Selling babies (for adoption)

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Selling babies (for adoption)

Postby cmsellers » Wed Nov 29, 2017 7:03 pm

So DP posted this, which made me smile and then I remembered I'd seen that and found the article.
Deathclaw_Puncher wrote:
Spoiler: show
Image

The article is defending parents who who give up babies for adoption getting paid. Currently, you can pay someone to donate eggs, and someone to carry the baby, but you can't legally pay someone to do both at once: if it's your sperm it's prostitution, if it's not then it's baby selling.

I'm tentatively in favor. My understanding is that there's a shortage of healthy babies in the US (special needs babies and older children are a different matter), which is why parents pay so much for international adoptions. International adoptions tend to be not super-well-regulated in the primary source countries, and sometimes involve baby stealing and often involve sundry other shadiness. I suspect actual child abduction cases are rare, but the assorted shadiness is enough of an issue that the top country for foreign adoptions changes every decade or so when the current country tightens regulations.

My feeling on most issues is "if it's between consenting adults and doesn't have externalities, it should be legal." I can't see any obvious externalities here, but I'm viscerally concerned because I know of one case of baby selling which involved the rape of a minor (as in, the husband of the couple buying the baby paid a teenage girl to let him knock her up and take the resulting babies). However that seems like something that would become less rare if you eliminate the black market. I mean, it seems like the reason this couple targeted a minor is that she was in a vulnerable situation with her parents and didn't know her rights; if it were legal to pay an adult for the same service you should prefer an adult since the pregnancy is less risky and the act less illegal.

So yeah, I see no compelling reason that this should be illegal and a couple of reasons why it should be legal. (Though my default is that things should be legal unless there's a compelling reason they should be illegal.) But I'm sure there's at least a few people on TCS who think it should remain illegal, so I'm curious what y'all have to say.
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Re: Selling babies (for adoption)

Postby DamianaRaven » Wed Nov 29, 2017 7:25 pm

I don't really think ANYONE should be turning a profit on the exchange of children. It's always annoyed me that adoption agencies can basically sell children, but if the manufacturer of said child gets a cut, then it's a crime. All I ask for is a single standard of consistency. Either selling children is OK and the birth mother should get paid or it's not OK and corporations shouldn't be allowed to profit from adoptions.
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Re: Selling babies (for adoption)

Postby SandTea » Wed Nov 29, 2017 11:37 pm

If there is a, I don't really want to say it but here goes, market shortage of those healthy squishy bobble-heads then I would expect a go-getter to exploit this vacuum for a nice profit. What I'm saying is, I really don't want to read about "baby mills" anytime soon.

Other than that, if there's good oversight and strict standards, I can see being fine with it. I don't like that there is a baby black-market just as much as I fear a 'technically legal' baby mill.
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Re: Selling babies (for adoption)

Postby iMURDAu » Thu Nov 30, 2017 12:41 am

Shortage of healthy babies my ass. The foster care system and group home kids come from somewhere. My thinking is that rich people don't want to adopt a black kid named Tamika unless she comes from another continent. Public housing baby, no. Veldt baby, yes. There were some African children who were adopted out to Americans but their parents were told they were being schooled and would eventually return home. Sorry for the CNN link.

Let's check out the viewpoint of the guy I quoted in my signature. You can't think it's reasonable to take a child who didn't ask to be born in the first place and send them off to the highest bidder.
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Re: Selling babies (for adoption)

Postby Pseudoman » Thu Nov 30, 2017 12:50 am

... ... ...
Ok, The event you described is more child surrogacy than child purchasing, which in itself is a different matter entirely it would be like equating a miscarriage to being sterile.

To give a better example that will reflect the subject;

Fey is impregnated with the intent of selling the child, in this scenario there is no buyer at the moment and the buyer will not be a biological relative to the child. Fey was luckily enough to find a buyer early in her pregnancy,
as monetary value of babies will drop the older they get. Money and ownership of child is exchanged at the same time and the buyer is legally able to back out at anytime before the exchange, unless the two parties made a contractual agreement before hand but that is not a legal requirement of being able to sell a child.

Fey gives birth and it's a boy but the child only has 9 fingers, her potential buyer backs out. Fey knows that a child with a deformity has little value and knows she'll be unable to sell the child,giving her the choice of either raising the child or putting it up for adoption.


Unlike sperm, eggs, child bearing, all of which are either services or providing resources to have a child to begin with. You're not buying a child, your buying the chance to have a child you otherwise couldn't have.
Also it probably be for the best if we don't do similar business ventures, like of those from third world countries.

Not only that but the ramifications. The people selling the children aren't going to be the rich or the middleclass. It will be the impoverish and because there's monetary incentive to have children, The impoverish class birth rates will rise, which in turn will require more welfare if not met will lead to higher crime rates.

There will be an increase of orphans because those babies have expiration dates and like you said there are many older children, well guess what there will be more of them.

Let alone that purchasing children is a few steps from reigniting good ol slavery.

Also you know that few to no babies having no parents is a good thing, just because there's little of something doesn't mean we need more of it.
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Re: Selling babies (for adoption)

Postby Kivutar » Thu Nov 30, 2017 1:09 am

I don't agree with any form of selling human beings.
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Re: Selling babies (for adoption)

Postby sunglasses » Thu Nov 30, 2017 1:20 am

There've been far too many scams where people pretended to be pregnant and asked for money to cover medical expenses by the prospective adoptive parents.

Saying to someone, "I'll buy you a house/give you $$$/ etc if you let me adopt your baby" is coercion. We don't know that they'd be willing to do that otherwise.

There are scores of children waiting for homes and it's like what Murda is saying many times. Although another huge issue with the adoption system is money and the hoops people have to go thru for domestic adoptions. They can be a nightmare.

But yeah, I second the notion that I'm not cool with buying and selling another human. I have significantly less issue with selling of eggs or sperm as they are only potential DNA supplies. I also have less issue with hiring someone for surrogacy as pregnancy can take a hell of a toll on the body and the medical costs aren't negligible.
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Re: Selling babies (for adoption)

Postby Absentia » Thu Nov 30, 2017 1:42 am

If we're okay with paying women to be surrogates, I don't see the problem. You're paying them to carry a baby and the only difference is whose genetic material is involved.

sunglasses wrote:Saying to someone, "I'll buy you a house/give you $$$/ etc if you let me adopt your baby" is coercion. We don't know that they'd be willing to do that otherwise.


Coercion is threatening to harm somebody in some way if they don't do what you want. Paying them to do what you want is the opposite of coercion.
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Re: Selling babies (for adoption)

Postby sunglasses » Thu Nov 30, 2017 5:09 pm

Sorry, I had a specific thought in mind when I was thinking about it. More like someone saying, "Oh you have debt? Be a shame if we couldn't help you out. But you know what we'd want *wink*"
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Re: Selling babies (for adoption)

Postby cmsellers » Thu Nov 30, 2017 9:22 pm

When it comes to the argument about older children wanting homes, I used to be sympathetic to that. Then I realized that saying someone should adopt an older child rather than a baby is no different than saying someone should adopt a child rather than conceive with medical help. Some people only want babies, and some people only want babies who are genetically related to them. To say that people should change their preferences is to miss the point entirely.
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Re: Selling babies (for adoption)

Postby Malfeasinator » Sat Dec 09, 2017 2:18 am

As long as I can get a receipt and a letter of authenticity, I'm all for it. Have to stock the farm with workers somehow.
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Re: Selling babies (for adoption)

Postby Crimson847 » Sat Dec 09, 2017 12:11 pm

viewtopic.php?f=57&t=7726
viewtopic.php?f=57&t=8417

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