To not understand the issue with surrogacy?

[Blackbird1234]

I've seen a few posts on some threads in this topic, from people condemning surrogacy. I don't understand why it is seen as bad, if all parties consent. Can anyone explain, please?

[quote flippertyop]@RepentMotherfucker if I knew that I was a much wanted and planned child and my parents had gone out their way financially and emotionally to have me I don't think I would have an issue with it. I think your view of children being ripped from their mothers arms is a little over dramatic. That was the plan - always. You can't compare that to my circumstances and my children. I wanted to have them and so of course if they were taken it would be devastating - but that is not the same as this situation. You see the money being paid as Bad thing. I see it as a sign of commitment to wanting a child really badly. It is by no means guaranteed they will have issue when they get older they may well be perfectly happy with their lovely parents and wonderful upbringing. You have no facts to back up that they are any more likely than nY other child to have issues [/quote]
Where have I said anything about a baby being ripped from its mothers arms?

You won't find any studies because you would never get it past an ethics committee and no mother would consent to being involved in such a trial - what does that tell you in itself? But there are many mammal studies out there which show massive effects on baby animals from being removed from a mother at birth.

You would find it devastating to have your children removed but you don't think a baby who has spent 9 months learning who its mother is and who is absolutely programmed to be with that mother at all costs because that is what keeps babies safe would find it devastating to suddenly be presented with another mother? Or two fathers? That's such confused thinking.

There is tonnes of evidence and it's also just common sense. But you don't want to see it. Fine. But don't pretend you have any facts on your side. There is no evidence whatsoever that you can remove babies from a birth mother without it having huge detrimental effects on that baby. None.

[quote flippertyop]@RepentMotherfucker if I knew that I was a much wanted and planned child and my parents had gone out their way financially and emotionally to have me I don't think I would have an issue with it. I think your view of children being ripped from their mothers arms is a little over dramatic. That was the plan - always. You can't compare that to my circumstances and my children. I wanted to have them and so of course if they were taken it would be devastating - but that is not the same as this situation. You see the money being paid as Bad thing. I see it as a sign of commitment to wanting a child really badly. It is by no means guaranteed they will have issue when they get older they may well be perfectly happy with their lovely parents and wonderful upbringing. You have no facts to back up that they are any more likely than nY other child to have issues [/quote]
When money isn't a scarce resource, spending a lot of it doesn't actually show any kind of commitment.
"I want it, I can afford it, I bought it." Just like the fancy convertible, Louis Vouitton bag or the fashion breed dog. It just shows that you can afford to buy something that you want.

Using that money to pay a woman to take all the risks, do all the work, endanger her health (mentally ,physically and emotionally) doesn't show commitment.

[quote flippertyop]@OhHolyJesus yes that is an extreme example - as are some parents who can't afford one child and have ten - also an extreme example. Could you honestly look a happy surrogate child in the face and say that they shouldn't have been born. If surrogate children have issues I will absolutely listen to those but you are arguing on behalf of children who wouldn't have existed otherwise and I don't thinks it's your place to say they shouldn't have had the opportunity of living a full and happy life [/quote]
👏👏👏

@NotBadConsidering

It sometimes works out

This is a conversation for grown ups about real lives, real women, and real children, so maybe come back when you’ve had a chance to think more deeply about your answers.

😂 says you who uses insults when someone disagrees! Brilliant 🤩

@BernardBlackMissesLangCleg

sometimes it can be absolutely fine for all involved

fuck me

that's your argument @Starcup ?

sometimes it's OK?

yikes

Yep

"Sometimes it's OK" acknowledges that sometimes it's not OK. So we shouldn't legislate for the things that can and do go wrong because they don't always? Where does balance tip? OK 99% of the time? 50%? 10%?

I’ve just finished listening to a Savage Minds podcast which explores this very issue with guest Arun Dohle. Arun was adopted and now campaigns against adoption and surrogacy seeing both as essentially exploitation of the poor by the rich and neglect of children’s rights by the state.

I recommend it as an enlightening listen to anyone interested in this topic.

Arun firmly centres the rights of children.

His website is here

www.againstchildtrafficking.org/what-we-do/

This is linked from his website

www.stopsurrogacynow.com/the-statement/#sthash.RDAz8vfO.CkmuZMQI.dpbs

That's really interesting. Looking at the website ot seems to focus on inter country adoption which is very open to abuse.

To those who are defending surrogacy, especially commercialised, you are doing so because:

• Sometimes it's okay.
• Other children have it worse in different circumstances.
• Rich parents can give their children advantages and opportunities.

Compared to:

• it is the commercialised practice of acquiring a child.
• there are huge ethical concerns about the use of a woman's body being commercialised in this way, both for the woman who gives birth and, in the case of an egg being donated, the woman who donates her eggs.
• there are significant medical implications for a woman to be pregnant, and to give birth.
• in many countries, the parents have a great deal of control in the decision making regarding the woman's body, and the unborn baby, whilst pregnant.
• we now know much more about attachment disorder; surrogacy actually actively fosters the strong possibility of that.
• in many countries the mother gives up all her legal rights to be known as a mother.
• the definition of a woman's "choice" in this processes, is very sketchy, especially as she is being financially compensated for this.
• several countries have made the decision to ban the practice altogether.

The arguments for it just do not stack up, but I'm desperate to hear some better ones than just "parents have given their children all the opportunities possible and other children come into this world and have it worse". That's not a reason not to condemn something, just because something worse exists in comparison. Moreover, money is no indicator of sacrifice, commitment or love when children are concerned.

@Blackbird1234

Would a baby really notice that its new mother is not the one it was grown in? I don't have children, so genuinely don't know.

Babies recognise the mother's voice and other voices around her. Also her smell and her heartbeat

‘[I think about] who my real mum is…I just really want to know like, who she is and meet her maybe.’ (Traditional surrogacy)

‘Would you like to get in contact… would you like to keep in contact?’ (TS)

‘Sometimes I can go, ‘Is it natural? Is it normal? Is it…a normal thing to happen?’ but kind of assure myself that it is fine.’ (Gestational surrogacy)

‘I would like to know who he is…quite a lot…Recently a lot more than I used to.’ (Sperm donation)

‘It’s more important to me now….Um, and I’m just always thinking about what she looks like.’ (Egg donation)

I would like to know who he is…quite a lot. And I told my mum that and I don’t want to tell my dad that because I don’t know how he would feel about that, so…’ (Sperm donation)

‘I think mum might be a bit upset but she’d understand about it but…I’d only do it when I was 50 or 60…I don’t feel the need to now.’ (Egg donation)

‘I’ve gone so long without knowing about her, it’s just easier…I think I’d want to meet to see if I had anything in common.’ (Egg donation)

‘I heard it’s when you’re 18 or something you can try to find out who it was, so I would possibly consider doing that, but I don’t know really.’ (Egg donation)

Some quotes from 14 yos conceived by different methods.

Excellent points @zweisamkeit

Imagine how these 14 year olds might feel in 10 or 20 years when they want to start their own families?

You can hear how much they want to protect their parents and not hurt them by expressing even a low level of interest in their genetic parents. That's a terrible secret, a burden to bear at such a young age, and to keep it from the ones who love you, who you love the most. I do worry for the mental health and well being of these children.

People talk about the distress to the baby but what about the birth mother? No matter about genetics or how much she wanted to "do it for the other people", she still will be losing the baby she carried and gave birth to

@Starcup

*She won’t be able to do such a selfless thing for her sister/best friend and it will mean her sis or friend will never be able to be a mother. That will likely be a topic that is discussed at length for several years.

If only there was something I could do to help take this pain away?… oh wait….*

So ... an emotional element. The same emotional element that often puts pressure on women to say yes? That is not a negative effect anyways. There is no bad outcome for women unable to do this because the law says no.

Tbh, there are only two possible answers anyways. Financial and/or emotional. Both highly questionable from an ethical ,legal and moral point of view, and also both more likely to apply as pressure/coercion against women rather than a positive factor.

There is absolutely no actual downside (physically or mentally, possibly you might argue emotionally.. but that applies to a whole manner of things when you can't fix something that's hurting/upsetting a loved one) in either not allowing surrogacy or having it heavily regulated,controlled and with safeguards put in place.

That's how legal frameworks and policies should be and normally are done. An analysis of benefits, downsides, risks , who carries the risk , who benefits , and so on.

As it stands now, the group that carries the most risks, has the least "benefit" and the least rights and protections with the added "bonus" that preventing them from taking that risk has no actual bad outcome.

So yeah, I really struggle to understand how it can be seen as a good thing even you are inclined to look just at the fuzzy,warm , pink fluffy unicorns dancing on rainbows side.

@grey12

People talk about the distress to the baby but what about the birth mother? No matter about genetics or how much she wanted to "do it for the other people", she still will be losing the baby she carried and gave birth to

There is documented trauma to women who've had children removed at birth or shortly afterwards. It's why women who have children taken away keep on getting pregnant.

Apologies if I'm not making much sense today by the way, monster headache and I managed to electrocute myself.Mumsnetting and housework is dangerous business.

@Clymene I meant in this thread

There is a focus on the baby and it makes it seem like it's just a breeze for the birth mother. "Giving a gift" to someone else BS

[quote flippertyop]@roarfeckingroarr I think you just had a clingy baby. I had to go back to work after a few weeks. My kids turned out just fine [/quote]
A clingy baby? Do you even read what you write?

A clingy baby, to be trained not to be so ‘needy’, at a month or two old?

FFS

@BernardBlackMissesLangCleg

She won’t be able to do such a selfless thing for her sister/best friend

oy vey

the upside for the woman is that she gets to risk her health and her life to satisfy the wants of someone else? you really think women are support humans don't you?

It’s not your choice. You don’t agree fine, you don’t get to decide what she does with her body and for her reasons.

@NotBadConsidering

So to be clear following on from my previous post, that twin baby girl being diagnosed with myotonic dystrophy possibly also diagnosed someone else with the same condition, the genetic donor of either the sperm or the egg. What is not clear is who that person was and whether they were told about that possibility. In normal circumstances the parents who were present looking after their baby would find that out they also might have it and be offered genetic counselling as to whether they wanted to know. But this is surrogacy so the questions are:

1. was the sperm donor informed and did he receive genetic counselling?
2. was the egg donor informed and did she receive genetic counselling?
3. do either of these two people have any other children?

So as well as the tragedy of the diagnosis, the horribleness of the recipient, the heart of the family to look after the baby, there is also the unknowns about whether two people have ever been told about the risk they have a genetic disease.

But hey, sometimes it works out, so all good eh?

Extreme

@OhHolyJesus

Could you honestly look a happy surrogate child in the face and say that they shouldn't have been born.

At no point have I said that surrogacy shouldn't happen at all, nor would I ever say that a surrogate born child, or an adopted child, or a donor conceived child, should not have been born. I would advocate for legal, regulatory frameworks built around the norm and the extremes so to protect, as far as possible, everyone involved in surrogacy, including the child. The example I shared if the Ozarks was shared with the point of them being an extreme example. I made that point in the post.

If surrogate children have issues I will absolutely listen to those but you are arguing on behalf of children who wouldn't have existed otherwise and I don't thinks it's your place to say they shouldn't have had the opportunity of living a full and happy life

No, you have misunderstood. I have never said any child shouldn't exist or that the opportunity of a full and happy life isn't afford to surrogate born children.

Your point about wealth is a relevant one but not all children born into rich families are happy. By saying this doesn't mean rich families shouldn't have children, nor does it mean poor couples shouldn't have children, that would be wilfully misinterpreting my point which I note only so to avoid it happening again 🤞🏻

At no point have I said that surrogacy shouldn't happen at all

[quote crunchermuncher]@starcup

Still waiting for a reply to my questions on how society is to handle this issue.

Still......waiting.....

Of course you can have a different point of view, but if you can't back it up with evidence and have no reasonable and considered response to others who challenge your point of view, you can't expect your point of view to be taken seriously, to be given equal weighting.

I would like to understand how you think surrogacy could work and what appropriate and effective safeguards could be put in place. I am willing to rethink my opinion. But you have not given me (or anyone else) any reason to, apart from repeating yourself that having laws is apparently unreasonably infantilising.[/quote]
Funny that. Ask your friend @OhHolyJesus as she’s just replied in one of her posts that she doesn’t completely disagree with surrogacy (I’m as shocked as you!)

I assume she wants safeguards in place and I agree with that, but I hold my hands up and say that I’m not the best person to comment on legislation etc. I wouldn’t know how his best to implement it.

Wonder if your friend can answer the question your desperate to have an answer for?… I’ll watch this space….

@Helleofabore

I love how you want to get involved and save the world and be the champion.

I love how women working and campaigning to make life safer for other women and children, to prevent exploitation, is considered to be something to be mocked.

I would say controlling…

She won’t be able to do such a selfless thing for her sister/best friend and it will mean her sis or friend will never be able to be a mother.

That will likely be a topic that is discussed at length for several years.

If only there was something I could do to help take this pain away?… oh wait….

I don’t think you quite understand that you are talking about emotional coercion right there.