Redbook magazine has a new online gallery of photos that “capture the beauty surrogacy.” The surrogate pregnancy adventure was chronicle by a birth photographer with the intended parent boasting that “Surrogacy can be just as special and beautiful as a natural pregnancy and birth.”

As we often remark at the CBC, we live in a story war. These pictures certainly illustrate one side of the story—capturing the joy of the intended parents, the drama and pains of labor, and the great gift of human life.

But that’s where the story begins—not ends. And should a photographer or journalist truly want to chronicle the experience of the most important person in question here, the child created and born through the process, there’s a far longer, less optimistic journey ahead that also deserves to be told.

This child may one day seek to know more about his conception and long to know or be known by the woman in those birth photos.

This child may wonder why his birth was made into a production and broadcast on the internet.

This child may suffer psychologically and experience regret from the commerce that was involved in the surrogate pregnancy arrangements.

Who will be there to capture that part of the story and tell how it ends?

Image by kit4na via flickr (CC BY-SA 2.0)

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Christopher White, Ramsey Institute Project Director