The case of the two Italians detained in Argentina following the opening of an investigation by the local authorities against, as we learn, their intermediaries for the alleged exploitation of a woman in financial difficulty in the practice of surrogacy, tells us in essence, even if the charges will not be confirmed, that the Italian centre-right has done well to make gpa a universal crime, that is, prosecutable even abroad.
The Varchi law, named after the deputy from Fratelli d’Italia who was the first signatory of the proposal recently approved in both chambers of Parliament, has nothing to do with the affair, as the facts preceded the approval of the regulation, which is still awaiting publication in the Official Gazette. But the fact is nonetheless emblematic, especially since gestation for others is not forbidden but neither is it regulated in Argentina: the local authorities have in fact blocked the Italian couple with important charges against the agency that allegedly put the two of them in contact with the 28-year-old Argentine woman, such as human trafficking, sale and appropriation of minors. The suspicion is that the woman who gave birth to ‘their’ baby girl, born on 10 October, was financially exploited. The couple, together with the newborn and her biological mother, were ready to leave for Europe when they were apprehended. According to the authorities, the woman is ‘in a situation of extreme vulnerability‘ and was therefore contacted by virtue of this to give birth to the child. Under Argentine law, the newborn child is the child of the biological mother and of whoever agrees to become the parent, in this case one of the two Italians. To attract the attention of those investigating, there is the fact that he has only been to Argentina once, in August 2023: it is therefore impossible that he is the biological father. In addition, the man is resident in Italy, the woman in Rosario, north of Buenos Aires. The latter would therefore be in financial difficulties: she has no job, no qualifications and is the mother of a small daughter. In order to start the process, the intermediaries are said to have provided her with clinical tests and treatment, an insurance contract and rent for a house. Then came the payments: approximately EUR 10,000. The 28-year-old woman was apparently not new to the practice, having been practising gpa for about ten years.
The child born on 10 October will certainly not be affected by the new Italian law making the practice a universal offence, nor will the two gay parents be affected by the rule’s non-retroactivity. But the whole affair shows us what is hidden behind a practice that is portrayed as the free choice of an emancipated woman: in most cases it is not a matter of free women, but of people in economic difficulty who market their bodies and that of the children they carry in exchange for money. It is commodification, this, of women’s bodies and the unborn, and it is no coincidence that part of the feminists, the hard and pure ones untethered from progressive political ideology, fight the woke practice. A reason that confirms, therefore, why Fratelli d’Italia’s battle against the woke womb has always been just and sacrosanct.