Thread by @saralikeclara

Ok I saw a video that pissed me off re: surrogacy. I will try to post but I might have to post piecemeal because Twitter is shitty.

Plenty more eloquent feminists and medics have described the fundamental inequality in the way the mother’s entire body and brain is changed during pregnancy in preparation to take care of a baby. It’s a chemical, hormonal connection between mother and baby.

That the idea of a pregnant woman being an oven is a complete misunderstanding of what is happening: mother & baby are one being, birth is the beginning of the slow process of separation for both (it takes the baby several months to even realise its mother is a separate person)

And that while other people will love the baby (the partner of either sex, grandparents, uncles, aunts, siblings) that incredibly strong, instinctive maternal bond that is in our biology which is meant to guarantee the baby loving, devoted care is non-transferable.

There’s a reason in the Golden Hour they don’t plonk the baby on literally anyone. The baby is supposed to go on the mother’s chest because that is facilitating the development of the natural, biological connection (and helping prepare for breastfeeding)

All of your “strong, independent blah blah” goes out of the window because as a mother you’ve been quite literally brainwashed by high concentrations of hormones to be utterly obsessed with your baby.

SO ANYWAY. That said. I saw this video this morning, of an influencer blogging about his & his partner’s “surrogacy journey”.

They have twins born premature, in the NICU. They did a prior video of the surrogate saying a sad, final goodbye.

In this video they have a very busy day: they have time to vlog, they go to Starbucks and get a very specific coffee order (quad shot latte with 3 pumps of brown sugar syrup, cinnamon and brown sugar oatmilk, shaken espresso but the hot version), they go to Target for supplies,

they go to the salon, they go to Walmart for more shopping, they get home, make an “unboxing” vlog of everything they bought, put some furniture together, organise supplies like nappies neatly into cute little storage boxes, vlog some more #brands for #influencerlife, hoover the

downstairs of THEIR MANSION, and finish by vlogging about how much all this means to them.

This entire time, those babies have been at the NICU alone.

Meanwhile, their birth mother had to be contractually dragged away.

That’s what babies commissioned through surrogates miss out on: the utterly devoted care of someone who doesn’t just not want to be apart but who hormonally cannot be apart. Someone who throws Starbucks/hoovering out of the window because they are completely obsessed with them.

(Side-note: when this couple finds out what caring for a newborn, never mind two, actually involves, it’s going to hit them like a tonne of bricks)

In the first months of life, newborns think they are still part of their mothers, which is why it’s called the fourth trimester.

Now who & where is the individual carer that these babies don’t realise yet is a separate person to them?

Other things that struck me: how good his hair is? In the days after birth I had to be literally helped into the shower, then in the first months of life I had to ask friends & family to hold the baby while I had a quick shower (all the time panicking something would happen)

Also, in anticipation of being called homophobic by people who are not willing to take arguments against the commercial baby trade seriously: the fact that there’s two male parents isn’t the issue. It’s the absence of the person who gave birth to them and the fact you have

two people performing the traditional dad role with neither of them performing the traditional mum role. The image of them with Starbucks lattes really reminded me of that old fashioned patriarchal tradition of “wetting the baby’s head” where the dad goes to the pub to celebrate

a birth with his male friends, while the mum is at home caring for the baby. Except in this case, the mum is busy NICU staff with other responsibilities.

Also I’m aware this couple has been attacked & called paedophiles by people who really are homophobic. That’s obviously not ok & good luck to them in getting that taken down frankly, but being victims of homophobia does not make the fundamental cruelty of surrogacy any more OK.

ONE MORE THING: “our lives are about to change forever!” The babies are a week old. Mummy’s life changed forever 7-8 months ago, now she has to go home & pretend it didn’t. It’s so male-centric the idea parenthood only changes your life the second you’re expected to do something.

It’s like Julie Bindel said, surrogacy is where capitalism meets patriarchy