Sperm by post? Gay Parents?
Friends, ministers, theologians, thinkers, humans, women, men, ethicists, scientists, psychologists, Others, I would love some thoughts on this- the more diverse in origin the better!
What does everyone think about this? The civil partnerships act is fab in beginning to give the same rights to gay couples as to straight couples. But should these 'rights' extend to having the ability to scientifically tamper in the reproductive process. As a lesbian woman do I have a 'right' to fertility treatment as I could not naturally have a baby, or should this be reserved to hetero couples for whom the process of male and female making a baby is natural?
Somehow for me the whole sperm by post thing seems to be messing with nature. Life is sacred and should be brought about under conditions of love, not scientifically and clinically begun. But we do not apply this argument to straight couples who have fertility treatment as the fella is firing blanks or otherwise impotent- we seem quite happy to begin life in a scientific and clinical way then.
And what about the bringing up of a child? Should this be done in single sex partnerships? Is it important for a child to have both male and female role models in a home? Or is it more important that they grow up in a secure loving environment? Are we adversly affecting child's development by bringing them up in a same gender relationship? What if there are lots of significant adults in their life outside of the partnership?
Lots of thoughts- answers or more thoughts anyone?
What does everyone think about this? The civil partnerships act is fab in beginning to give the same rights to gay couples as to straight couples. But should these 'rights' extend to having the ability to scientifically tamper in the reproductive process. As a lesbian woman do I have a 'right' to fertility treatment as I could not naturally have a baby, or should this be reserved to hetero couples for whom the process of male and female making a baby is natural?
Somehow for me the whole sperm by post thing seems to be messing with nature. Life is sacred and should be brought about under conditions of love, not scientifically and clinically begun. But we do not apply this argument to straight couples who have fertility treatment as the fella is firing blanks or otherwise impotent- we seem quite happy to begin life in a scientific and clinical way then.
And what about the bringing up of a child? Should this be done in single sex partnerships? Is it important for a child to have both male and female role models in a home? Or is it more important that they grow up in a secure loving environment? Are we adversly affecting child's development by bringing them up in a same gender relationship? What if there are lots of significant adults in their life outside of the partnership?
Lots of thoughts- answers or more thoughts anyone?
posted by Nikki @ 11:49 am
2 Comments:
At 2:11 pm,
Anonymous said…
I think this is an enormously difficult issue. In general terms I think that there ought to be a big question mark over fertility treatment at all. There is no right to have children – I do not think there is even a right to life. We're here by an incredible accident that depends upon a whole series of incredible accidents in that a whole line of forbears had particular surviving offspring to contribute to our genetic and cultural make-up. A difference in the actual individual sperm that made it in our case would have made us a different person because the shareout of paternal genes we inherit from our grandparents would have been different because of the way meiosis works. Just think of what that means over a multiplicity of generations! And of course there is a knock-on effect on recombination. So we start from chance, and we can only make the best of what we've got.
Having got that out of the way, we live on a seriously overpopulated planet that we are bringing to the brink of disaster. We need to be helping people achieve satisfactory child-free lives as part of an attempt at serious population reduction without resorting to the usual method (war). To do anything artificial that increases the population, and especially that part of the population that consumes the greatest share of scarce resources, is highly irresponsible. Malthus had a point, you know.
Having said that, I have 2 friends who have resorted to IVF and I would not, at least in one case, have wanted otherwise. That one, the daughter of a friend in Chicago, has found great happiness where previously there was great pain. How can I begrudge her that? Her happiness radiates through her family and her husband's family too. I just think it is terribly unfortunate that we see motherhood as essential to being a complete woman.
The other couple were a lesbian pair who were neighbours of mine. My feeling was that their desire for parenthood was more to do with making a statement about the validity of their relationship, which at the time I thought was not a good reason for becoming a parent. And they were both totally dependent on benefits, which meant that the child would add to the state's burden, and I didn't see how that could be justified. On the other hand the actual potential father was a gay man keen to be involved in the upbringing of his offspring.
What a terrible difficult issue when dealing with real human beings and their individual pain and its resolution, but clear enough, in my view, on a theoretical level.
So I'd like to see the same standard – no support, at least no state funded support – for fertility treatment until we've got the population and the damage we're doing to the environment under control – applied to everyone.
I don't buy this “life is sacred” argument. Life exists – its diversity is one of the things on which its continuation depends because of the way the food chain works. Individual human beings are to be valued and treasured (in most cases – the planet and the political world would be better off without some of them). The other animals should be treated with as much respect as we can muster. We would not be here without them. But I really can't see that the lifeless worlds that make up the rest of the solar system are any the worse for being so.
As for whether children are better or worse off being parented by same sex couples, it depends entirely on the quality of the parenting. Some heterosexual couples are lousy parents who bring nothing but misery to their kids. Some gay couples would be excellent parents. There is no general rule.
At 12:15 pm,
Kates said…
I think I agree that you can't make a general rule and it does depend on the quality of the parenting. It's hard because I think I was always taught that children need a male and female role model in order to have the most balanced upbringing. But that doesn't mean that perspective is right and I can think of friends who grew up in one parent families and are just as balanced (and sometimes more) than people who grew up with mother and father around.
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