California commodifies women and babies for gay men

[collateral]

(100) Telling it Like it is Without the Gaslighting (substack.com)

“Why is it considered tragic if a newborn’s mother dies, but acceptable when the same conditions are planned for to cater to the desires of adults who bought their baby?”

Because in the second scenario the man doesn’t want the mother to be involved but in the first scenario he does. In other words, as the article points out, it’s all about the adult male’s wants, not about the baby’s needs. (Adoption being different as the motivation there (in ethical situations involving careful decision making about placing a baby who can’t be looked after by its mother) is the baby’s need for a family.)

"Women’s bodies are not a “pregnancy treatment” for men"

Says it all

That’s a really good point

Why is it considered ethical/acceptable to demand that a mother had no contact with her child just because the men want exclusivity?

In cases of separation/divorce etc the bar to deny access is often extremely high even when the parent in question has behaved appallingly, purely because it is understood that it’s best for the child to know their birth parents if at all possible.

the selfishness of the adults who seek a surrogate is seemingly always justified because they for whatever reason are deemed to have had a difficult path to become parents.

Children have a basic human right to not be separated from their parents. Surogacy can only be deemed acceptable when set against this basic human right because we've been able to redefine 'parents'. It's another case of using language to shape reality.

But the reality for a newborn is that the only parent they know is the mother who gestated and birthed them. The reality is a newborn doesn't actually care who provided the egg or the sperm.

I think it is unbelievably cruel to create a baby with the express intention of removing them from their mother at birth. And I think it contravenes the baby's human rights.

Yes, and it’s the baby that’s being denied access to its mother.

These are men paying for babies to be brought into the world so that they can deny them their right to their mother. It’s because what they want is the ability to prevent the baby having access to its mother that they are going down the surrogacy route. If they simply wanted to be parents, there are so many children needing foster families and adoptive parents. But no, it’s not about what the child needs. It’s about their own wants.

We don't take puppies away from their mothers until they're at least 10 weeks old (ideally 12).

Most surrogacy contracts require newborn babies to be taken straight from birth to the adoptive parents. They don't even get the benefit of the skin to skin contact with their mother before being taken away from the only parent they know. It's barbaric and entirely done because the commissioning parents know that the initial contact would create a bond that could threaten the surrogacy arrangement.

I don’t see how the trade in women’s bodies to produce babies on demand is in any way defensible.

Yet it somehow seems that the sort of people who believe themselves to be ‘on the right side of history’ are determined to pretend it’s actually a good thing.

Redefining not being able to have a baby because you don’t want to engage in the behaviour required for conception (heterosexual sex) as ‘infertility’ is yet another example of the 21st century trend to view reality as malleable for people to make (or ‘manifest’) to suit their preferences.

I simply don’t believe that fertility is a human right. Talk of ‘equal fertility rights’ is nonsense.

Fetuses don’t “know” their mother. How ridiculous, if they did then goodbye abortion rights. They are blank slates and attachment, the knowing, starts directly after birth. That’s why the most humane thing is to start the parent -child bond with the adoptive parents from day one.

You may feel attached to your fetus inside you, but that’s a one way feeling, it is not reciprocated nor is it universal given the fact that women have late term terminations.

And the comparison to puppies! They are not just kept with the mother, they are raised by the mother. The age we adopt out puppies is adolescence not infancy.

“I simply don’t believe that fertility is a human right. Talk of ‘equal fertility rights’ is nonsense.”

I don’t disagree. But this isn’t even about fertility. Those men are not infertile.

The “rights issue” being campaigned on here is the legal right to have the power in contract law to remove an infant from its mother.

And if it’s about “human rights”, well then, “being supplied with a human infant on demand” is not a human right. But there’s certainly an argument that could be made that “not being separated from your birth mother at birth” should be a human right.

But there’s certainly an argument that could be made that “not being separated from your birth mother at birth” should be a human right.

Yeah if you hate women and think that your opinion of what a baby wants supersedes the birth mother’s wishes. We know babies are barely aware they’re even alive and don’t have the capacity to make decisions. But, yeah if you want women forced to keep babies they do not want, go ahead and argue the baby has a human right to be raised by his/her birth mama and that takes precedence over the mother’s wishes and she therefore has no right to put her baby up for adoption, planned in advance or otherwise.

Youd also see an increase in infanticide…women aren’t going to be saddled with babies they don’t want and have no legal means to adopt out.

We are talking about newborn infants here, not foetuses.

And we are also not talking about a situation where a human infant needs to be adopted because it’s mother can’t care for it.

We are talking about a situation when two men don’t want to adopt a child which is already in the world and in need of a family, but instead want a human infant to be created for them, and want a woman to go through all the risks of pregnancy and childbirth, and want that newborn infant to denied access o its mother as an infant and through childhood. And there are commercial enterprises wanting to make money from that trade in human infants, and from the supply of women’s bodies to support that trade.

its mother

Another point is that pregnancy and childbirth is actually quite dangerous for women.

It is high risk, and should not be undertaken as a «job».

To me all surrogacy is slavery. It is buying and selling human beings.
Every child needs their mother, especially in the first few years.
Attachment does not only 'happen after birth' - ridiculous.

Who cares why? You’re still telling women right, you are capable of caring for baby X, therefore you have no right to give baby x up for adoption as it’s the baby’s human right to be raised by you. You are overriding the mothers rights and agency as a human being herself.

And commercial surrogacy is banned. All the companies facilitating it are not for profit.

You were talking about foetuses with the “only parent it’s ever known” the fetus knows nothing. The newborn baby knows only what we expose him/her to, and it is more humane to get that newborn to the parents that will raise him/her than to allow a parent-child bond to form only to be traumatically broken months later.

This is a money making business on the backs of women. Not very unlike slavery buying babies.

Contrary to what have been said, babies are used to the mothers voice, heart beat, smells. If breastfed food is tailored to the baby by the mothers body.

Taking a baby away from their mum cause you bought it to complete your life style is despicable. There are many babies looking for a family because a variety of reasons.

Wanting your gene pool to produce offspring is not a human right.

Great 👍🏿
While you’re at it why not ban women from all high risk jobs then?
Armed forces, police, fire, bin woman, postie, lorry driver, construction, farming, paramedic….nope all women must be protected from deciding to take on a risky job where they might end up injured or dead.

It’s for our own good to only have men doing the risky jobs, is it?

Or maybe we let women decide for themselves what risks they want to take? Shocker I know to think women have the mental capacity to consent to doing a job that has risk.

This isn’t in any way about women’s rights to choose a job.

Surrogacy is simply unacceptable. It’s a trade in human life (growing babies to order) and not just a woman’s right to choose what she does with her body.

It might also be a woman’s choice to use her body to traffic drugs. But we don’t pretend that just an occupational choice and we should stop telling her what she can do with her body. Using her body to traffic infants is even worse.

Not very unlike slavery buying babies.

Oh yes because we know all actual slaves were loved members of the family with their freedom and rights. It’s nothing like slavery, you make a compete mockery of any slavery suffered by any people by comparing adoption of a baby via surrogacy to buying a slave- even a slave baby.

L3thirtyseven, you are looking at this the wrong way.

The mother has a right to bring up her baby, if she wants to. The baby has the right to be brought up by its mother, if that is possible.

If the mother doesn't want to or if it is not possible, then adoption is the next best option.

Are you deliberately twisting what is being said to try and force team abortion rights to surrogacy? So if you oppose surrogacy, you have to oppose abortion rights? And if you support abortion rights, you have to support surrogacy? No one here is saying that at all.

You can oppose surrogacy for the benefit of the mother and baby and also support abortion rights for women who don't want to be mothers (again). Both viewpoints are in the best interest of women and babies.

You can argue this is not in the best interest of a fetus but ultimately the woman carrying the fetus has the right to decide on her body.

You can also argue opposing surrogacy, and sex work, denies women the right to do what she wants with her body, but as the majority of women do not actively choose sex work or surrogacy, but out of economical necessity, opposing it is to ensure vulnerable women aren't taken advantage of.

Ultimately sex work and surrogacy is condoning abuse of womens bodies for the benefit of others, mainly men. It is also turning womens bodies into objects you can rent. Both should be banned.

That’s a stretch to compare surrogacy to trafficking class A drugs!

The newborn baby knows only what we expose him/her to, and it is more humane to get that newborn to the parents that will raise him/her than to allow a parent-child bond to form only to be traumatically broken months later.

If this is true, why is it, in child protection situations, that in order to remove a baby from its mother who is considered unfit a family court judge has to decide it’s necessary?

If you oppose surrogacy on the basis of the unscientific belief that a fetus knows its mother while still in the womb, then yes, you endanger abortion rights. The whole “human right of the baby” rests on that belief. It’s a short hop from saying an unborn fetus knows it’s mother and so the mother must raise it, to saying the mother must also carry that fetus to term and give birth.

Im saying, if you oppose surrogacy at least understand the double edge of the arguments you are making and how they can harm women.

As for women being taken advantage of, that is a problem, but to ban all women from making decisions about their own bodies for their own protection is infantilising and patriarchal. The focus should be on regulation and taking steps to prevent women from being taken advantage of.

No. It’s not. They’re both in the category of socially harmful things that make the ‘my body; my choice’ argument beside the point. There are lots of things that it’s not acceptable to do with your body. Selling your organs. Trafficking drugs in your stomach. Renting yourself as an incubator so you can sell the baby to someone else. Offering your arm to someone who wants to try cannibalism. Many things.

Buying a baby is abhorrent and indefensible. We should not be selling human life.

Parenthood is not a human right. It is a responsibility if you have children. But having children is not a basic right.

This is complete bullshit. Have you ever had a baby?
Also resoundingly ignorant about abortion.