They may not care as little children, but eventually they will

February 10, 2007

They may not care as little children, but eventually they will

This is a part of what Damian Adams wrote on his own blog on January 14, 2007:

The point is that as a juvenile you are too busy being a child to be concerned with identity issues and family relations. These don't surface until teenage years and in some instances not until adulthood. For me personally it did not change until I was 28 and had children of my own. Until that time I was a supporter of donor anonymity and also reasonably proud of myorigins. Now it is completely the opposite. Through my own childrens eyes I have been able to recognise the unbreakable bond that flesh and blood gives us. No matter what may ever happen between my wife and myself, or whatever mayhappen to me, I will always be my children's father. Nothing can ever change that. As soon as I thought about how it would break my heart that my children might ever grow up not knowing who I am, was I able to relate that to my own situation of being donor conceived. I was able to fully understand how the severance of my biological connection with my father had deprived me of family relations, it has left me with only knowing half of who I am, and has given me a different family name than the one I otherwise should have. It has also deprived me of a family heritage and family health history. I cannot answer health surveys or questions from doctors acurrately which can adversely affect my health. I was also unable to answer all of the questions in our recent national census.

Of course, prospective DI parents will probably not be deterred. The human mind has an amazing ability to ignore evidence to the contrary of what it wants to believe. They want to believe that they're not doing anything wrong and that their children will be just fine because biology doesn't matter after all (except when it does - to them). So they're able to rationalize their way out of the most obvious slap-in-the-face truth. Which is why we need the STATE to disallow this kind of behavior. Not just anonymous donation, but gamete donation in general, should be made illegal. It is wrong because it robs children of half of their biological heritage, and that is utterly selfish and incredibly immoral. It needs to be ILLEGAL, because relying on the good will of those who are desparately trying to have children is very likely to be insufficient.

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Stop the Baby Trade

Yes, it is a baby trade, like the slave trade of old. Babies have become consumer products, accessories to our lifestyles. They are like pets, those cute and cuddly babies. And like pets, they can be made to your liking. Just buy the sperm at your nearest sperm bank, purchase an egg from your local egg dealer, and rent a surrogate womb. And in 9 months, bring home a baby without a pregnancy, without even a dent in your schedule!

There is supply and there is demand. Babies are disposable: their value and worth depend on being "wanted". As embryos they can receive a life or death sentence based on a screening of their genetic traits. They can be frozen indefinitely, donated for research or simply killed. In the womb they can be "selectively reduced". They belong to whomever they were "intended" for.

Apparently, adults have a "right" to a baby. And before they are born, babies have no rights at all. They can be bought and sold, or traded from person to person.

Even after they are born, some of their natural rights are not recognized or respected. They had better not complain about not having their "natural" or biological parents. If they mind, they are ungrateful. After all, we cuddle them and spoil them and shower them with love - just like our pets.

Well, it's time to stop the baby trade. Infertility is tragic. So is being panhandled by your own genetic parents and being raised by biological strangers. So is being created in a laboratory only to be frozen as "surplus" or screened out and left to die because you are "unwanted".

Children have not consented to these things. Their own parents, their supposed protectors, have allowed these things to happen to them. Adults have selfishly allowed their reproductive urges to trample on the fundamental rights and needs of their own children. But now, as many of these children come of age and we hear their cries of pain, it is time to admit that what reproductive technologies have given to parents, they have also taken away from children.

Sometimes doing the right thing requires a lot of sacrifice. This is one of those times. We need to set aside our adult desires in order to protect children's rights. Let's see babies as human beings who are our equals. Let’s admit that we have no right to harm others to get what we want. Let’s stand up for those who don’t have a signature line on the consent forms, yet who will be forever affected by the decisions taken.

We will find that by protecting the weakest, we are also protecting ourselves. The rights of children are tied to the rights of adults. Children have a right to their own parents; and those parents also have a natural right to know and to educate their own biological children. These natural rights cannot be eliminated, only violated.

Let’s stand up for the natural human rights of children: their right to life from the moment of conception, their right to be carried in the womb of their own biological mother, and their right to know and be raised by their own biological parents.