Susan Markens,
"Interrogating Narratives About the Global Surrogacy Market"
(page 3 of 4)
Why so much emphasis on the lack of financial incentives motivating
American women who serve as "good" surrogates and what does this
discursive framing reveal more broadly about cultural assumptions of
mothering in the U.S.? As I argued in my earlier work, this framing of
"good surrogates" distances supporters from charges of exploitation
revealing a strategic need to disassociate the practice from charges of
commodified reproduction and "baby selling." Yet, this is not the only
cultural assumption this strategic framing reveals. I suggest this
framing of who is and who isn't a "good" surrogate also illuminates
broader assumptions about poor women in the U.S. That is a discourse
about avoiding poor (i.e. "bad") surrogates reveals underlying cultural
assumptions about poor women in general as bad women/mothers and
irresponsible reproducers. This narrative frames poor women in the U.S.
as both undeserving and untrustworthy (surrogate) mothers. As a result,
narrative frames of surrogacy that downplay the fiduciary aspects of the
transaction are drawing on and reproducing dominant cultural ideologies
of undeserving women/mothers found in discourses from welfare to
population control.
Of note, however, is that this discursive construction of "good"
versus "bad" American surrogates—that "needy"/poor surrogates are
"bad" surrogates—contrasts with surrogacy advocates' framing of Indian
surrogates. For instance, in a Los Angeles Times article on the
surrogacy industry in India a local surrogate broker unapologetically
"acknowledged that money was the primary reason these women had queued
up to be surrogates; without it, the list would be short, if
nonexistent."[23]
Yet, despite the economic need driving these women
to be surrogates their motives and characters are not denigrated. In
her online blog about Indian surrogates Judith Warner also points out
this contradiction "... when the women in question are living in abject
poverty ... [t]hen selling one's body for money is not degrading but
empowering."[24]
Ironically, then, in the global political economy of
mothering, while poor women in the U.S. are constructed as irresponsible
and bad (surrogate) mothers, poor women elsewhere aren't necessarily
viewed with the same scorn and distrust—at least when they serve to
"empower" themselves by acting as surrogates.[25]
Are media accounts and discursive narratives that present more
critical frames of surrogacy better with regard to class-based
assumptions about good parenting and deserving motherhood? Detractors
of the practice do often frame their discursive narratives around issues
of class, privilege, and reproductive inequality. For instance, there
is often much disdain and concern expressed regarding the amount of
money spent by the intended parents—the baby-buying aspects of the
practice and the possible exploitation of needy women. As bioethicist
George Annas succinctly states in a New York Times article,
"[Surrogacy] really does treat children like commodities. Like
pets."[26]
Narrative frames about the exploitation of those who are
economically desperate are also found in the Times public editor
Clark Hoyt's follow-up to the Kuczynski article in which he pointed out that for
many readers the practice "screamed rich woman exploiting poor
woman,"[27]
and a Wall Street Journal article's opening sentence
that begins, "Here's another sign of the tough economic times: some
clinics are reporting a surge in the number of women applying to donate
eggs or serve as surrogate mothers for infertile
couples."[28]
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