Opinions on surrogacy?

Golden_Lavender · 2021-04-27T02:51:55+00:00

Some people might disagree but surrogacy is to me extremely misogynistic. The concept of throwing some random sperm into a woman for her to make a custom baby is so odd to me. Noone is entitled to have children and poor women are not rent a wombs. Adopt or foster if a child is that serious to you but pregnancy has serious health implications to both a woman and child. There is nothing more fragile than a pregnant woman and a newborn baby. I also think its messed up to just just snatch a baby away from a mother even if you "bought" it .

The_Pyramidion · 2021-04-27T05:50:37+00:00

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MadSeaPhoenix · 2021-04-27T03:16:42+00:00

Watch the documentary Google Baby (YouTube).

That was all I needed to be against it entirely. Men ruin everything.

UnpeacefulLily · 2021-04-27T09:47:22+00:00

Surrogacy is very exploitative of women. I've had a man who claims to be a feminist say that when he gets married, he would rather have kids via surrogacy because pregnancy is rough and he wouldn't want to lose his wife.

It boggles my mind because I told him surrogacy is very exploitative. It's basically a rich person renting a woman's body for 9 months. But guess what, the effects of pregnancy continue past those 9 months.

The woman in question could suffer mentally afterwards. Have complications from the birth that make it hard to recover. For example, her abdominal muscles may shift ( diastasis recti), her pelvic floor muscles could become weaker, she may never be able to hold in pee properly, there is a risk for prolapsed uterus and so many more conditions.

So no, surrogacy is exploitation. If you want a child so bad, go ahead and adopt.

JasmineAndCloves · 2021-04-27T11:29:00+00:00

I’m a nurse. I‘ve cared for surrogates. I want to leave this story here as food for thought.

I once had a patient who was a surrogate. She was pregnant with twins. The babies were conceived using both donor eggs and sperm from the biological parents. At around 27 weeks, her water broke. For those who may not be aware, this is a high risk complication called “premature rupture of membranes.”

If the pregnancy is considered viable (i.e., far enough along that the baby has a reasonable chance of survival should a pre-term delivery become necessary), a patient experiencing PROM will be admitted to the hospital. PROM can lead to a number of other complications including infection, the umbilical cord prolapsing, malpresentation (think: baby’s foot falls out into the vaginal vault or something along those lines), etc. ... and, of course, fetal death.

We admitted the surrogate and explained that she would have to remain inpatient until the babies had to be delivered, with the ultimate goal of keeping her pregnant until at least 34 weeks. She was going to require IV antibiotics, modified bed rest and frequent fetal monitoring.

She said no. She had three small children of her own at home and she wasn’t prepared to abandon them. The nurses and doctors had no clue how to proceed because it was such an unusual situation. We had to involve hospital administration.

It was explained that she could potentially be charged with any number of things including willful endangerment and even kidnapping because the babies she was carrying were legally considered the genetic property of the bio parents. She had to stay.

Staying was absolutely the right decision because both she and the babies were at extreme risk. My main point is that surrogacy is a huge gamble for everyone involved. Not least of all, the surrogate, who not only has put her own life on the line but has sacrificed her own bodily autonomy as she has essentially been reduced to a human incubator.

thinktwiceorelse · 2021-04-27T05:14:31+00:00

It's not legal in many countries, including mine, so it speaks for itself.

dance-in-the-ashes · 2021-04-27T05:18:48+00:00

It’s definitely problematic. Like so many things, money is everything and the harms disproportionately fall on poor and working class, and POC women.

One of the books on my to read list is Being and Being Bought: Prostitution, Surrogacy, and the Split Self by Kajsa Ekis Ekman. I want to read her views on prostitution but I’m also curious about how she interrogates the harms of surrogacy.

UnstrirringCoffee · 2021-04-27T07:08:02+00:00

My views on surrogacy is that's it's prostitution on steroids. It puts the women who have to undergo the surrogacy at such a high risk of death and complications and it colonizes their bodies for 9 months and sometimes more.

It is abhorrent and another form of modern slavery.

RecordingImportant94 · 2021-04-27T10:19:59+00:00

Having a child is not a right, it is a privilege. Surrogacy is a topic I feel very strongly about.

While I understand the anguish women must feel if they cannot have a child of their own when they desperately want one, that does not mean that renting another woman’s body is an acceptable solution. There was a story recently of an American surrogate, Michelle Reaves dying during childbirth, leaving her own children motherless. I don’t know if she was paid, no articles I can find detail whether it was “altruistic” or commercial. But how much money is a woman’s life worth? With pregnancy you take the risk of death, asking another woman to do that for you is abhorrent. Surrogate pregnancies are riskier than carrying your own child, and plenty of women die giving birth to their own children, but it’s brushed over as something that only happened before modern medicine.

Until fairly recently it was a thing for westerners to be able to pay poor women in India to be surrogates. Julie Bindel did an article for The Guardian on the subject which gives an insight into how corrupt the industry is, and how awfully exploitative it is. Not only do these people want to rent a woman’s reproductive capabilities, but they want it for as little money as possible.

I also question the ethics of essentially buying a baby. What’s to stop a peadophile sourcing an egg donor and a surrogate and creating their own victim? A baby is a person, and a person should never ever be able to be bought, just as our bodies should not be able to be “rented” for sex or reproduction.

Wealthy women do not choose to be surrogates, it is overwhelming women from lower socioeconomic backgrounds who desperately need money who become surrogates. Choices are not made in a vacuum, and when money is involved there is sure to be exploitation, especially when the payment for surrogacy in America would seem a life changing amount for a economically disadvantaged woman, but is less than the cost of a luxury car the “clients” would buy. Much like prostitution, if there were better options for these women the practice of surrogacy would almost die out. While there are women who act as surrogates altruistically, this is simply due to the pervasive socialisation of women from childhood onwards to be selfless, kind, giving - to the point women should risk their lives to give someone else a child they want but do not need. It’s brainwashing in my opinion.

Jingoboi · 2021-04-27T13:45:14+00:00

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myousername · 2021-04-27T02:36:20+00:00

I agree, I think surrogacy is immoral for the reasons stated in that paragraph. If you want kids but can't give birth, you can adopt.

PinkBlair99 · 2021-04-27T02:55:24+00:00

I agree. But you definitely can’t say this in public.

TrixieFriganza · 2021-04-27T08:03:43+00:00

I agree with you so much. I have usually been okay with a woman with a good economy and who doesn't make money from it doing it, where it's clear she's doing it to help. I really dislike how people (usually these rich people who buy babies) try to excus e that the women from the poorer countries do it just to help too. That makes zero sence to me, why would women from more poor countries like Indian and Ukraine who have so much other things to worry about care of some rich person gets a baby or not. It's totally biting womens bodies and humans, extremely unethical and I look down att anyone who has surrogate children. I think most women in US so it for the money too because there are many women think in desperate need of money.

I think too the baby should always be the surrogates it she forms a Bond with it and chances her mind, even if the egg isn't hers, I'm quessing this opinion would probably get angry comments in other places, not many think about the poor surrogate and baby and the huge sacrifice and roll it takes on your mental health, which you can't always expect before. I have at least seen many be very angry how selfish the surrogate is when they have chanced their mind.

I have thought it was okay if the woman clearly does it to help or for a friend but I had not thought much about the baby. I think that you're probably right because I have heard many who adopt new born baby say that those babies come with trauma too because they're taken from the mother who has carried them. It's not like a baby suddenly becomes a human when it's born, I think the fetus becomes a sentient human being probably many months before it's born, lot of evidence att least says that it's a fully formed baby fairly early in pregnancy so we can't say it wont have any effect on the baby like possible feeling of confusion and trauma from being dragged from their birth mother. I dislike how little many people think about the baby until it's born and how the surrogacy might effect rest of their life, like with unexplained anxiety.

jeniiiiiblue · 2021-04-27T05:22:02+00:00

Well said 🙌🏾🙌🏾

seashellsupplier · 2021-04-27T07:59:49+00:00

I am so with you on this. There was a documentary on youtube I think, where the surrogate mothers were interviewed. It‘s an extremely traumatic process to go through, the children are their children, they care for them for 9 months! Not to mention, these poor women in countries like India are often forced to do it by NVM, wo refuse to work and say it‘s easy money for the woman. It was interesting seeing known patterns play out. The men would convince the woman to perform surrogacy and then critique her, for carrying another mans baby. I think there should be a blanket ban on surrogacy. Adoption is always an option, you have a right to want a child but no right to have one.

ScalesHaveFallen · 2021-04-27T03:07:42+00:00

I think it might be mentioned in the FDS handbook. Which is fair enough, it’s exploiting women.

fruitpunchsam · 2021-04-27T13:45:43+00:00

I'm also against it because it commercializes an extremely intimate and harrowing experience. Not only that, but it's often low-income women of color—sometimes in poor, formerly colonized countries—who do this work. This paper breaks down the intersectionality of it really well: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=http://racialcapitalism.ucdavis.edu/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Re-imagining_Reproduction_Unsettling_Met.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwiYu7v1xp7wAhW_FlkFHWKsC0QQFjADegQICRAC&usg=AOvVaw2nT6yllqTJxHiBeNUTGeay

ShitFaced_Dumbledore · 2021-04-27T22:18:52+00:00

I used to work for a Surrogacy agency and I’m super ashamed of it!

I was there for a few months and I can confirm that all of the agencies are incredibly predatory. They lure women in with the promise of a huge compensation 80-100k but if you break down the emotional and physical trauma your body goes through during and after pregnancy, it is not fucking worth it. On top of that the contracts surrogates actually end up signing are like 20-40k below what is advertised to them.

We were also told to target marketing for specific low income/ WOC demographics. The industry in the US should be banned. It is heavily unregulated anyone can start a surrogate agency, and claim to have “years of experience” helping “families”. It’s sickening.

idiosyncraticg1 · 2021-04-27T19:52:57+00:00

I absolutely cannot believe that surrogacy is legal. It literally is renting out a woman’s body. Some surrogacies pay around 60-100k for 9 months which might seem great, but people often forget about the effects of pregnancy on the body. The woman won’t be able to work right away, she most likely will have to have some sort of PT, gym membership, maybe even laser in the future. Her boobs will still be leaking milk for the next few months.

I truly don’t understand this.

mackenzie013 · 2021-04-27T05:21:33+00:00

It’s not legal in most countries outside of the US, I believe? I know there’s some countries where altruistic surrogacy is allowed.

Personally, I can’t relate to wanting to bring a human being into this world, so I heavily advocate for adoptions. I actually feel like wanting a bio-kid is selfish, so surrogacy is so far beyond that line for me.

radsera99 · 2021-04-28T15:37:54+00:00

Having children is not a human right and women’s bodies should not be available for consumption. Once you are able to buy a human being, they are no longer a human being.

Peak_Tree · 2021-04-28T16:14:40+00:00

To me is in the same camp as prostitution "just because you can pay to use someone else's body it doesn't mean you should or that is moral" .

Also about altruistic surrogacy I know the story of a woman whose cousin convinced her to give her her eggs and she did it...just to end up with orange sized ovarian cists and the cousin bailing on her and letting her to seek ( very expensive and painful) treatment on her own. You just can't convince me this doesn't happen when altruistic surrogacies go south.

Ana_jp · 2021-04-27T04:28:24+00:00

Egg donations too. The hormones that need to be pumped into a body to make that happen can’t be good. And as far as I’m aware, there have been no long term studies on the effects. Do they cause cancer? Who knows. Do they cause infertility down the road? Who knows!

apple_cores · 2021-04-27T10:13:38+00:00

What do you all think about women carrying a family member’s or friend’s child? I’ve read stories of grandmothers carrying their grand children and I think it’s so strange; I would never want my mother doing that.

One of my friend’s sisters can’t have kids so the plan is for my friend to carry the baby for her. If I’m honest, I think that can get messy. My friend has baby fever and I can only imagine that she will feel the loss of handing the child over to the parents (her sister and brother in law). Even if they are family members, there is a bond between whoever is carrying the child, even if it’s not their own dna. I think it’s going to get complicated with spending time with the baby and possibly decision making.

laffytaggy · 2021-04-27T02:59:42+00:00

I thought surrogacy means the “carrier” is not the bio mother, just her womb?

burritogirl101 · 2021-04-27T03:49:54+00:00

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shelballama · 2021-04-27T12:20:00+00:00

I would do it because thanks to student debt I'm under extreme financial distress, which points to other huge systemic problems in the US that targets the young/ women (I'd probably be able to have more financial security if I hadn't spent my time being very qualified yet underpaid/undervalued to men with no experience)

chunkycasper · 2021-04-27T21:22:57+00:00

I'm against, for the sheer reason that adoption exists. Every child who exists should be wanted and loved, and that includes those who for some reason or another have lost their parents. I don't understand why we, as a species, prefer to bring a new life into the world rather than protecting an existing one.

GrungeAudrey · 2021-04-29T20:30:32+00:00

In my country, selling blood, sperm and eggs as well as surrogacy is illegal based on the same arguments stated in this article.

Lately, a few of our male gay celebrities went to the US to buy eggs and hire surrogates. Most people questioned the decision considering they could have easily adopted instead. After all, egalitarian marriage and adoption have been legal here for years. Other people adressed the problematic objectifying and colorist/racist undertones present in the whole process.

(Interestingly, lesbian couples rarely resort to this. If they want bio kids they usually gestate themselves with the sperm of an actual a voluntary donor, usually a friend that they keep around as an uncle figure, or adopt).

Anyway, all these valid concerns were easily framed by several mass media as an hOmOpHoBic reaction.

Also, how is that reasoning not far from buying a baby altogether? It is the same, with extra steps.

Black market baby- selling rings are a thing, and are located in very poor isolated rural areas characterized by low levels in education and high teen pregnancy rates. (Even in first world nations, in areas considered "4th world") In an area like this, in my own country, there was one of these rings. Rich couples, foreign or local - would travel there to buy babies - in particular- white, blond babies (Many descendants of German inmigrants in that area).

Unfortunately there are people out there that see children as mere accesories and many people feel entitled to our bodies and reproductive labour, acting as if throwing some money in the interaction somehow magically makes it ethical.

BooksandEarlGreyTea · 2021-04-27T09:33:25+00:00

I am completely against surrogacy, both commercially and altruistically, as it is exploiting women and commodifying their bodies, while at the same time devaluing the entire process of pregnancy and giving birth (all the time, energy, money, health risks and long term effects of pregnancy). Plus it is human trafficking.

My concern is this will rise as human fertility rates drop, due to all the chemicals we are being exposed to and the degradation of sperm. A lot of the time, when a couple is struggling to get pregnant the 'blame' for the failing is put on and felt by the woman and I can see the lack of checking if scrotes sperm is working meaning more women turn to IVF and surrogacy to get the baby they desire.

I am very much in favour of a blanket ban on surrogacy for all reasons.

Commercial surrogacy targets women in financial difficulties and or abusive situations, where they feel pressured to make money and don't see much of a way out. Then the trauma of having the child you physically grew inside you for 9 months, take away must be heartbreaking. It really is prostitution on steroids.

Altruistically being a surrogate is also exploiting women's kind, supportive, empathetic and helping natures. Pregnancy carries a risk of death and it feels manipulative to use another person's womb to grow a child and risk that. A child is not a right and whilst it must be heart-wrenching to experience fertility issues and infertility, adoption or fostering are alternatives.

Title	Opinions on surrogacy?
Author	Jingoboi
Upvotes	192
Comments	82
Date	April 26, 2021 9:17 PM UTC (5 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/FemaleDatingStrategy
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/FemaleDatingStrategy/comments/mz8ab2/opinions_on_surrogacy/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/FemaleDatingStrategy/opinions-on-surrogacy.760910 https://theredarchive.com/post/760910

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