Further demonstrating the growing commodification of human Life and the family, a same-sex couple in California sued a fertility clinic after the surrogate mother they hired gave birth to a baby girl, instead of a boy, in 2021.
Albert and Anthony Saniger had always dreamed of having exactly two male children. So specific was their dream, that in 2015 they created Gmail accounts with the names they had already chosen for these two boys.
In 2020, they provided their sperm to HRC Fertility to have their children created as embryos in a lab. They gave the clinic instructions to have only the male embryos implanted into a mother’s womb. The men went so far as to pay $300,000 – not to be parents, but to avoid having to parent children they did not want.
Their lawsuit targets HRC Fertility in Pasadena, California, and Doctor Bradford A. Kolb, alleging breach of contract, medical malpractice, negligence and fraudulent concealment, and violation of the Unfair Competition Law and the Consumer Legal Remedies Act.
Albert and Anthony claim they were very clear with the fertility clinic that they only wanted male embryos to be transferred into the surrogate mother. Their lawsuit alleges, in quite dystopian fashion, that the clinic “negligently, recklessly, and/or intentionally transferred a female embryo to the men’s gestational carrier.”
HRC Fertility responded by saying, “The couple ideally desired a baby boy but were blessed with a healthy girl. To their dissatisfaction, we have sought to address their concerns. Every child has value and limitless potential regardless of gender.”
The clinic is correct: Every child is a blessing, and has immeasurable value. Yet, artificial reproductive technologies and surrogacy encourage treating children as commodities rather than human persons to be loved, cherished, and valued. The way the men see it, they did not get the product they ordered.
The suit is rife with dehumanizing language and themes. The mother of the child is referred to as merely a “gestational carrier.” The demand that the embryos be tested prior to implantation—which requires severing cells from an already tiny human embryo—is equivalent to a demand that these children be harmed in order to ascertain whether they are worthy of living. Filing a lawsuit expressly because of the baby girl’s sex devalues her inherent worth as a human person.
Albert and Anthony’s daughter will have to grow up knowing that her parents specifically wished she was killed as an embryo, and that they even sued for damages for her existence.
In many ways the attitude exhibited towards children in this case is an outgrowth of the attitude towards children and parenting created by abortion. Children are treated as products, as the mere property of parents. According to the abortion industry and the pro-abortion left, a child only has value when he or she is “wanted” or “planned” and it is a “woman’s right” to terminate children who are unwanted for any reason. This philosophy cuts straight at the heart of the dignity and inherent goodness of all human children and encourages couples to treat children as disposable.
Human beings should never be treated as commodities to be bought, sold, or bartered over. Building a Pro-Life Texas means more than just opposing abortion and other forms of destruction against innocent human Life. The Pro-Life movement must strive to create a society in which the basic shared understanding is that all lives are infinitely valuable as they are made in the Image and Likeness of an infinite and loving God. If this fundamental understanding existed in our culture, we would never find ourselves in awful situations like this in the first place.
Life is immeasurably valuable, and every child deserves to live, regardless of whether she meets the preferences of her parents.