Surrogacy vs Adoption

Published by

Clarissa

December 13, 2023

Readers point out that surrogacy and adoption have similarities, and it’s true that in both cases babies are separated from their mothers. Of course, the crucial moral difference is that adoption is the response to a tragic set of circumstances, whereas surrogacy is the deliberate design of tragic circumstances. It is the difference between selflessness after the fact and premeditated selfishness.
https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/surrogacy-vs-adoption/

Exactly. I wouldn’t consider surrogacy for myself, even though I’d love another child, because it’s immoral. It’s a terrible thing to separate a child from its mother. Nobody is entitled to another human being. If you are incapable of giving birth and aren’t big enough to adopt, that sucks, and don’t I know it. But that’s life. You don’t create somebody else’s tragedy to alleviate your own.

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11 responses to “Surrogacy vs Adoption”

methylethyl

December 13, 2023

There are good reasons our church forbids it.

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ed

December 13, 2023

Agreed. Surrogacy just seems very unethical to me. The $20k or so paid to the surrogate is also a pitance. I wish this was completely outlawed.

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Stringer Bell

December 13, 2023

Here’s a spicy question: what do you think about gay/lesbian couples adopting kids? Do children necessarily need parents of both sexes?

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1. Clarissa
  
  December 13, 2023
  
  If every effort is made to preserve the child’s relationship with the real family and if this is an alternative to foster care, I’m for it. There are so many sad, abandoned kids in really bad circumstances. Adopting them is a wonderful thing to do.
  
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Anonymous

December 13, 2023

I mostly agree with you, but what do you think about surrogacy within a family? Let’s say a woman is unable to carry children of her own, and she asks her sister to be the surrogate.

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1. Clarissa
  
  December 13, 2023
  
  I’m very close with my sister. Extremely close. I can’t begin to imagine putting her in such a horrid position. Who asks a person for such a thing? Hey, have a kid and then abandon him or I’ll be saaaad. The poor woman is supposed to spend the rest of her life pretending she’s not the mother of her own child. It’s torture. What’s the kid going to call her, aunt?
  
  No, sorry, this is all abnormal.
  
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el

December 14, 2023

// It’s a terrible thing to separate a child from its mother.

If the egg is yours, how would it be somebody else’s kid?

If I carried Klara to term, would she magically become my daughter carrying my genes and those of my relatives? Inheriting my looks, intelligence, character traits?

I partly understand the confusion, including a possible one on the level of feelings, since surrogacy has become possible only in the last decades and through all millions years of (even pre-human) history pregnancy meant carrying one’s own biological child.

Still, I do not believe women, who agree to be surrogates, view those children as theirs or want to raise them instead of their own biological families / mothers.

In Israel, I was surprised by the last condition here:

“Surrogate motherhood should be conducted voluntarily, meaning a surrogate mother should not receive money as remuneration for her services. […] The Surrogate has previously been pregnant and given birth other than as a surrogate, and her children have not been removed from her custody under any law. […] The Surrogate is not a relative of any of the designated parents.”

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1. Avi
  
  December 14, 2023
  
  @el
  
  “If the egg is yours, how would it be somebody else’s kid?”
  
  Children are not egg + sperm, that’s just the biology of it.
  
  “If I carried Klara to term, would she magically become my daughter carrying my genes and those of my relatives? Inheriting my looks, intelligence, character traits?”
  
  There is no magic about it: it’s the reality of spending the most intimate relationship (entirely inside another human being, think about it!) that can be imagined, sharing the very oxygen you breathe, nutrients, listening to the same music, words, sounds, living through the same experiences as the woman carrying you in her womb, for a whole 38-40 weeks: NOTHING compates to it!
  
  It is one of the experiences that define us as humans, and irresponsible people are destroying it for others.
  
  Search for the recent testimony in the US Congress of a surrogacy child now 40 years old: she wants it banned and explains how bad it was for her and why it is wrong for everybody.
  
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  1. Clarissa
    
    December 14, 2023
    
    I wrote my comment before seeing this one. I’m not Claudine Gay who plagiarizes. 🙂 It’s simply that this is the truth.
    
    It’s extraordinarily cruel to wrench a newborn out of its mother’s arms. Like it’s a package from Amazon and not a human being.
    
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  2. Anonymous
    
    December 14, 2023
    
    I can’t find anything about this testimony, do you have a link? I want to hear her story. Thanks
    
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2. Clarissa
  
  December 14, 2023
  
  During pregnancy, you develop a powerful bond with the child. It’s like nothing else. Even for an adult woman, it’s earth-shattering. The strongest connection she ever experienced in life. Imagine what it is to a baby. The mother is its whole universe. When Klara was a baby and she’d start crying, she would calm down instantly the moment I came into the room. I didn’t even have to say anything or hold her. It was like magic. Somehow, she knew I was there.
  
  For the first 40 weeks of your existence, a person lives within a universe that has its own rhythms, sounds, smells. And then the child is wrenched out of that world from which it came and never encounters it again. That is true horror.
  
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