“I want young girls and women to be able to feel like they can be involved in public life and not have to face questioning like the questioning I faced yesterday,” Â – said Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard.
No one is condoning what the radio show did. If his attitude is offensive, why is it NOT offensive for the issues below:
1) If a man uses his sperm and has an IVF child with help of compassionate women who are egg donor and surrogate, why is his rights LESS than that of a woman using her egg to have an IVF child with help of a sperm donor and surrogate? Is it OFFENSIVE to the IVF father to somehow be LESS of a parent?
2) If a man (gay, straight, single) decides to have a child and assuming they are fertile and adoption is not a solution, how will they have a child? Is it OFFENSIVE to have laws that only cater to fertility needs of a woman and not a man?
3) As an IVF father, is it OFFENSIVE to want your IVF children to learn the truth with compassion and enjoy independence with love? Why can’t an IVF father be allowed to be HONEST with his IVF children?
4) As an IVF father, is it OFFENSIVE to change the focus to the “infertile person” Vs the needs of IVF children and families?
5) As an IVF father, just like Ms. Gillard has hope for the future for young girls and women, I also have hope for all IVF parents and children and should not have to face such OFFENSIVE questions.
6) As an IVF father, who has had two wonderful IVF children – a son and a daughter with help of compassionate women – two egg donors, two surrogates. Who is the MOTHER? And this was because infertility in the marriage was being dealt as a “we” and not a “I”. Is it OFFENSIVE to be left alone in dealing with issues of lack of laws and rights for IVF children and families?
It is heartening to see the support for Ms. Gillard and women still facing issues at work even after more than a century since Susan BÂ Anthony kickstarted the Women Suffrage movement. Analogously maybe someday, deserving men will also get EQUAL rights as parents at home.
What is right will remain right and what is wrong is wrong. No amount of SPIN is going to change the truth. It may take time, oppression, persecution, injustice, defamation, and so on but truth will remain truth. As an IVF father, I was left for dead but I am fortunate for the love and support from family to have survived and am alive.
