform
Second Report of the Surrogacy UK Working Group on Surrogacy Law Reform
December 2018"

(Sorry, I can't give the link, it is a pdf and doesn't work, but copy and paste and search for it in your search engine and it will turn up).

which included a stated aim for full funding for surrogacy.

"Public funding should be made available for surrogacy-related fertility treatment in the UK and to pay UK surrogate expenses, in line with the principles that apply to non- surrogacy fertility treatments."

This neatly feeds into the "fertility equality" narrative by making it equally available for rich and poor.

Of course, what you WON'T find is equality with respect to the women offering to provide the service. The women choosing to do this invariably do so because they need the money. I have yet to see a wealthy woman choosing to go through pregnancy and childbirth on behalf of a poor prospective parent.

Today I was chatting to a female doctor at work. She didn't know a lot about surrogacy although she had seen reports about Baby Grammy, and babies born during the coronavirus awaiting collection by parents stranded, unable to travel, all of which she was concerned about.
She was a bit non plussed by my barely controlled rant that erupted.
I told her about Scotland fully funding surrogacy, and the push to get it on the NHS throughout the UK. She simply didn't believe me!

This is why there is a push to get surrogacy fully paid for on the NHS.

Fucks sake. Where does it end. I could kinda see the rational if say a sister was a surrogate and they wanted the 1 or two rounds of ivf on the nhs that everyone else gets. But paying expenses, they'll want the nhs to have an army of breeding sows sorry surrogates on staff next.

Also the argument for ivf on the nhs is infertility is a medical condition - ivf is helping the body to do what it was designed to do. Being in a same sex couple is not a medical condition and the men are not infertile, so what right do they have to medical treatment under the NHS.

We would do well to remember that same sex males couples mentioned in articles and in general aren't actually infertile.

They lack two critical elements due to their biology - but they are not infertile or they would also require sperm donors as well as the egg donor and the rented womb.

Tbh I can't see it actually happening in reality. The nhs are pretty tight with money. They're not going to offer up 15k plus to surrogates. They would probably work out what actual reasonable expenses are, ie few bits of maternity clothes, hospital parking, bit of extra food allowece, vitamin allowance, travel to appointments. That would equate to hundreds rather than 1000s. They would then offer 1 round of ivf to the surrogate as per what everyone else gets.

The standard of living is pretty high in the UK. Not many people are going to be a surrogate for nothing and I assume the nhs will want actual receipts for expenses too. And the success rate if you can only have one round of ivf is pretty low.

So nothing would really change. The rich will continue to have private surrogate arrangements where they pay £15k for "expenses".
Some people will have true altruistic surrogacy (or family pressure) through the nhs or a combo of NHS and private funding, and some unscrupulous people with a bit of extra cash will go abroad to exploit a poor Eastern European.

It is just unthinkable to me that anybody willingly creates a situation whereby a newborn baby is ripped from its birth mother, the only person it has ever known, and the only person who can breastfeed them. You have to be an incredibly cold, vain and selfish person to do that, which does not make for a good parent.

I resent the fact society has so little say over situations like this; politicians wont touch it with a barge pole for fear of looking homophobic/transphobic, and nobody else with a platform can say anything without being cancelled. As I said my thread got deleted yesterday for merely breaching the topic.

*broaching

Whenever you breed animals, the babies are kept with their mother for a period of time which it's acknowledged is best for the offspring (and possibly the mother). Someone mentioned calves earlier in the thread but we do the same with cats and dogs.

If a bitch dies in labour and pups have to be hand reared, it's acknowledged that it's difficult, some pups may not survive and those that do may struggle to thrive as well as those who were fed and raised by mum until they were 8 weeks or so.

Where is the respect for human babies' need to be with their mothers?

In years to come, this will be another scandal, when we will scratch our heads at a world where the 4th trimester is recognised as crucial to a child's development, where early trauma has a profound impact on future wellbeing, and yet people bought newborns from their mothers.

I really don't believe in Frankenstein-type science where reproduction is concerned

I said that as an 19 year old way back when the first "test tube baby" was trumpeted as a miracle. I oppose all forms of artificial conception.

No one has a right to children. If you're lucky enough to have them then great. But you shouldn't be able to have them at the expense of others. Egg harvesting and surrogacy need to be banned

I'm fed up of reading and hearing complaints that the NHS is underfunded and that the Conservatives want to scrap the NHS.

Planned spending for the Department of Health and Social Care in England is £140.4 billion in 2019/20. You need then to add Scotland, Wales and N.I on to that.

The NHS is not underfunded. There is not a bottomless money jar. Fertility treatment should not be paid for by the NHS.