In Defense of Artificial Reproduction
Let's talk about embracing a feminism that's more Firestone and less Flintstone.
Happy late new year, readers! I needed some time off to rest my cells, but I am happy to share that the hot take factory is very much back in operation, though I might start posting only twice a month to ensure quality of content and prevent me from burning out the way I did before I took this break.
Today I am sharing my thoughts on artificial reproduction, a rather controversial topic within most political convictions. To understand why feminists such as Shulamith Firestone have argued in favour of relocating reproduction using the power of technology, one has to consider how the responsibility of women to be the producers of new people has been used to justify sex-based hierarchies and stereotypes. An important thing to consider in this is the social and economic organisation of early modern society, which has established patterns of gender relations that to varying degrees remain alive and well to this day.
Looking at the evolution of gender throughout history from a materialist point of view, it becomes apparent that a primary factor that has been used to justify women’s subordination since the origins of private property as a way of managing resources has been their ability to give birth, which was strongly enforced as their one and only societal responsibility. Women were to dedicate most of their life to gestating and caring for children in order to pass on the family’s property. Being a woman equalled being a mother, and being a mother during this time came with the inability to maintain very much individual personhood in the midst of producing and caring for offspring in larger numbers than today, as it was significantly more common for babies to die during birth, or for grown children to die in the throes of disease or battles before they were able to inherit any of the family’s estate. Naturally, people of this time came to connect womanhood and motherhood inextricably, and to view women as naturally created and intended to be caregivers.
Circumstances like these came to divide people into classes of “producers” and “reproducers” as described by Firestone, categories that are in dire need of dissolution:
In the division of labor typical of traditional families, one half of the species sacrifices itself to perpetuate the entire humanity, while the other half goes about the “business of the world” (p. 205). This leads to a conception of the female gender as connected to the natural, while man is seen as the creator of culture. So, just as Marx and Engels called for a radical revolution whereby the underclass of proletariat should regain control of the means of production, so too should women revolt and seize control of the means of reproduction. And what’s more, just as the socialist revolution aimed to abolish not just the privilege of the bourgeoisie, but also the class distinction altogether, so should feminism eliminate sex differences completely. (1)
The connection of the female gender to the natural, and the romanticisation of this association that almost implies a demand for women to embrace what makes them different in comparison to men, is a deeply conservative idea. It does not surprise me at all that “tradfems” have made it their mission to redefine feminism in a way that does not seek to liberate women from the burden of traditional roles related to reproduction, but instead encourage them to celebrate their unique ability and do what they do best, do what they are “made for”. It seems completely unfitting and regressive, however, for radical feminists to be moving in a similar direction by deploying earthy, cottage-core “motherhood appreciation” posts, many of which come with an undertone of motherhood being a woman’s greatest contribution to society – as if nothing else she will ever do in her life could come close to this divine achievement.
In “Philosophical Trends in the Feminist Movement”, Anuradha Ghandy describes the cultural feminist desire to cling onto the differentiating factor of motherhood as a type of resignation – “women should not give up motherhood since this is the only power they have”. In other words, women deserve full equal rights because their presence in society is inevitable, because men need them to reproduce. This implies that if there was no such distinguishing factor, men would have no reason to share even a crumb of their power with women.
This is not only insulting to women, but also a wrongfully passive conception of feminist progress – men historically have not, for any reason, voluntarily given up their power to women, women have fought for and taken on power for themselves. Essentialising the natures of men and women as innate, in which women are non-violent natural caregivers and are therefore best fit for parenthood, while men are aggressive warmongers and have no good purpose in raising offspring, as their natural skill and affinity is for violently acquiring and maintaining power, is counterproductive to women’s struggle, as well as our shared struggle as workers:
It unites well with the postmodernist trend and has deflected the entire orientation of the women’s movement from being a struggle to change the material conditions of life of women to an analysis of “representations” and symbols. They have opposed the idea of women becoming a militant force because they emphasise the non-violent nature of the female. They are disregarding the role women have played in wars against tyranny throughout history. Women will and ought to continue to play an active part in just wars meant to end oppression and exploitation. Thus they will be active participants in the struggle for change. (p. 61)
We do not need a special trait that distinguishes women to justify their socio-political relevance. Whether we choose to reproduce or not, whether or not we are even able to, whether we do it out of the power of our own wombs or artificially constructed ones, all of this should not matter – women are people in their own right, thinkers and emotional beings, pacifists and violent fighters. Emphasising our real (biological) or perceived (socially constructed) differences will not get us any closer to society at large coming around to the simple reality of men’s and women’s equal human natures, and through this, the irrelevance and needlessness of gender itself.
In the following quote, Ursula K. Le Guin aptly criticises the dehumanising framing of women as earthly beings that operate mainly on natural intuitions, and she does so rightfully, as this framing does nothing but propagate and solidify traditional stereotypes of women being less capable of rational thought and intellectualism, which in turn justifies the categories of “producers” vs. “reproducers”:
“But I didn’t and still don’t like to make a cult of women’s knowledge, preening ourselves on knowing things men don’t know, women’s deep irrational wisdom, women’s instinctive knowledge of Nature, and so on. All that all too often reinforces the masculinist idea of women as primitive and inferior – women’s knowledge as elementary, primitive, always down at the dark roots, while men get to cultivate and own the flowers and crops that come up into the light. But why should women keep talking baby talk while men get to grow up? Why should women feel blindly while men get to think?” (3)
If we reject this esoteric talk of women’s magical traits and abilities, and view women simply as people, the same way men are people, with the same mental, intellectual, and emotional capabilities, and their own personalities and desires as individuals, we should recognise that we have one class of people unfairly disadvantaged by the biological conditions they happened to have been born into, and that entire oppressive systems of gender have been justified on the basis of this natural disadvantage. The same way we work on overcoming other physical disadvantages using progressive medical science, we should also look into freeing women from the burden of birthing without its naturalness being a counterargument:
“Human society,” (Firestone) wrote, “is an antiphysis – in a sense it is against nature; it does not passively submit to the presence of nature but rather takes over the control of nature on its own behalf.” She thus makes the perfectly sensible point that human beings do not, for example, passively submit to dying of exposure during the winter months on account of rain and snow being natural and therefore good, or at least unchangeable, but instead use technologies such as tools to build shelters and make clothes. (4)
In light of all of these considerations, the seemingly blanket rejection of artificial wombs on the part of radical feminists surprises me. Among various blogs and online postings warning about the fall of society looming because we’ve finally managed to artificially construct a lamb, I’ve recently seen a Twitter thread with esoteric undertones lamenting the soullessness of eliminating the “mother-daughter connection in the womb”, to which came an excellent reply along the lines of “soulless would be to put one’s partner through the pain of childbirth and countless medical complications when there could be a way to avoid it”. The womb-connection advocate in this case was a proud traditionalist, but the comments appeared to also resonate with the radfem bubble. Now that’s one horseshoe I wasn’t expecting, especially since it is radical feminists who are well aware of the health risks and class-based exploitations behind the practices of IVF and surrogacy, which I might write about in the future, and which may be eliminated using the technology of artificial wombs.
One might feel uneasy about Shulamith Firestone’s choice of wording, but in a sense, she had a point when she referred to pregnancy as “barbaric” and “like shitting a pumpkin”. Compared to releasing a simple nut, the physical sacrifices a mother makes are considerable. Most importantly, it is something that men do not have to go through, and if our aim is to free ourselves from sex-based expectations, stereotypes, and hierarchies, we should do what we can to get closer to reproductive equality. Reproduction may not be the one weird trick that brought us patriarchy itself, but it would be hard to deny its strong effects on gender relations.
The pains of pregnancy, birth, and motherhood are often romanticised to portray women as natural carers, as metaphysically connected to their offspring and to children as a whole, since they are so willing and able to endure this struggle to create life. Any amount of further stress and sacrifice for her children is expected to be gleefully shouldered by a woman – the societal expectations of what a good mother is supposed to be are unrealistically high. The marginal involvement of men in the reproductive process is used to justify their marginal role in childrearing as well, as it can help support the stereotype of men’s natural inability to be nurturing and caring in the way that women are said to be. The different roles in reproduction serve gendered expectations that are applied not only to parents, but men and women at large, in ways that will be hard to overcome regardless of any political changes we may accomplish.
Being a “mother” is not at all like being a “father”, biologically and in consequence socially. If we’re advocating for gender equality, the abolition of gender entirely even, we should argue that that is a problem and it ought to be the same, with all people being able to simply be “parents”. As rewarding as it may be to many, the birthing process and everything that surrounds it has implications for a woman’s life that some would prefer to avoid, and that men can live without. Forgoing motherhood is not a matter of lack of respect and appreciation, or anything that can be changed by making sharepics about how divine and magical birthing children is. It is not the evils of patriarchy and gendered oppression that make a woman internalise a misogynistic ideology of anti-motherhood and choose not to reproduce. It is a material decision and a personal one that for a notable number of women would not be made if the experience of motherhood did not carry such unique burdens.
It is important to also mention the regressive social and political implications that the celebration of “giving life” as women’s natural mission and single source of power might have in the future. Having fewer children has been a reliably predictable outcome of societies evolving in favour of equal education, professional opportunities, and economic security for women. Politicians of the first world already are starting to be concerned with this in light of aging populations and smaller numbers of potential future workers. In the foreseeable future, as the standard of living rises even in countries whose immigrants we currently hire to work in understaffed jobs, we can expect covert to overt pressure on women to keep reproducing in the numbers required, through political decisions, social pressures, and conservative pro-family propaganda – and if feminists continue to romanticise biological motherhood uncritically, their messages will end up sounding more or less the same, even if the intent may be different. This would mean that all sides of the political spectrum will have taken on the position that women should make peace with their biological task as reproducers of humanity and start prioritising the right things in life.
It should be easy to see how such an evolution in the public opinion, especially if it is supported by people who hold political power, would mean absolute societal regression. The “divine feminine” portrayal of pregnancy, birth, and motherhood, almost always embedded in the classic nuclear family unit, on the part of feminists who claim to have taken on the banner of women’s liberation is a sign of conservative ideals and clear assignments of sex-based social roles making their way back into our society that I find concerning, especially when it comes with an esotericism reminiscent of anti-enlightenment ideologies, which is usually inseparable from the nature fetish.
Yes, we should support mothers and appreciate the work they do for society. Yes, we should make their lives easier wherever possible and do what we can to make biological motherhood a safer and more pleasant existence to be in, socially, economically, and in terms of health. But a fundamental unfair inequity lies in the way that biology has formed us, and that cannot be completely abolished until we find a way to outsource birth using the advances of technology. Feminists who lived around the time Firestone did, such as Anuradha Ghandy, have dismissed this idea as a utopian fantasy that should be done away with in favour of more realistic and practical ideas. Living in 2023, however, means that this technology is actually within our reach, and this does not have to be a bad thing at all.
Recognising the burdens around motherhood and looking for ways to solve them is not internalised misogyny. If anything, misogyny would be to firmly advocate against advancements that could relieve women from the pains of childbirth, and if executed within the right framework, could help us make huge strides in terms of gender equality and abolition.
Of course, this needs to be done right, and with the best interest of people in mind. Would I trust a profit-oriented private corporation with my potential offspring? Or even the state in the way it currently exists? Probably not. To ensure that this technology is used responsibly and with care, advocating for the control of the working class over the means of production and reproduction through socialism should be at the forefront of our political priorities. But in order to think about the ways in which such a technology could be harmful and find solutions to potential problems before they occur, in order to steer the development of this technology in a positive direction, we first have to be open to the possibility in the first place, and I would argue that we absolutely should be.
End the traditional nature fetish. Embrace cyber-communism!
We have nothing to lose but our reproductive chains.