Someone else said US couples still went abroad because it was cheaper. Legalising won't help poor women in other countries. Even if it contributes to exploitation (which I don't think it does as those women are being exploited by people who have a legal option too), removing the ban won't do anything to reduce it IMO.…

What does adoption have to do with anything? I know biology doesn't make a parent, you'll notice I even used "the people who brought them into the world" instead of "parents".

Not to mention there are also infertile poor people who don't have access to this service so even if we frame it as a right, it's a right restricted to the wealthy.

Has an Australian black market developed? Or are couples mostly going abroad?

I really don't think not allowing paid surrogacy is the government having control on women's bodies. That's stretching is quite far. Do you think selling your kidney should be allowed too? Because as far as "the government controlling one's body" goes, it's the same thing.

Abortion is about bodily autonomy, not parenthood. Both sexes have bodily autonomy and they correspond to their respective roles in reproduction. Women can terminate a foetus. Men can withhold their sperm. Once a child comes into existence though, it's about the rights of the child; and the child has a right to be…

Child support is not punishment. It's support for the child. All children deserve financial support from the people who brought them into the world.

The fact that they didn't want him doesn't make him not their child.

Why shouldn't parents be forced to arrange the life of their own child? The child they chose to bring into the world? And yes, if you go for surrogacy in a country where abortion is illegal, you choose to bring it into the world no matter what. If they don't want the child, they can take him to Australia and put him…

Well there are the cases where sisters or cousins or close friends volunteer. Everything else I agree with, thinking everything can be solved through legalisation is very short-sighted.

It sounds like your situation is nothing like the one in the article and completely unlike what CrimeSceneShoe was talking about, so it's not about you at all. No need to tell her to go fuck herself, the point that surrogacy, especially overseas surrogacy, can be exploitative, is a valid one. She didn't say everyone…

Because it's a very serious concern. Informed consent is very easy to circumvent (informed only on paper), as many desperate people would sign anything to get paid so they can provide for themselves. How would you regulate that?

Well Australia is protecting its own women from exploitation which is all it could do. Passing laws so women in other countries wouldn't be exploited is a futile exercise, because people from other countries will continue to exploit them anyway, and meanwhile you've opened your own vulnerable citizens to exploitation…

So they should have put him up for adoption. It's their fuck-up that they chose a woman who's a national of a country where abortion is illegal. The child is their responsibility, not hers.

Of course they're responsible. The same way a man is responsible for any children he creates, even if he wanted the woman to abort them. It's about the child, not the couple. He's their child, they're responsible for him.

Because believing all women everywhere have the exact same amount of agency and control over their lives makes us feel like better feminists, because feminism is about correctly held beliefs and not about action or compassion. Didn't you know?

Because it's ripe for exploitation. Richer families taking advantage of poorer women. Here are the Ladyology's own words on it, from another comment:

For me, it's the huge potential for exploitation. It's yet another way to exploit female bodies.

Firstly, you said armpit shaving started in the USA, not the modern trend of it started in the USA. Secondly, where was I nasty? I see two perfectly neutral sentences in my post. And thirdly, it probably depends on the country you are in Europe, so extrapolating to the entire continent from several encounters isn't…

You said "several years ago". It was completely inaccurate.