{"id":301089,"date":"2023-11-05T11:30:31","date_gmt":"2023-11-05T17:30:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liveaction.org\/news\/?p=301089"},"modified":"2023-11-13T12:27:06","modified_gmt":"2023-11-13T18:27:06","slug":"handmaid-epidemic-renting-wombs-class-breeders","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/handmaid-epidemic-renting-wombs-class-breeders\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Handmaid’ epidemic: How renting wombs creates a class of ‘breeders’ for the elite"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>

Another story of a wealthy celebrity using surrogates to have children is raising questions about a “Handmaid’s Tale” epidemic \u2014 not due to abortion, but because women’s bodies are quite literally being used to create offspring for the wealthy elite.<\/p>\n

Broadway star Kyle Dean Massey told PEOPLE<\/a> in an exclusive that he and his husband, actor Taylor Frey, are having their second child. Their daughter, Rafa, was born using a surrogate, and their newest daughter is on the way thanks to a surrogate as well. But they also own Elevate, an egg retrieval and surrogacy business. So they are both using women’s bodies to make their own children, and profiting off of the entire process as well.<\/p>\n

“It takes an enormous amount of advanced planning,” Frey said of surrogacy. “Each step is intentional and deliberate and I’ve been so patient to go again because our priority has been to match our clients with surrogates before ourselves. I was constantly asking Kyle \u2014 who works more on the surrogacy side of our business \u2014 ‘is there anyone for us?'”<\/p>\n

Unlike other celebrity couples \u2014 such as Lance Bass<\/a> and his partner \u2014 Massey and Frey at least acknowledged their surrogate and showered her with praise. Yet the situation still calls into question the growing prevalence of surrogacy, particularly among the wealthy elite.<\/p>\n

WATCH: Jennifer Lahl shares dangers of egg donation and surrogacy for women and children<\/em><\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The women choosing to become surrogate mothers are not typically wealthy themselves; they are often poor women, looking to better their situations through something they see as generous and altruistic. The countries most used for commercial surrogacy are those with high poverty rates, like Ukraine<\/a>, because it’s a way to earn tens of thousands of dollars \u2014 but even surrogates in the United States are often low-income<\/a>.<\/p>\n

And their wealthy clients all too often tend to treat their bodies as property, buying insurance<\/a> in case the woman’s body doesn’t perform on demand as expected, or forcing a surrogate into abortion if the preborn child she’s carrying has a disability<\/a>, if she has too many multiples<\/a>, or even if the baby is the “wrong” gender<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Celebrities are playing a big role in making surrogacy seem like a normal, valid way to start a family, even for women who just don’t feel like carrying their own children. The list is seemingly endless: in addition to the aforementioned Bass and Massey, other celebrities buying women’s bodies for their own use include Kim and Khloe Kardashian<\/a>, Priyanka Chopra and Nick Jonas<\/a>, Paris Hilton<\/a>, Elvis Presley’s granddaughter Riley Keough<\/a>, Chrissy Teigen and John Legend<\/a>, Sherri Shepherd<\/a>, and many more.<\/p>\n

Taslima Nasreen, a feminist and humanist activist, perfectly summed up the ethical issues with surrogacy in a headline-making statement<\/a>\u00a0last year.<\/p>\n

“Surrogacy is possible because there are poor women. Rich people always want the existence of poverty in the society for their own interests. If you badly need to raise a child, adopt a homeless one,” she said. “I won\u2019t accept surrogacy until rich women become surrogate mom [sic]\u2026 [people] are abusing me for my comments on surrogacy. They claim it\u2019s my stone-age idea to not rent wombs for making babies. I suggest to adopt homeless children [and] to not exploit\/invade poor women\u2019s body. Actually its a stone-age idea by any means to reproduce babies for following traits.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Another story of a wealthy celebrity using surrogates to have children is raising questions about a “Handmaid’s Tale” epidemic \u2014 not due to abortion, but because women’s bodies are quite literally being used to create offspring for the wealthy elite. Broadway star Kyle Dean Massey told PEOPLE in an exclusive that he and his husband, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":301104,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false},"categories":[15,3473,9456,9459],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\n'Handmaid' epidemic: How renting wombs creates a class of 'breeders' for the elite<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"What if the real 'Handmaid's Tale' epidemic isn't due to abortion but surrogacy as women's bodies are used to create babies for wealthy elite?\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/handmaid-epidemic-renting-wombs-class-breeders\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"'Handmaid' epidemic: How renting wombs creates a class of 'breeders' for the elite\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"What if the real 'Handmaid's Tale' epidemic isn't due to abortion but surrogacy as women's bodies are used to create babies for wealthy elite?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/handmaid-epidemic-renting-wombs-class-breeders\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Live Action News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/liveaction\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2023-11-05T17:30:31+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2023-11-13T18:27:06+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/GettyImages-1248053750-handmaids.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"650\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Cassy Cooke\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@liveaction\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@liveaction\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Cassy Cooke\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/handmaid-epidemic-renting-wombs-class-breeders\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/handmaid-epidemic-renting-wombs-class-breeders\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Cassy Cooke\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/16622da192101346f516b7444d125392\"},\"headline\":\"‘Handmaid’ epidemic: How renting wombs creates a class of ‘breeders’ for the elite\",\"datePublished\":\"2023-11-05T17:30:31+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2023-11-13T18:27:06+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/handmaid-epidemic-renting-wombs-class-breeders\/\"},\"wordCount\":570,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/#organization\"},\"articleSection\":[\"Analysis\",\"Newsbreak\",\"Pop Culture\",\"Top Story on Homepage\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/handmaid-epidemic-renting-wombs-class-breeders\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/handmaid-epidemic-renting-wombs-class-breeders\/\",\"name\":\"'Handmaid' epidemic: How renting wombs creates a class of 'breeders' for the elite\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2023-11-05T17:30:31+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2023-11-13T18:27:06+00:00\",\"description\":\"What if the real 'Handmaid's Tale' epidemic isn't due to abortion but surrogacy as women's bodies are used to create babies for wealthy elite?\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/handmaid-epidemic-renting-wombs-class-breeders\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/handmaid-epidemic-renting-wombs-class-breeders\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/handmaid-epidemic-renting-wombs-class-breeders\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"‘Handmaid’ epidemic: How renting wombs creates a class of ‘breeders’ for the elite\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/\",\"name\":\"Live Action News\",\"description\":\"Covering Human Rights, Abortion, & Pro-Life Issues\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Live Action\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Live-Action-Logo-Black.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Live-Action-Logo-Black.png\",\"width\":701,\"height\":710,\"caption\":\"Live Action\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/liveaction\",\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/liveaction\",\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/liveactionorg\/\",\"https:\/\/www.pinterest.com\/LiveActionFilms\/\",\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/user\/LiveActionFilms\"]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/16622da192101346f516b7444d125392\",\"name\":\"Cassy Cooke\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/8b602f8210f1a7d948ca1c0dcab11fad?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/8b602f8210f1a7d948ca1c0dcab11fad?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Cassy Cooke\"},\"description\":\"Cassy has over 20 years of experience as a writer and editor, most of which have been spent covering pro-life issues like abortion, disability rights, euthanasia, and more.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/author\/cassy-fiano\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"'Handmaid' epidemic: How renting wombs creates a class of 'breeders' for the elite","description":"What if the real 'Handmaid's Tale' epidemic isn't due to abortion but surrogacy as women's bodies are used to create babies for wealthy elite?","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/handmaid-epidemic-renting-wombs-class-breeders\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"'Handmaid' epidemic: How renting wombs creates a class of 'breeders' for the elite","og_description":"What if the real 'Handmaid's Tale' epidemic isn't due to abortion but surrogacy as women's bodies are used to create babies for wealthy elite?","og_url":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/handmaid-epidemic-renting-wombs-class-breeders\/","og_site_name":"Live Action News","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/liveaction","article_published_time":"2023-11-05T17:30:31+00:00","article_modified_time":"2023-11-13T18:27:06+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1200,"height":650,"url":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/GettyImages-1248053750-handmaids.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Cassy Cooke","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@liveaction","twitter_site":"@liveaction","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Cassy Cooke","Est. reading time":"3 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/handmaid-epidemic-renting-wombs-class-breeders\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/handmaid-epidemic-renting-wombs-class-breeders\/"},"author":{"name":"Cassy Cooke","@id":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/16622da192101346f516b7444d125392"},"headline":"‘Handmaid’ epidemic: How renting wombs creates a class of ‘breeders’ for the elite","datePublished":"2023-11-05T17:30:31+00:00","dateModified":"2023-11-13T18:27:06+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/handmaid-epidemic-renting-wombs-class-breeders\/"},"wordCount":570,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/#organization"},"articleSection":["Analysis","Newsbreak","Pop Culture","Top Story on Homepage"],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/handmaid-epidemic-renting-wombs-class-breeders\/","url":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/handmaid-epidemic-renting-wombs-class-breeders\/","name":"'Handmaid' epidemic: How renting wombs creates a class of 'breeders' for the elite","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/#website"},"datePublished":"2023-11-05T17:30:31+00:00","dateModified":"2023-11-13T18:27:06+00:00","description":"What if the real 'Handmaid's Tale' epidemic isn't due to abortion but surrogacy as women's bodies are used to create babies for wealthy elite?","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/handmaid-epidemic-renting-wombs-class-breeders\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/handmaid-epidemic-renting-wombs-class-breeders\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/handmaid-epidemic-renting-wombs-class-breeders\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"‘Handmaid’ epidemic: How renting wombs creates a class of ‘breeders’ for the elite"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/#website","url":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/","name":"Live Action News","description":"Covering Human Rights, Abortion, & Pro-Life Issues","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/#organization","name":"Live Action","url":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Live-Action-Logo-Black.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Live-Action-Logo-Black.png","width":701,"height":710,"caption":"Live Action"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/liveaction","https:\/\/twitter.com\/liveaction","https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/liveactionorg\/","https:\/\/www.pinterest.com\/LiveActionFilms\/","https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/user\/LiveActionFilms"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/16622da192101346f516b7444d125392","name":"Cassy Cooke","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/8b602f8210f1a7d948ca1c0dcab11fad?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/8b602f8210f1a7d948ca1c0dcab11fad?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Cassy Cooke"},"description":"Cassy has over 20 years of experience as a writer and editor, most of which have been spent covering pro-life issues like abortion, disability rights, euthanasia, and more.","url":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/author\/cassy-fiano\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/301089"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=301089"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/301089\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":301529,"href":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/301089\/revisions\/301529"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/301104"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=301089"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=301089"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=301089"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}