Why Surrogacy Is Wrong

I read an article that was published on The Hasting Center Journal, called “The Case Against Surrogate Parenting”, by Herbert Krimmel, Krimmel takes a stand against surrogate motherhood arrangements because of the many ethical issues it causes, he argues surrogate motherhood, is a financial profit, there can be conflicts during the process, and is designed to separate in the mind of the surrogate mother. First, Krimmel argues that the reason a woman often or always undertakes the pregnancy is because of the money motive. He states, “The cause of this dissociation is some other benefit she will receive, most often money.' In other words, her desire to create a child is born of some motive other than the desire to be a parent. This separation

Baby Business by Insight on SBS had a discussion about surrogacy in relation to a couple that had a baby though surrogacy. In the show it was said that most surrogate mothers have genetically babies, which the mother gives her egg and the father gives his sperm and the doctor inseminates it in the surrogate mother. Most of the everyday people have to the term “renting a womb” towards surrogacy whereas the Women Health Resources

When one or more persons contract with a woman to gestate a child than relinquish that child after birth to the person or couple is known as surrogacy. It is a course of action that goes outside of natural reproduction. For some, it is the only method of having children, extending family. Surrogacy has been stirring up many controversies over the years. Ethics, morals, laws, religious views, etc. have played a major role in the issues that follow the topic of surrogacy. Laws and regulations pertaining to surrogacy vary from state to state. Some states have no enforceable laws

Australian law reforms have been adequately effective in dealing with surrogacy and birthing technologies. The NSW state reforms have effectively supported the changing values of society by aiming to achieve justice and avoid conflicts surrounding surrogacy, while the commonwealth is obsolete on effective laws to prevent surrogacy issues. As the demand for surrogacy and birthing technologies increases, issues surrounding surrogacy are more prevalent in society. Additionally, there is no Commonwealth law, meaning each state and territory has developed individual laws of surrogacy and birthing technologies, allowing for issues and challenges surrounding the protection and the rights of all parties involved.

Commercial surrogacy is the process in which a woman is paid a fee to carry and deliver a baby to term. Once the baby is delivered, the woman relinquishes all parental rights to the commissioning couple who exclusively raise the child as their own. Altruistic surrogacy, by contrast, is an arrangement where the surrogate receives reimbursement but only for the expenses that she may have incurred during the pregnancy. In this essay I will argue that commercial surrogacy should not be market-inalienable. I will start by outlining Elizabeth Anderson’s argument in “Is Women’s Labor a Commodity?” in which she offers a number of criticisms to commercial surrogacy. I will then outline objections to the argument and highlight how her argument is highly speculative and does not provide an adequate basis for the prohibition of commercial surrogacy.

Non-legal responses include surrogacy Australia, which advocates for surrogacy as an effective means for infertile parents. By supporting surrogacy it helps to make it a positive way of becoming parents, which creates debate about it which eventually helps to create a law reform which will benefit people.

Law reform is considered proactive with relation to surrogacy and birth technologies, as methods of conception must be permitted before they are conducted. Surrogacy, which occurs when one woman agrees to fall pregnant and bear a child for a couple, is illegal in NSW when the woman is paid a fee or award, under the Assisted Reproductive Technology Act 2007 (NSW). Hence, surrogacy must be altruistic. Furthermore, the Surrogacy Act 2010 (NSW) now criminalises an international journey for commercial surrogacy.

This makes for a major divide in what should be done in the case of women having an abortion. In Paula Abram’s The Bad Mother: Stigma, Abortions, and Surrogacy, she talks about how stigma is placed on both surrogacy and abortion because conservatives view them both as unnatural ways of maternity. What people on this side of the argument fail to understand is that women seek a surrogate when they are physically incapable of carrying a child, but want to start a family. Stigma is tied heavily into surrogacy, because not only are women seeking this service, but gay and trans people seek to start families, and use surrogacy to do so. Stigma is also placed here because others believe that surrogacy disrupts the traditional expectations regarding pregnancy. But because of recent laws that allowed gay couples the right to marry, this opened up the opportunity for gay and trans couples to start families. This is not to say that gay and trans couples weren’t already starting families through surrogacy and adoption, but the right to marry allows them the opportunity to make for a more traditional process of marriage and family. Surrogacy has allowed married couples, unmarried couples, and even singles to raise children and families, which may seem untraditional to some, but a way of life for others.

Laws are legislated and enforced for the mere purpose of protecting all individuals in a society by stating what is and what is not acceptable behavior. Though it is impossible for these legislative decisions to please every single individual in a society, these governs are passed in morality of the thousands of elected parties in charge. Commercial surrogacy is a current complex issue that evokes strong moralistic response. Commercial surrogacy takes away the childbearing element in the reproductive period for individuals looking to have or extend a family. It has opened the doors for many who cannot bear children of their own though this behavior has also raised many concerns about the appropriate scope of the market. This “method for acquiring children” is more commonly objected because the children and women’s reproductive ability are being treated as a commodity. Summed up through Elizabeth S. Anderson’s article, “Is Women’s Labor a Commodity?” children are buyer durables and women are baby factories (Anderson 82). Anderson communicates commercial surrogacy children as commodities stating how this “market” that these children are born into expresses attitude that endorses market norms as opposed to ‘norms of parental love”(Anderson 76). Anderson focuses her paper towards the manipulation, alienation, and exploitation of women that commodifies women’s reproductive capacities. Through Anderson’s argument and her perceptive relations of this market to alienation,

One of the ethical issues that people have about in vitro fertilization is that people will opt for in vitro fertilization to try and solve infertility. Previously in the past adoption was the solution for this problem. Due to the creation of the in vitro fertilization method most people believe others would prefer to try conceiving their own child versus adopting one. If true, then adoption rates will decline, leading to more children in foster care and group homes. Not only do people have ethical issues concerning in vitro fertilization, they also have moral issues as well.

In today’s society, surrogacy is becoming a more and more popular and common issue. For many couples who cannot or unwilling to carry babies by themselves, surrogacy is the first choice to have their own babies and build a family. The legality of surrogacy is different for every country. There are countries that consider the birth mother as the legal mother while there are those that don't. Besides, a lower price of surrogacy in developing countries drives them to find surrogate mother overseas. Thus, international

Some view altruistic surrogacy as a form of exploiting the surrogate. There is no monetary compensation to woman placing her health and well-being on the line for another’s benefit. However, it can also be held that the woman knowingly entered into the agreement with full disclosure of the risks and benefits to her health and body. Again, autonomy and justice are extremely prevalent ethical principles to explore when discussing the topic of surrogacy. Same-sex marriage has become a hot topic in the United States in the last few years. The idea of raising a family by homosexual

Reproduction plays an important role in the stages of life. Unfortunately, for some, infertility prevents this from happening. By definition, infertility is “a disease or condition that results in the abnormal functioning of the male of female reproductive system, which interferes with the ability of a man or woman to achieve a pregnancy or of a woman to carry pregnancy to live birth” (Gilbert, 2007). Those who suffer from infertility have the desire to bear children and raise a family. Assisted Reproductive Technologies (ART) such as In Vitro Fertilization (IVF) have made the desires of bearing children a reality. IVF is fertilization of an egg in a laboratory dish or test tube; specifically: fertilization by mixing sperm with eggs surgically removed from an ovary followed by uterine implantation of one or more of the resulting fertilized eggs. Preimplantation Genetic Diagnosis (PGD) is a procedure used prior to implantation to help identify genetic defects within embryos (Merriam-Webster Dictionary, n.d.). PGD is preceded by IVF. In 1998, a couple using IVF contacted the Centre for Medical Genetics to request to prescreen a selected embryo in the hopes of finding an identical human leukocyte antigen (HLA) donor sibling (Pennings, 2002). Since this request and procedure has taken place, more requests have been made to prescreen embryos. This has created attention among the media and public. In my opinion, PGD is unethical because an individual can discard unwanted

Procreation of life is the single most greatest phenomenon nature has bestowed upon women. However, not all couples are blessed to conceive due to various factors - social, physiological, etc. Surrogacy gives hope to these couples who long to have a child of their own. These couples take the help of the technological advances in the field of medicine today to see

Surrogate Motherhood is something that not many people actually support, even though it “is one of the many reproductive techniques that have enabled infertile couples to have children” (qtd. in Freedman). There are two types of surrogacy, traditional and gestational. The traditional type of surrogacy involves the surrogate mother being (AI) artificially inseminated with the sperm of the intended father or sperm from a donor when the sperm count is low. In either case the surrogate’s own egg will be used. Genetically the surrogate becomes the mother of the resulting child (Storey). Although there are two different types of surrogacy, a traditional surrogacy is rarely seen or done anymore. In gestational surrogacy, the surrogate mother has