Charity urges caution over Elton John 'adoption plan'

Funny thing about celebrity surrogate stories, celebrities can afford American surrogacy prices when their foreign adoption plans tank.

When Elton John was denied his Ukraine adoption-plan, (because he was too old and not married), where did the dream-baby come from?  America.

When Ricky Martin discovered his plan to adopt a child from every color was going to turn into a more global child-friendly plan, (combat child trafficking), did he abandon his dream to become a dad, himself?  Hell no!

In fact, thanks to his announcement to the world that he was gay having twins, via surrogacy, we learned just how brave he could be, with Oprah's support and encouragement , and talk about the importance of honesty in a parent-child relationship.

Who cares about the name of the surroate, or the agency he used... who cares about the rumors that he attended the birth of his twins, in San Diego.  None of that is important, is it?  After all, aren't famous people entitled to some privacy? Must we be so nosey and know every bloody detail about a wealthy person's life?  [pst... keeping things very private and away from suspicious eyes often costs extra money.... but most people already know this, don't they?]

When Nicole Kidman announced to the public she was going to be a mum for the fourth time, who did she thank?  Not the agency she used.... nope... she thanked her gestational carrier, and she was criticized for calling a surrogate a mere "gestational carrier", because some find that term offensive.  

Yep, in a world that must be fair, there are those who want others to know a surrogate is NOT some woman who delivers the goods, and walks away a richer woman. because she loaned her body-out to a complete stranger (with money).  Nooooo!  Many  surrogate-supporters want the world to know surrogates have to experience pain and suffereing and make many sacrifices, just so another person could have a child.  [You know, it's like using the word "Breeder" to describe a birth-mother who made an equally loving choice... or using the word "whore" to describe an "adult entertainer" --  you just don't say those things in public if you want to be cool, hip, and politically correct.]

In fact, if not for Nicole's honesty, we would never have learned little Faith, (bio-child of two world-famous Aussie parents), was born where else?  America, of course.  The Women's Hospital at Centennial Medical Center in Nashville, Tennessee, to be exact.  (Hey... here's a fun fact:  how many knew her first two were born in Florida -- a hop-skip-and-short-flight from Faith's birth-place?)

I for one can't bad-mouth any person for wanting the best health-care/hospital/doctor services money can get.  It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure-out  one gets what one pays for, especially if you're ready to make a baby/adoption-plan, Hollywood-Style.

Truth be told, I'd be SHOCKED if some gay/infertile celebrity chose Surrogacy Hot Spot, India as the prefered place to go and start a pregnancy/family.  (Then again, with all the money that can be had from traveling foreigners, who knows how India will look in a few very productive/profitable years....)  

As long as the wealthy/famous stay away from regions that can easily exploit the poor, there should be no real reason to believe Hollywood-style birth-plans have anything to do with surrogacy scams that  put young women and babies in terrible terrible uncertain situations.  [See:  Future uncertain for children of Thai baby scam ]. 

Yes, that was dripping sarcasm.

As an adoptee, I find it's a real effort not to feel sick about the many shady-ways the baby/family-making industry works, especially when one remembers how so many of these surrogacy  birth-stories began:

The popularity of adoption, due to high profile people like Angelina Jolie (three adopted children) and Madonna (two adopted children), at one stage rose to ridiculous heights prompting every Tom, Dick and his best mate to publicly declare that they would like to adopt a child. But with the popularity came the criticism and celebrities were lambasted for skipping prospective parents’ queues, glamorising an important institution and using it to their publicity-driven advantage. Outrage continued when it was revealed that Madonna’s adoption of Malawian David Banda in 2006 had been fast-tracked and Banda’s biological father allegedly had no idea he was signing over custody of his son to Madonna forever. In Malawi the law prohibits adoptions by non-residents and so the custody struggle began. She has since, however, successfully adopted another child, daughter Mercy, from Malawi.

Calista Flockhart, Sheryl Crow, Sandra Bullock,  Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman…these stars have all walked the red carpet of adoption. Nicole Kidman, however, recently changed tack when she announced that she and husband Keith Urban had become parents again on December 28, 2010, by surrogacy.

[From:  Surrogacy:  Fab or Fad?, March, 2011 ]

And yet, as twisted irony would have it, if we were to believe tabloidesque-gossip reporting, we'd soon start to believe wonder what really took place over ten years ago, when a famous married couple learned adoption could ease the pain felt by the infertile:

Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman were ­married in 1990 and tried to start a family, but had little success. Nicole told Vanity Fair nearly two decades later: ‘We lost a baby early on, so that was really very traumatic.’
Finally, the adoption option was pursued — apparently with the help of the Scientologists, who found a married Scientologist mother of two, who said that she could not afford to look after a third child, and offered the infant up for private adoption.
On December 22, 1992, the ­couple became parents to a 9lb girl they named ­Isabella Jane ­Kidman Cruise, who was born in a hospital in Miami.
They completed their family in 1995 by adopting Connor, then four months old.

[From:  Why a new baby won't end Nicole Kidman's family heartache, January 20, 2011 ]