Surrogate Mothers—Double Standards (Letter to the Editor in the FAZ)

Surrogate Mothers—Double Standards (Letter to the Editor in the FAZ)

Regarding Bettina Wiesmann’s op-ed “A Rejection of the Compassionate Society” (Fremde Federn, F.A.Z., August 5): In my view, it is completely irrelevant in which country surrogacy is permitted and why, because the fact that it is allowed in a country does not make it any less ethically or morally questionable. The U.S. has Trump, has ICE, has its gun laws, and also has surrogacy—so what?

Mr. Spahn did not lose his position because he used a surrogate mother for his child, but because he opposes or refuses surrogacy in his own country; yet, by going through the United States, he circumvented German law and demonstrated a double standard, which is incompatible with Christian-social politics and its principles. Aside from the major ethical concerns regarding surrogacy, there are very real, terrible stories and tragedies that are rarely mentioned in the articles. Surrogate mothers in Ukraine whose babies were not picked up by the parents due to the war. Surrogate mothers and their newborns who died in the war and, to put it cynically, were thus unable to fulfill the contract. A surrogate mother in Canada who refused to terminate a pregnancy involving a child with a cleft palate and was subsequently sued and punished by the court at the behest of the intended parents and the agencies involved.

Surrogate mothers who were ultimately left “stuck” with the children due to unexpected illnesses or unexpected genetic abnormalities in the fetuses, because the “parents” refused to accept the child. Surrogate mothers who themselves became seriously ill and put their lives at risk for others. Surrogate mothers who, to this day, are not allowed to see the child they carried to term because it was taken away from them immediately after birth.

Not everything that is feasible is good. Not everything that is medically feasible is ethically and morally acceptable. In Switzerland, egg donation has not even been legalized yet. Adopting children is subject to the strictest regulations and seems harder to achieve than having a child through a surrogate mother abroad. Embryo research is subject to the strictest rules and has rightly been the subject of intense debate for years. The same applies to stem cell research and genetic manipulation. Kidney transplants from relatives or in exchange for money are not permitted. But what about children born to women in exchange for payment? Ultimately, proponents argue that there is no right to restrict a person’s free will. But an act that is ethically and morally highly questionable does not become any more legitimate simply because of the will to do it and to carry it out.