"Altruistic" vs. "Commercial" Surrogacy

Recently, a reader commented on my lecture on surrogacy pointing out that all surrogacy is altruistic, regardless of whether money is exchanged. The failings of the current terminology are not news to me, and I'd talked about them in the lecture, though they hadn't made it into the slides. But what's a girl to do when right from Reproductive Technology Council comes this definition:

Altruistic surrogacy: Altruistic surrogacy means a practice whereby a woman agrees, for no financial gain, to become pregnant and bear a child for another person or persons to whom she intends to transfer the child’s care at, or shortly after, the child’s birth. (Specific expenses incurred, associated with the pregnancy and birth, may be reimbursed).

The alternative term you can find floating around is compassionate surrogacy. OH! Well take a huge sigh of relief, because THAT's certainly better!!!



The obvious solution is to stop making a distinction between 'commercial' and 'altruistic' surrogacy. After all, who the fuck cares?? There's a good deal of evidence showing that cash isn't a motivating factor for most 'commercial' surrogates [1], and anyway, they make so little money from it that it really couldn't be a motivating factor. "Woooo, I wanna get pregnant and risk my comfort and health instead of getting a part time, low wage job!!!!!" yeah right.

I'm not satisfied with throwing out the distinction, however. Not satisfied at all, but not because I think we need to label surrogates as 'money earning' and 'non-money earning.' I think the REAL distinction is independent, but correlates strongly with the altruistic/commercial distinction. It's how closely the surrogate knows the intended parents before the process begins.

'Altruistic' surrogates, in most cases, are very close to the intended parents. Family members, close friends, etc - and it's the closeness of their relationship that drives them to be a surrogate. They are touched by the specific needs of someone they love, and they recognize that they can help - whether or not it sounds like a fun project.

'Commercial' surrogates, however, are a totally different breed! According to my cursory research [1], [2] and observations in the blogosphere, commercial surrogates, who usually don't know the intended parents, could be argued to have the more accurately altruistic motivations. Sure, some of them just REALLY LIKE being pregnant. Wow. Good for them. But a lot of them are driven by a deep empathy for nameless, faceless childless couples, paired with a desire to do something heroic; make a change in someone's life.

It's the difference between someone who sees their friend at their kitchen table hungry and decides to feed them, and someone who thinks "gosh, I bet there's someone hungry out there" and goes out to feed them. THIS distinction should not be overlooked.

Personally, I would never have chosen to be a commercial surrogate. I don't have the drive or the metaphorical balls to go out and take this kind of burden on for someone I don't know. I like drinking and rugby too much :) So I think that, if new terms are to be coined, they don't need to reflect the exchange of money (we have our old, crass terms for that), but they should rather reflect the relationship between the surrogate and intended parents. Philanthropic vs. intimate surrogacy? I'm taking suggestions :)