If there's one rule you should remember when listening to someone's opinion, it's this: anyone who says things are black and white is wrong. It might be hard to work out how they're wrong at first, but you can be sure they are. That's where the solid moral ground runs out.
Says Saletan, in his recent article on the embryo bank set up by Jennalee Ryan, "That's the central question Ryan's venture poses. She didn't invent commerce, quality control, or trait selection in human reproduction. Those trends are rampant in the egg and sperm markets. All she did was extend them across the line of conception. Does that line matter? If it does, you'd better figure out how to square that with your views on abortion and stem-cell research. But if it doesn't, you'd better figure out where to draw the next line. Because the logic of what Ryan is offering—more control, more customization, higher quality, fewer hassles, lower cost, and lower risk—won't end here."
And that's the problem, isn't it. There's no logical boundary to this moral problem. At what point does the state have the right to interfere on behalf of the child? When the genetic and social parents are being selected(1)? Once the embryo is conceived(2)? At some point during gestation? After the baby's born? Or perhaps when a social worker has documented several years of systematic abuse? And to what extent is the state obligated, or indeed allowed, to interfere on behalf of the adults? To protect donors from exploitation? How about the potential for exploitation of infertile couples by birth parents or surrogates?
It's not good enough to demand one rule for infertile couples and another for everyone else. That's exactly the inequality Ryan is striking back against. It's these inequalities, and not some evil industry or amoral desperation, that drives businesses like hers forwards. And it's only through increased access to improved reproductive technology that these conundrums will ever come close to being resolved.
So let's start insuring IVF properly - either through state or private cover. Let's fund those research programs. Let's treat infertility like the medical condition it is. I look towards a future where infertile couples have an honest shot at parenthood, as if they're just as important as everyone else(3). A future where no-one has to get hurt.
Sure, we'll still need some tidying up around the edges; some case-by-case musings over unusual scenarios(4). Society can handle that - it happens in every facet of life. After all, nothing's ever black and white.
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(1) I include, here, the selection of genetic and social parents in instances of natural, as well as artificial, conception.
(2) I don't buy into the argument that full human rights should be conferred at conception. I haven't met a prolifer yet who truly thinks an embryo is just as important as an adult human being. The simplest demonstration of this fact is the scenario in which the baby has to die in order for the mother to live. I have not spoken to anyone who wouldn't terminate, however regretfully, the life of that unborn child. And now we're back to drawing lines in the grey.
(3) I should add that in some parts of the world the entire social welfare system leaves a lot to be desired. Take it as read that everyone in society should be treated as if they have value.
(4) There are, of course, other valid ways to build a family than having the female partner of a heterosexual couple gestate their genetically-related child, and I don't mean to imply otherwise. Let's not even get into the whole issue of same-sex couples, for example. But there are an awful lot of heterosexual couples who only turn to alternative methods of family creation after reaching the limit with ART (we may yet fall into that category). In the ideal I'm striving for, those involved in alternative methods of family creation (donors, adoptive and birth parents, etc) will be there because they want to be, not because they had no other choice(6). See also comment #1.
(6) Except parents whose children are forceably removed from their care on reasonable grounds. There's choice and there's abusing your freedom until it gets taken away. Go on, find me another unexplained grey area to write a footnote about.
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