IVF : Gay & Black Glossary

IVF (In Vitro Fertilisation) is a set of techniques infertile couples can use to have a child. In the simplest case, eggs are harvested from the female, and collected from the male and mixed in a petri dish. Then the most promising embryos are implanted in the female. The other embryos are killed or frozen indefinitely until they die or are killed. It often take repeated tries to get a viable, implanted embryo. Despite its simplicity, the procedure is very expensive. In most European countries, except Poland, the state covers the cost. Normally the Catholic church promotes fecundity by opposing condoms, abortion, masturbation, fellatio, homosexuality… But they oppose IVF on the grounds the spare embryos are killed.

I oppose IVF on a number of grounds.

• It costs tens of thousands of dollars for each child. The public health care budget would better be spent saving lives.
• It encourages parents to have ego-babies, leaving orphans un-cared for.
• The world as a whole is already grossly overpopulated, even if there are pockets with dwindling population.
• The generated children will inherit their parent’s fertility problems.
• Women may undergo the procedure who would never be considered qualified enough to adopt.

It can also be used to allow male-male and female-female couples to have a child. Most of my objections still stand.