Seeking Surrogates in India

Growing and giving away children is becoming a "respectable" business in some places, it seems. Could this perhaps be called "exploitation," or is it merely another legitimate free-enterprise way of making money and escaping poverty? Are Western couples preying on poor Indian women, or are they giving them a way out of their misery? As with many questions, it all depends who you ask.

Sarah J. Flashing, MA, says it very well in her new essay at the Center for Bioethics and Human Dignity:

"The problem with commercial surrogacy...is that at its very foundation it rejects human dignity, the inherent aspect of what it means to be human, having been made in the image of God. ...Her dignity is violated by exploiting her financial vulnerabilities. Her dignity is violated by viewing her womb as a piece of factory equipment that can be utilized over and over again for the production of a product, or fixed when it breaks down from continued use. Her body is not a piece of property that can be monopolized for nine months by a child she may grow to love but cannot be held. She is a human being created in the image of God, and to treat her as such would mean to be generous to her without consideration of her procreative capacity, not to use this capacity as a means for her survival."

"We the infertile people"

Yesterday I received a comment on this blog, where a woman demanded that I cease speaking out against reproductive technologies because, until I have walked a mile in her (infertile) shoes, I can't possibly imagine the hell of infertility, and therefore I can't appreciate how any and all means of getting out of that hell - including repro tech - are clearly acceptable.

She assumed that if I am speaking out against repro tech, then my knowledge of infertility and repro tech must be purely academic. And if my knowledge is purely academic, then I have no right to express my opinion, which is so offensive to those who have actually walked the "road of hot coals".

I thought about this comment for some time. In the past, I have not made personal comments on this blog about myself, and part of me did not want to get into that. I disagree with the view that a person is not entitled to speak about something just because he or she has not experienced it himself. That kind of mindset would lock us in narrow and separate worlds.

Nonetheless, I finally decided to clarify a bit about my own situation, because it just so happens that I do know for myself the pain of infertility. My husband and I have been trying to have children for many months now. We have watched other couples we know - friends, family, coworkers - have babies, and more babies, and more babies...while we are still coming home to our two pets.

No, it is not easy. In fact, it can be very difficult, and yes, I have cried a lot.

In our own case, I still have hope. We are now being seen by a fertility specialist, and we are undergoing tests to find out what the problem is (or are - if they can be found). It is stressful, embarassing, awful...every time I go into that clinic I completely tense up and hate every minute of it, and yet it is our hope.

However, my views on repro tech remain the same. If in vitro or other repro technologies turn out to be our only hope, then we won't do it. We will try to adopt. That can, of course, be long and difficult and expensive too. Well, we may try to be foster parents too, I am open to that.

And whatever else happens...we trust in God and what he has planned for us. I do believe that things happen for a reason, and that everything, even pain and suffering, can be made to work for the good. My husband has been incredibly supportive through it all, he is truly a solid and great man.

It is certain that infertility is a great suffering. Sometimes I feel like a social outcast because I struggle with having children. Sometimes I feel like a leper...and I wonder, if it is my fault, am I ruining my husband's life, do I even deserve to be with him? What will my mother in law, who is eager for more grandchildren, think of me if she finds out that it is me? I just want to hole up and hide.

On the other hand, it is good to put things into perspective. I am currently reading a book about Africa by a Polish journalist who lived there for 40 years. He describes the terrible poverty, the wars, the famine, the dire living conditions. Those still exist today. People struggle with so many things in the world. In the West, people's suffering is mostly hidden within big houses, behind smiling faces, and we do not see it. Everyone seems happy, and we feel like the only ones who aren't. But the fact is, suffering is a fact of life.

In my opinion, the best way to deal with suffering is to take a step back and to realize that our suffering is NOT worse than a lot of other people's. People all over the world are terminally ill, they are dying, they are divorcing, they are losing their loved ones, they are losing their homes, their countries, they are hungry, they are persecuted, they are in war-torn countries fearing for their lives...in fact, in comparison with most of the world, WE are the lucky ones, in many other ways.

I still believe that the answer to the pain of infertility is NOT to transfer the suffering onto the children who are created - that is NOT our right, even as "infertile people".

Bone marrow can become sperm

A few days ago I wrote about how the British government wants to take out the reference, in their laws, to children needing a father. My question was, are men passé?

Well, it turns out that again in Britain, scientists have discovered how to turn women's bone marrow into sperm cells!

This is no longer mere science fiction. Men and women appear to be losing any need for each other. We have already lost a need for each other in almost every way in normal life, and now, we are losing a need for each other in the most elemental aspect of all, human reproduction.

I view this is a very sad development indeed. Not just for the sake of men, but especially for the sake of the children who will not have fathers - due to parenting by lesbian couples or single women, or, perhaps one day, due to the fact that even their own genes come only from two women.

Mommy 1, Mommy 2 and Daddy

A team of doctors have created a human embryo with three biological parents. They planted the nucleus of an embryo (formed in the usual way with egg and sperm) into another egg whose nucleus had been removed. The embryo began to grow as normal.

This of course leads to the disturbing question: do we want to create people with three genetic parents? What are we doing to our children? And does anyone even care about the impact on children, since the overriding concern in all these technologies seems to focus on the desires and "needs" of the adults?

A rather disquieting tangent along these lines is the door that such an experiment opens to polygamy. If children have three "natural" parents, then why can't these parents all get married and live in the home, and share in the raising of their child? Any other arrangement is arguably unfair to the child, who is forced to choose between parents and see less of one than the two others.

It is also interesting that for this experiment, the scientists used the "defective" embryos left over from IVF. And with this little "transplant," the embryos got a second wind and started developing as normal. Thus, there may now be a way to "save" some of those embryos that were previously written off as too damaged to use in IVF.

Britain - blazing the way to the new dark ages

How lovely, the National Health Service in the U.K. is debating whether to use taxpayer money to cover the cost of renting surrogate wombs. Couples or individuals - whether heterosexual or homosexual (or, presumably, "other") - would be able to get their babies from rent-a-wombs free of charge, with taxpayers footing the bill.

I am constantly amazed at the repro tech stuff that is coming out of the U.K. these days. It's a train out of control. Can it get any more crazy, any more appalling, any more disturbed and disturbing?

WIth the government picking up the tab, the surrogate business is liable to increase to a veritable "cottage industry". Some women could even begin to specialize in being live baby incubators. It could become a whole new career field, perhaps even supported by courses in local community colleges.

Perhaps women like Jill Hawkins are visionaries and pioneers of the future after all. The question is, what kind of future are they harbingering? Jill Hawkins, on antidepressants as she plans the surrender of her eighth baby...the pioneer of a future:

• where children belong to no one by nature and anyone by law;
• where children have no right to their biological parents, siblings, relatives, families or cultures;
• where adults have the right to give life or inflict death and to "assign" babies to whomever they choose;
• where adults commission the manufacturing of their children based on preferences and specifications, and can seek damages where these specifications are not followed or the child is an "inferior" product;
• where even adults are used and exploited for their sperm, eggs, and wombs, especially adults that are young and not fully informed or cognizant of the consequances, financially or emotionally needy, or who live in developing countries;
• where being an adult means having might - and might makes right, and contains all rights - and where being a child, especially unborn - means having no rights at all...

A grand old future. Britain is blazing the way of progress and enlightenment, that much is sure.

Baby manufacturing defect II

Last September, the media reported that a lesbian couple is suing their doctor for transferring two embryos rather than one. They want $400k for their damages in having to raise two girls rather than just one.

The doc is defending himself by saying that although the transfer of two embryos was a bona fide mistake, the rate of "embryo splitting" is also high in IVF and the embryo could have split on its own even if only one was transferred; hence, the doc alleges that he owed the mothers no duty of producing only one child.

It's not clear who will win that one. In the immediate dispute I would lean towards the plaintiffs. Yes, the doc owed them no duty of final outcome - however, he did have the responsibility of carrying out his end of the bargain without error. He did err, and raised their chances of a twin outcome from a certain lower percentage to a higher percentage.

Notice the lesbians did, according to the story, briefly consider giving one of the girls up for adoption. But they chose not to - and yet, they still want damages. How could they still believe they are entitled to receive funding for raising and educating the second girl, if they were not forced to keep her?

They might claim that they simply could not bear to part with their own genetic child. The irony of their situation is that since they are lesbians, the girls are evidently the product of a sperm donor. As such, the lesbians can't possibly believe that biological parents matter so much to a child - or even to the parents of the child. After all, they already intentionally separated the girls from at least one of their biological parents.

Since they had the option of placing one of the girls up for adoption, the court should point out that it is simply unreasonable for them to receive funding for raising and educating the second girl.

The broader point, however, is that we are witnessing the birth of a society where parents sue because their children didn't come out as ordered. In other words, parents are now the disgruntled customers, and their children are the products.

Rather than being happy with whatever they get, parents are now demanding that their children conform to certain specifications. Back in the days of natural reproduction, parents would never have dreamed of suing each other (or God) because they got twins instead of a single baby. Each baby was a gift, even if it was a challenge.

Now, parents demand specific numbers of a specific kind of child, and they expect to have their cake and eat it too: "Two boys without the deafness gene, one girl without the cancer gene, and no down's syndrome or other disabilities, please."

If anything goes wrong, parents don't just accept it anymore as the gift of a nature that knows better than our own human limitations. They rage against the clinic for wasting their time and hurting their emotions, and leaving them with a deficient product that requires their time and money - certainly a cause for "damages."

It is a shame that while the parents may believe they have sustained "damages" due to the errors of the clinic, their attitude will likely lead to even deeper "damages" to their own children, who will inevitably perceive that they are a burden rather than a blessing to their own parents, and who will perceive that rather than being treated as beautiful and invaluable no matter what their attributes, their parents value and love them only conditionally.

Parents sue over baby manufacturing defect

Imagine if one day, your parents told you that if they had known that you'd be born with a certain defect that you have, then they would rather have never conceived you at all. They would have adopted or just not had children.

And it's not because your defect has made you a serial killer or because you are a psychopath, dangerous or evil to society or to themselves. It's only because they didn't want to be burdened with the medical expenses that your defect brings, and possibly also because they think your life may become too full of suffering (for you - or for them?) and you may die young - and, it seems, they would only have wanted a child that lives to old age.

And how would you feel, additionally, if the same defect for which they would have rejected you and ended your life in a Petri dish, is the same defect that your mother actually has, and which she has lived with for many years even as she married and had children (like you)?

This is what an Australian couple is alleging, in a lawsuit where they are suing their IVF clinic for implanting them with the wrong embryo. The embryo happened to have the cancer gene that the parents commissioned to be screened out. The clinic had created 8 embryos. 6 were killed on the spot, while two were implanted. Only one made it through to birth. But oops - three months after the baby's birth, the parents found out that their son had the cancer gene after all!

So of course, like proper dissatisfied shoppers, they stormed Customer Service and sued. They want money for emotional trauma and they want money for the medical expenses of raising their new son, whom they allege they would never have had if the doctors hadn't assured them that he would be free of the cancer gene.

Away with the old; in with the new. In the days of yore, parents used to love and be thankful for any child that was born to them. They did not have demands of a clean bill of health or anything else for that child. A child was God's gift, a free and great miracle. Parents believed that each child had its own value, and that if their child had a disability then it was still equally valuable and had something to teach them about love.

Today, some parents are no longer content with receiving the flawed and damaged gifts of nature. Parents now pre-select their children in the lab dish. They will no longer accept just any child; they want the most perfect child that they can get. When their "order" gets messed up and is filled incorrectly, and another child is born as a result, they have "emotional trauma". The child has created great and grievous "damages"solely by being born less perfect than its parents demanded. Parents are enraged at being "stuck" with an inferior product that they did not order. They are appalled that now, they are supposed to pour their love and attention, their finances and their time, onto this inferior product that was never supposed to exist. What a travesty of justice! Someone certainly has to pay the price.

But regardless of how much the clinic pays, someone else will pay the most. That is the child itself. The boy, once he realizes how conditional the love of his parents is, will pay the most. The parents may think that the cancer gene will ruin their child's life. In fact, it is their own inability to unconditionally love their child and rejoice at his birth that could very well damage him psychologically beyond anything else.