“Why Did We Destroy Europe?” It’s an arresting title, chosen by Michael Polanyi for a 1970 essay that looks back on the conflagrations that consumed Europe between 1914 and 1945. (The essay can be found in Society, Economics & Philosophy, a posthumous volume of selected papers by . . . . Continue Reading »
Proposals to use brain-dead women as “whole body gestational surrogates” are utterly inhumane. Continue Reading »
A newly-influential strand of feminism aims to free us from the inconvenience of embodiment. Continue Reading »
The New York State Legislature has legalized commercial gestational surrogacy—the contractual renting of wombs and the buying and selling of newborn babies. Continue Reading »
On this episode, Adeline Allen and Mark Bauerlein discuss how gestational surrogacy is dehumanizing. Continue Reading »
Everybody has a master, I suppose. Continue Reading »
Technologies are moving us away from the unconditional acceptance of the children we receive toward a perceived right not only to have a baby, but to have “the baby we want.” Continue Reading »
It can be difficult to live with an artist. Poe’s classic short story “Oval Portrait” details the tragedy of a beautiful young woman married to a painter. She sits so obediently as he tries to capture her in a state of youthful perfection, she seems not to allow herself to eat, sleep, or go to the bathroom. By the time the painter completes the painting, he looks at the body of his bride and realizes that she is dead. Continue Reading »
What do donor conception, surrogacy, divorce, and adoption have in common? According to the newly-founded International Children’s Rights Institute (ICRI), they are all practices which violate the rights of children to be born free, to be raised by his or her biological parents wherever possible, and to have a knowledge of the heritage of his or her biological parents. Dubbed “Bonds that Matter” for its focus on these beginning-of-life issues, the ICRI’s inaugural conference gathered scholars, activists, and students from around the country to Simi Valley, California last Friday to discuss the various ways in which these four practices violate children’s rights. Continue Reading »
Suzanne is a forty-year-old mother of two who recently attended an Evangelical women’s Bible study in a suburb of Chicago. At this particular gathering the topic was infertility. The church had brought in two guest speakers. One spoke of how she and her husband had spent years unsuccessfully . . . . Continue Reading »
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