Impact on Women
Before the meeting
Articles
(Read two or more)
Definitions:
Assisted Reproductive Technology: a process that involves surgically removing eggs from a woman’s ovaries, combining them with sperm in the laboratory, and returning them to the woman’s body or donating them to another woman. – Centers for Disease Control (CDC)
Third-Party Reproduction (or donor-assisted reproduction): any human reproduction in which DNA or gestation is provided by a third-party or donor other than the one or two parents who will raise the resulting child.
Genetic Father – the male, who provided the sperm for fertilization and after birth, assumes the responsibilities of the child’s father,
Genetic Mother – the female providing the egg for fertilization and concurring, after birth, to assume the responsibilities of the mother,
Paternal Donor – the male, who provides the sperm for fertilization without intending to assume responsibilities of the father,
Maternal Donor – the female, who provides the egg for fertilization and does not intend to assume responsibilities of the mother,
Traditional Surrogate – the female of child-bearing age who provides her egg for fertilization and agrees to carry a child of the genetic father without intending to assume maternal responsibilities,
Gestational Carrier – a female of childbearing age who does not provide her egg, but agrees to carry a child from the genetic parents without intending to assume maternal responsibilities.
The Dark Side of Third-Party Reproduction
There are real consequences to artificial reproduction. Women who donate eggs face serious health risks now and in the future. The children of these techniques also face life-long consequences.
Surrogacy, Love, and Flourishing
Surrogacy is dehumanizing to both birth mother and child, because it reduces them to commodities. By design, it denies mother and child what they need to flourish as human beings.
Expendable Mothers
Women are having babies and are being denied their motherhood.
Surrogate Future
A seemingly helpful cottage industry
born of science fiction is harming
women and threatening to redefine
the family.
Real Grownups Know No One Has the Right to a Child
Surrogate pregnancies are more risky than other pregnancies, and the only women who can carry these pregnancies by the laws of many countries are those who are already mothers and have children that depend on them.
15 Reasons to Oppose Surrogacy
This provides a condensed and simplified list of reasons to oppose surrogacy, from the physical and mental health of the mother to the rights of the child.
Videos
(Watch one or more)
Harms of Surrogacy
This video highlights the harms of surrogacy using clips from the film “Breeders: A Subclass of Women?” Full film with Spanish subtitles available here.
Vice on HBO
Lines in the Sand: Outsourcing Embryos
By exploring some of India’s 3,000 surrogacy clinics, watching doctors deliver surrogate babies, and following recruiters who find prospective surrogates in the slums, we see the true cost of outsourcing reproduction. (Begin watching at 14:30.)
Radium Girls: The Fight for Workplace Safety
Radium poisoning had never been observed or diagnosed before, and there was little hope for the “Radium Girls,” except to change the law that had killed them.
Supplemental articles
Surrogacy Documentary
The physical detriments women endure after selling their eggs.
The Dangerous Effects of Surrogacy: A Review of a Transnational Feminist View of Surrogacy Biomarkets in India
Surrogate mothers are willing to abide by the rules imposed by the clinic and the intended parents in their desperation to bring their families out of poverty.
India Surrogate Mothers Talk of Pain of Giving up Baby
Understand surrogacy from the experiences of surrogate mothers.
Think Again: A Study Guide on the Legal, Medical, and Ethical Questions of Third Party Reproduction
A study guide focusing on egg donation, sperm donation, and surrogacy.
Supplemental videos
#BigFertility: It’s All About the Money
Trailer for surragacy documentary. See full video on Youtube, here.
Surrogacy is fast becoming one of the major issues of the 21st century—celebrities and everyday people are increasingly using surrogates to build their families. But the practice is fraught with complex implications for women, children, and families.
Eggsploitation
Trailer for surrogacy documentary. See full video on YouTube, here.
The infertility industry has grown to a multi-billion dollar business. Its main commodity: human eggs. Young women all over the world are solicited by ads offering up to $100,000 for their donated eggs.