Here in (country) everyone on the left hates surrogacy with a burning passion, since it involves rich people essentially buying babies and using the bodies of poor women for their own benefit. Even the right wing parties feel sliiightly uncomfortable discussing said topics (with the exception of the extremely liberal ones who also love to act all european and modern).
Even sitcoms such as Friends or Always Sunny in Philadelphia had plotlines where this happened and they didn't pointed out how some rich fuck was taking advantage of a poor person. (Well, it was a sitcom so the poor person was either an asshole or doing it out of the goodness of their hearts, but you get the picture: whitewashing surrogacy is also bad).
So yeah, what's the deal with that? No one points out how fucked up it is???
It also comes from people that would surprise you. I told my parents years ago that I was thinking of just adopting kids because I didn't want to bring any into this world and my mother said "it's just not the same". Excuse me? I have 2 first cousins with whom we're close who were adopted into this family. So how exactly do you think of them then? It's just so gross man.
The weirdest part is that my mother was so desperate to become a grandmother at that time (she still wants to be but I think she's altered her priorities) and yet she was still being picky about HOW she would become a grandma. The whole interaction was so gross and it further solidified my decision to keep some distance from my parents. At least my father I trust would love them (unless they came out as gay later in life 🙄).
oh, 100%. the friend who blurted that out to me is not who i would have expected to harbor that kind of sentiment, which is why i pushed back. i also had some pushback from family when i talked about the same topic, for different reasons. i.e. i wasn't/am not interested in reproducing personally. i like kids. i've worked with kids. they're funny.
i was explaining this and there was a big freakout, "don't you want kids!!" and i'm saying, "i am older now. pretty much everybody out there now already has some kids, so i'm likely to get some as a package deal. and if i get real charged up about it and come into enormous wealth, i could adopt a kid. either way, i would be passing on what i think is important: my values, my knowledge, my sense of humor, etc. not like myopia, baldness, and heart disease." and there was definitely still pushback like "no it needs to be biologically yours for some reason i can't articulate without looking like a complete asshole" which eventually petered out.
i think a lot of it has to do with media conditioning. if you go off road with your life plan, people expect or even feel owed an explanation. and the road in america is making miniature versions of yourself, which is apparently the only way some people can ever experience true, unconditional love: looking at a small, cuter version of themselves that is utterly dependent and malleable.