Читать книгу Contract Children - Daniela Danna - Страница 7

As Karl Marx said, technology introduces new possibilities that re-arrange human existence and human relations. When reproductive technology enabled the implanting of embryos in wombs, even from another woman's ovum, the language of kinship acquired a new meaning, and the legal constructions based on it were called into question. The figure of the "mother," already divisible into a birth-biological-genetic mother and a social one in the cases of formal or informal adoption and of "traditional" surrogacy, endured a further split. From then on, the birth mother, carrier of the embryo/fetus, could be a different woman from the one furnishing the genetic material, that is the egg. It appeared logical that the woman whose egg has been fertilized[16] should also be considered a "mother," entitled to share the attribution of biological motherhood with the birth mother who has carried the fetus to term. For example, the jurist Alicia Benedetta Faraoni (2002, 332–3) jokingly comments upon the "scientific revolution" that has called motherhood into question, saying that the famous Italian motto "di mamma ce n'è una sola" (the mother is only one—we have just one source of unconditional love and material support) is not true anymore: "Today one can have two, even three mothers, as the Tribunal of Rome wrote," in its decree on a case of surrogacy. These are the court's words:

In the cases of surrogate motherhood the question of "who the mother is" cannot find an answer from a scientific point of view, as both subjects appear to be causally necessary to the process conducive to the birth; both women have a biological connection with the child. What is noteworthy, instead, is the problem of defining who will be the person having the duty to care for the newborn after delivery, and which of the two women should be considered socially responsible.[17]

But there is no ambiguity. The doubt and the confusion about exactly which figure is duplicated in this kind of ART stem from language, not from a supposedly essential modification of the biological process of procreation inaugurated by ART. Our languages have been forged over the ages in which the technical possibility of separating egg contribution and pregnancy was inexistent. The divisibility of these acts through ART has given rise to conceptual problems, as language does not change so easily, and the same word "mother" now stands also for a new concept: the egg contributor.

"Gestational surrogacy" (also called "full surrogacy") comes in two forms: either using the future social mother's egg or a donor's egg. Using an egg from a woman other than the surrogate is a practice that has been developed over the last thirty years, and some say that it has now become the preferred one, as it can allow a couple to have a child that is genetically theirs. But the purpose for using donor eggs is to cut off the surrogate from claims of motherhood based on genetics, and purportedly even from her feelings, extolling DNA provenience over pregnancy.[18] In California gestational surrogacy seems to have nearly replaced traditional surrogacy, which was simpler both from the point of view of the technique and from the cultural consideration of the facts about motherhood. A lawyer working in Oakland with decades-long practice with surrogacy contracts affirms:

The non-related surrogate is the general case now. Usually it is the donor's egg or the mother's egg, and the surrogate is not related: they call it gestational surrogate. This happens in 90% of the cases, the other 10% is what they call traditional surrogacy and the surrogate is officially inseminated in the doctor's office, usually. Then 1% is actually doing it at home, and there are financial reasons: they can't afford the IVF procedure. (Personal interview, January 2013)

Nevertheless the true proportions are unknown, though there are countries, as we will see, that mandate the gestational form in order for the agreements to be approved.[19]

From the material point of view, the (nonmonetary) price of the surplus of medical interventions to perform a gestational surrogacy is paid for by the surrogate mother, who submits to an unnecessary surgical operation to implant the embryo, and to avoidable but obligatory hormonal stimulation in the name of efficiency. From a contemporary cultural point of view, the lack of her genetic contribution tilts the balance of power in favor of the intended parents (whether the gametes come from their bodies or from a purchase) over the centrality of the pregnancy process in procreation. It is here that the true innovation lies, and it is cultural more than technical. The first IVF with a "donated" egg and the consequent embryo transfer into the womb of another woman, did not create another "mother," the mother only by genes, but shifted the whole position of females in matter of procreation. A woman can now have the male experience of externally expecting a child that is genetically hers, if another woman bears the embryo derived from her egg. With IVF, women have assumed a role previously reserved to men, from gamete donation to the external wait. Of course there have always been similar situations: in adoption both the woman and the man wait "externally" for a child to come into their family, but the child is never genetically related to them. In surrogacy instead, for the first time since the beginning of the human species, there is the possibility for women to share the universal fathers' experience. An act of emancipation, perhaps, maybe even a step towards gender equality. But, more exactly, the emancipation from the "slavery of pregnancy" that Simone de Beauvoir dreamt about and Shulamith Firestone hoped for, is realized through the bodily engagement of an