IntroductionOver time, surrogacy has become more broadly available to a variety of people (e.g. male same-sex couples or transgender women). Whether the wider public supports surrogacy, and what contributes to such support remains unclear. This study investigated what demographic and surrogacy arrangement-based (which people participate in the arrangement) factors shape attitudes towards surrogacy.MethodA representative sample of Dutch adults (N = 1,074) reported their attitudes on four (out of 30) randomly assigned vignettes in 2023. Each vignette described a surrogacy family with variations in sexuality and gender of parents, the social and genetic bonds between the parents, the surrogate, and the oocyte donor, and was followed by an attitude questionnaire (6 items). Multilevel regression analyses were conducted with attitudes as the dependent variable and demographic factors (gender, Dutch background, age, education, sexual orientation, urbanisation, and religiosity) and arrangement-based factors (parental composition, genetic and social bonds with the surrogate, and oocyte donors).ResultsParticipants held fairly positive attitudes towards surrogacy. People identifying as women, with only having a Dutch background, who were younger, more highly educated, non-heterosexual, or less religious were more likely to have positive attitudes. Participants had more positive attitudes if surrogacy arrangements entailed cis-man cis-woman parents compared to cis-man cis-man or transgender parents, and when there was no social bond between parents and oocyte donor.ConclusionsAttitudes are influenced by both demographic and arrangement-based factors. Based on these findings, families can be informed of fairly positive reactions they might encounter from their environment.
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Globalization was supposed to connect people, but instead ended up connecting the powerful. Local news is rapidly disappearing and leaving crucial stories unreported, communities unrepresented and disconnected, a side-effect of digitalization and the ownership concentration in media markets. But local and hyperlocal media play an important role in sustaining robust and resilient regimes of public service. In an age of technological changes and political pressure, niche publications and a renaissance of zines lead the quest for new, sustainable models in publishing.In the second instalment of the special edition Eurozine podcast series, produced by Talk Eastern Europe, Eurozine editor-in-chief Réka Kinga Papp talks media models old and new with Rachael Jolley, editor of Index on Censorship and philosopher Miriam Rasch of the Institute of Network Cultures.
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