The New York Times magazine has a cover story today called “Her Body, My Baby.” It’s an obvious story for me to blog a out, given my many past postings about surrogacy.
I’m having a very hard time focusing on the bulk of the story because I have a fairly strong, visceral reaction to the title, the cover photo and the opening. (I’d guess this is exactly what the author/editors intend, right? Provocative is good in this sort of an article.) Anyway, for the moment the best I can do is to try and sort out that visceral reaction. I think there are several components to that, and if I throw them out here, maybe I’ll be able to tell if I’m right. (This is definitely in the category of thinking out loud.)
First off, there is this pregnant woman. I really do not care one bit about the specific genetic make-up of the developing embryo, she is quite clearly the one who is pregnant. Let me put aside for a moment (as I have frequently done) the question of whether the developing embryo is a baby. Instead I’ll say that if all goes well, she will in time give birth to a baby. The assertion of the title and the picture is that the baby is not hers, but instead belongs to someone else who has paid her to provide services.
The author and editors have made it really quite graphic here, and I suppose that is what keys my reaction to it. How can it not be “her” baby? (I do think that the whole ownership thing (as in my baby, your baby, is baby, her baby) is potentially problematic. But if we are using the language of ownership, then that’s what I’m stuck with, too.) If it is someone else’s baby, what is it that she is doing? Child-care, I imagine?
I’m willing to say it is a baby that the author of the article expects/hopes to raise as her child. I’m willing to say that the pregnant woman has agreed to give the child to the author once the child is born. Perhaps she even has a moral obligation to do this, since other people have made quite significant decisions based on her asserted willingness to give the child over.
What I am not willing to do is to reduce pregnancy/birth to some form of child care. I think this might be my bottom line. After being pregnant/giving birth, the woman will be the mother of a child. The author’s claim that it is “my baby” is the kind of bald assertion of ownership and entitlement that (to me at least) bespeaks the power imbalance and dehumanizing potential of surrogacy arrangements.
I can also spend a moment considering the basis on which the author claims it is “my baby.” One is DNA. The claim that a genetic link defines you as a parent is something I have frequently posted about. Bottom line there is I don’t accept it, but I will not go into all that right here. Beyond that, there is the whole idea that there is an agreement in place and under the agreement, the author will end up being parent to the child. But notice how I choose to say that–she’ll end up being the parent of the child. It doesn’t give her the present claim to be a parent.
I’ll calm down after a bit and focus more clearly, I’m sure. But this is where I have to start. Certainly clear that surrogacy is in the news again, though.
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Professor,
I’m glad (and a little surprised) to see that you had the same visceral reaction to that cover as I did. I think the author may be falling victim to a zero-sum conception of motherhood, something along the lines of a child can only have one mother, and I want that to be me; if the surrogate is at all a mother, then my claim to motherhood is diminished.
As someone with a stepmother and a couple of other women who played a parental role in my life, I obviously don’t feel that that’s the case. But to a woman so focused on having a child, especially to the point of surrogacy, it’s probably very important to assert the exclusivity of her parental rights.
(I haven’t read the article yet, but I look forward to reading both it and your take on it.)
It’s unfortunate (but perhaps not unexpected) that the NYT chose to go with such a sensational piece.
The same author once published (in the NYT, I believe) a provocative article about her use of Botox and plastic surgery. That history certainly invites us to conclude that she, as a woman of privilege, is ready and willing to buy her way past biological obstacles (real or perceived). And now, the NYT treats us to a photo of the gestational surrogate sitting barefoot on a porch (complete with peeling paint – what assumptions does this invite?), while the author/intended mother stands in front of one of her several homes with her baby nurse (a woman of color) at the ready.
The photos are so distracting that it’s nearly impossible to digest the article. At the end of the day this is a manipulative piece which adds very little to a useful discussion about surrogacy. Too bad.
Huh, I think your issue with putting pregnancy and childbirth under the title “child care” is weird. Is it putting down the huge responsibility and commitment that is inherent in child care? What the hell is ‘just child care’ anyway?
(This is in response to robynanne’s comment above.) I’m afraid that the constraints of electronic communication (sarcasm doesn’t really come across well) may have obscured what I meant to say with regard to pregnancy/child care in the original post here.
I do think it is problematic to equate child-care and pregnancy. That’s actually exactly what I meant to say. At the same time, I don’t mean to diminish the importance of child-care generally. Let me try to unpack just a little bit.
Child-care is critical, often unpaid or under-paid work. But, critical though it is, child-care is also something that (in my view) can reasonably be farmed out to another person, preferably one who is appropriately compensated for her/his time. I see nothing problematic in hiring a baby-sitter or paying for good daycare and so on.
Pregnancy, while also critical, is not something (again, in my view) that can be farmed out to another person. I don’t think I can pay you to be pregnant “for” me. And that, I fear, is what surrogacy is all about. It reduces pregnancy to a service, like child-care. That’s what I meant when I introduced the reference to child-care in the original post. Indeed, I think people promoting surrogacy often explicitly invoke the child-care equation.
But, just to reiterate one last time, I don’t by any means to imply that child-care is unimportant or trivial work. As I’m writing this, I’m beginning to wonder whether the difference is in part one of degree. I can hire someone to care for my kids for four hours so I can have an afternoon off. That’s rather different than hiring someone to care for my kids 24/7 for forty weeks, isn’t it? Perhaps something for a later post.
I left a message on another of your posts on surrogacy – this one is equally as interesting – im intrigued as to why not much is ever in the media about surrogacy.
If you could have a look at The Struggles Of Surrogacy – a short documentary about the problems with the legal and admin systems in the UK – I would love to know your response.
It can be found on my blog or at http://www.youtube.com/mikebuonaiuto
Many Thanks
We’ll have to agree to dissagree then. (Which, I guess, is why we both get to have our own blogs.) One question though – you speak of hiring someone and paying them. Is it the financial aspect of paying someone to watch your children when you cannot? I mean, I’ve never met another surrogate in real life to ask about the financial part but for me, personally, I didn’t even KNOW there was a financial aspect until I was asked how much I thought was appropriate. My motivation was wrapped up in my life experiences. I find it hard to think that others drawn to being carriers would go through all of this as a financial plan.