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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Babies with no biological mother - breakthrough for male same-sex couples, or further erasure of women?

85 replies

usernamealreadytaken · 01/10/2025 10:34

I just read what I think is a very scary article regarding the process of mitomeiosis, where skin cells can be used to create an "egg" which can be fertilised by sperm. The skin can come from a man or woman, which enables the person to have a genetic relationship to a baby, where they have no egg. I can totally see the benefits for women who have no eggs, or are infertile due to medical issues such as cancer treatment, but am I the only one who fears this is just another way for male same-sex couples to have children, and the only need for a woman in the process will be to carry the pregnancy?
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/09/30/babies-could-be-born-without-mothers/#:~:text=Babies%20could%20be%20born%20without%20a%20biological%20mother%20after%20scientists,sex%20cell%20ready%20for%20fertilisation.

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https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/09/30/babies-could-be-born-without-mothers#:~:text=Babies%20could%20be%20born%20without%20a%20biological%20mother%20after%20scientists,sex%20cell%20ready%20for%20fertilisation.

OP posts:
MrsSkylerWhite · 01/10/2025 10:35

There’s a thread about this.
Personally, my feeling is just because we can do something, doesn’t mean we should.

Jk987 · 01/10/2025 10:35

Good Lord 😩
babies need mummies!

JamieCannister · 01/10/2025 10:36

I had to turn off the radio before it had properly started... in what way is creating human beings without a mother "progress"? Surely scientific progress would be the reverse... finding a way of giving babies whose mother died in childbirth a real, biological mother?

TempestTost · 01/10/2025 10:37

I don't see this as erasure of women any more than the ability to make a baby from two eggs was the erasure of men.

To me this comes down to what it means for the child. So I would say it does mean the erasure of mothers and fathers, which is a bad thing imo. Some may disagree.

But it is also experimenting in the most invasive possible way on children which is not at all ethical.

PumpkinSeasonOctober · 01/10/2025 10:38

It’s barbaric to mess with creating human life like this.

usernamealreadytaken · 01/10/2025 10:47

MrsSkylerWhite · 01/10/2025 10:35

There’s a thread about this.
Personally, my feeling is just because we can do something, doesn’t mean we should.

Sorry, I did look and didn't see one already. Do I need to get this one deleted as a duplicate?

OP posts:
usernamealreadytaken · 01/10/2025 10:49

TempestTost · 01/10/2025 10:37

I don't see this as erasure of women any more than the ability to make a baby from two eggs was the erasure of men.

To me this comes down to what it means for the child. So I would say it does mean the erasure of mothers and fathers, which is a bad thing imo. Some may disagree.

But it is also experimenting in the most invasive possible way on children which is not at all ethical.

I did have a quick Google but can't find anything about that - I thought the sperm was essential which was why they created an egg. Not seen anything about creating a "sperm".

OP posts:
Daleksatemyshed · 01/10/2025 10:49

I agree wholeheartedly with @MrsSkylerWhite , just because somethings possible doesn't mean we should do it

MrsSkylerWhite · 01/10/2025 10:49

usernamealreadytaken · 01/10/2025 10:47

Sorry, I did look and didn't see one already. Do I need to get this one deleted as a duplicate?

No don’t think so? Pointed it out just because you may be interested in opinions there.

usernamealreadytaken · 01/10/2025 10:51

MrsSkylerWhite · 01/10/2025 10:49

No don’t think so? Pointed it out just because you may be interested in opinions there.

Do you have a link, or what to search for? Just tried and couldn't see anything. TY.

OP posts:
RNApolymerase · 01/10/2025 10:53

Here's the BBC article on it from yesterday. It is not even close to being a workable process - because they have to artificially reduce the number of chromosomes in the skin cell from 46 to 23 before it can be fertilised by the sperm. Trouble is, those are just reducing randomly - any 23 are being removed, rather than one of each pair.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4g2vyee0zlo

A clear petri dish stands is illuminated from below through an aperture in a black platform. There are blobs of fluid in the petri dish and two needle-like implements are there to perform microscopic manipulation of embryos

Human skin DNA fertilised to make embryo for first time

US scientists testing the technique say it could help people overcome infertility and potentially allow same-sex couples to have a genetically related child.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4g2vyee0zlo

Tallisker · 01/10/2025 11:14

Where’s the foetus gonna gestate, in a box?

Northquit · 01/10/2025 12:06

Jk987 · 01/10/2025 10:35

Good Lord 😩
babies need mummies!

They currently need a womb.
Unless they've got jars in the lab too.

userwhat632 · 01/10/2025 20:31

Northquit · 01/10/2025 12:06

They currently need a womb.
Unless they've got jars in the lab too.

Not just a womb. An actual mother. To grow up with.

Uggbootsforever · 01/10/2025 20:37

As soon as they’ve mass produced the first sex robot, alongside this, we’re finished.

I’m only half joking.

Instructions · 01/10/2025 20:57

Still going to need wombs to grow these 'motherless' babies in aren't they?

And even when they have created viable false wombs it will remain a tiny minority of people who would prefer this route over normal human reproduction

I don't think it should be happening but I don't feel particularly threatened by it. More disgusted.

RedToothBrush · 02/10/2025 00:26

Still need an egg and a womb.

Just like surrogacy. We also don't yet know the risks of this... Short term or long.

How many eggs do you have to go through to get one embryo?

How many women get put at risk to still bring a baby into the world in this process?

All because some rich people want a vanity trophy.

It's not going to be available to anyone who isn't affluent...

Zippedydodah · 02/10/2025 06:51

It’s like some sick, Frankenstein experiment, grotesque and depressing.
Should children result from this in some dystopian future then god knows how screwed up the world will be.

Uggbootsforever · 02/10/2025 09:07

It actually angers me that they’ve somehow managed to create embryos from skin cells presumably for the purposes of men further expunging all our roles bar sex and cleaning from history, but they can’t cure cancer or diabetes or infertility.

Wetoldyousaurus · 02/10/2025 09:44

The Taliban are going to be all over this. When they switch the internet back on…

BadgernTheGarden · 02/10/2025 09:51

An egg's an egg, if it was created from a man I expect it would be close to his mother's DNA. I don't know how close to actually being done this is, it may have some good uses. A woman with no eggs may be able to use her own skin to make eggs or if she has genetic problems use her mother or father's skin. Why does everyone assume the worst?

FlirtsWithRhinos · 02/10/2025 10:05

This method still required a female cell and would were it to proceed to gestation require a female mother.

As far as I can see, kicking a cell bundle off growing in vitro in ways other than the traditional egg meets sperm is the (relatively) easy part. The hard thing that we are nowhere near able to do yet is gestate a foetus outside the womb. Even with experiments that have sort-of approached a small degree of that like the male rat, behind the headlines there was a female rat frankensteined on to him delivering all the complex chemical signals that made the womb functional and the pregnancy viable.

All that said, theoretically I don't have an issue if we eventually find a way to reproduce that doesn't involve a woman undergoing pregnancy.

The problem is that humans have so far have a pretty poor track record at synthetically reproducing nature. We simplify it then realise all the stuff we thought wasn't needed was the stuff that made it work properly. UPF for example, or indeed gender reassignment treatments like cross sex hormones or surgery.

We split natural creatures or processes up into boxes to make it easier to reason about them but we forget the boxes aren't real, they are arbitrary divisions of a complete and interdependent system.

So sadly I suspect if we ever did grow babies outside the womb, it would look successful at first but over their lives those people would have higher than average incidents of something because the significance of whatever would have controlled that risk in the womb hadn't been appreciated and so hadn't been incorporated in the technology.

ShrankLastWinter · 02/10/2025 13:29

Possibly no genetic mother. But certainly a 'biological' one, since a woman would gestate the foetus and give birth to it. Women aren't incubators; they are mothers.

These people are all 'but kinship is based on care, not genetics!' right until they're 'ok, a woman is the only person who has so far had any relationship to this child but she is not related to it and definitely is not the mother even though she gave birth to it'. And they're 'mothers are birthing parents!' until they switch to 'birthing does not make you a parent'.

AgentPidge · 02/10/2025 13:31

Daleksatemyshed · 01/10/2025 10:49

I agree wholeheartedly with @MrsSkylerWhite , just because somethings possible doesn't mean we should do it

Yep. Me too.