A) Denying the agency of women to make their own choices is by definition misogynistic. Asserting that when women make choices you don't agree with, it must be due to exploitation, is likewise misogynistic. Paternalistic too. Hardly the vocab of women's lib.
B) Somehow I doubt I'll be getting a particularly balanced take from a website called 'the critic slash end womb trafficking'. Julie Bindel is a fiery political opinion columnist - the Ann Coulter of radical feminism - and the article you link is brazenly polemical. I could respond with my own polemical links which counter yours, but I honestly don't see what the point of that exchange would be. It sounds like surrogacy is a culture war issue for you, which is sad, because the culture war is a parasite on good intentions.
Your definition of misogyny is far too narrow then, if you're focusing entirely on the concept of individual agency, yet ignoring the larger structural inequalities and power dynamics that constrain women's choices and perpetuate exploitation.
Did you actually read the article I linked, or are you just complaining about the URL? If you did read it, do you dispute the factual content that describes several examples of exploitation of women in the surrogacy industry?
Complaining that a woman has a strong opinion is a rather odd criticism, Julie Bindel has been actively researching surrogacy and its harms for many, many years now and it would be very surprising if she wasn't opinionated on this topic.
Just because there are some regulations in place doesn't mean that exploitation doesn't occur. The fact remains that surrogacy often involves financial transactions where women's bodies are being used as a means to an end. It is not at all misogynistic to critically examine this.
> Your definition of misogyny is far too narrow then, if you're focusing entirely on the concept of individual agency, yet ignoring the larger structural inequalities and power dynamics that constrain women's choices and perpetuate exploitation.
There's a long history of imagined threats being used to take away people's rights. At the end of the day, you're saying that you know better than individual women what is best for them, and implying that you wish to take away their right to choose in ways that are inconsistent with your views. It's the pro-life argument, just in a different context.
> Just because there are some regulations in place doesn't mean that exploitation doesn't occur. The fact remains that surrogacy often involves financial transactions where women's bodies are being used as a means to an end. It is not at all misogynistic to critically examine this.
The problem with your argument is that there's ample evidence of successful surrogacies, with all sides walking away very happy. Your argument rests on some tortured process of explaining to people that no, they're actually super unhappy, they just don't know it. Which is nuts. Anecdotes from third world countries without adequate legal protections for surrogates are only useful for making the point that we need strong legal protections for surrogates, which I totally agree with.
Ultimately, I do believe you're coming from a good place. I disagree though, profoundly, that banning surrogacy will in any way elevate or protect women. It will not. It will mostly harm same-sex and infertile couples. Many of which contain women. (It will also lead to many, many instances of people choosing to be surrogates anyway, except with no legal protection or framework.)
Using more words does not make you not misogynistic. ChatGPT can also spew endless pages of superficially coherent but intellectually devoid text, and is also entitled to the same amount of entertained debate.
B) Somehow I doubt I'll be getting a particularly balanced take from a website called 'the critic slash end womb trafficking'. Julie Bindel is a fiery political opinion columnist - the Ann Coulter of radical feminism - and the article you link is brazenly polemical. I could respond with my own polemical links which counter yours, but I honestly don't see what the point of that exchange would be. It sounds like surrogacy is a culture war issue for you, which is sad, because the culture war is a parasite on good intentions.
Here are the legal protections for surrogates in the state of New York: https://health.ny.gov/community/pregnancy/surrogacy/surrogat....