Friday, 21 January 2011

Words and Phrases that Make Me Ill at Ease

'Gestational carrier', the phrase used by Nicole Kidman and her husband, to refer to the woman who bore them a second child.

4 comments:

  1. Sterile prose used to describe the most poetic wonder of the natural world. Completely agree with you. I'm glad I don't have to read their love notes to each other -- or, should I say: "Their endorphine-caused essays composed with the purpose of edifying each other's belief in the verity of their romantic bond." Blech.

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  2. I feel ill at ease about the way the phrase dehumanises someone who actually went through the flesh and blood experience - not a person, a carrier. This news coming hot on the heels of the news that Elton John and his partner have a surrogate-produced child makes me worry about the ethics of wealthy well-known people asking anonymous females to contribute their physical effort to the cause of producing the well-known people's offspring. On the subject of sterile interchanges, in today's SMH Mike Carlton reproduces quite a funny imagined breakfast table conversation between J Gillard and her partner.

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  3. We can all guess the contract-breaking storyline if the 'carrier' were referred to as a 'surrogate mum'. Hallmark Channel does a nice line in such 'based on a true story' films.

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