# Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022 > [!cite] > Tao, Han. ‘A Desirable Future of Unaffordable Hope? Queer People Becoming Parents Through Assisted Reproductive Technology (ART) in Guangdong, China’. *Culture, Health & Sexuality*, vol. 25, no. 4 (2022), pp. 413–427. https://doi.org/10.1080/13691058.2022.2049879. > [!abstract] > Based on one-year’s ethnographic fieldwork, this article unpacks experiences of assisted reproductive technology (ART) among queer parents and queer wannabe parents in Guangdong, China. Although existing state regulation on the use of ART and birth planning tends to deny parenthood to single and queer people and further limits their ability to form legible family units, queer parents who have had children through ART are growing in number in urban China. This research delineates how state and cultural conventions, together with market and economic conditions, have shaped queer individuals’ decision making regarding whether, when and how to have children. Findings make an original contribution to studies of the use of reproductive technology in Chinese queer lives. Narratives regarding how queer parents employ ART services unscramble links between sexual citizenship and reproductive agency, as individuals make consumer choices and reproductive decisions synchronously. The paper also explores alleged LGBT-friendly ART companies and the image of a desirable ‘rainbow baby’ they have created. Chinese queer parents’ participation in assisted reproduction has destabilised the dominant hetero-reproductive family matrix while simultaneously contributing to stratified reproduction. --- ‘In 1979, the state introduced the one-child policy to restrict population growth, but this was replaced by the two child policy in 2015.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 414)]] ^6a5266 ‘In 2001, the Ministry of Health in China issued Order No.14, concerning the Management Measures of Human Assisted Reproduction Technology, and Order No.15, detailing Regulations for the Administration of Sperm Banks. These orders were aligned with China’s family planning policy, meaning that ART, including IUI (intrauterine insemination, also known as artificial insemination), and IVF (In Vitro Fertilisation), were only available to married infertile couples. In addition, the orders prohibited surrogacy and the trading of human sperm, eggs and embryos.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 415)]] ^5fb888 ‘China’s ART regulations have strongly reinforced a hetero-reproductive family model, denying parenthood to single and non-heterosexual people and restricting their ability to form legible family units (Lo 2020; Yu, Liu and Lo 2018).’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 415)]] ^aca827 ‘\[There are] two types of Chinese private ART company. The first works as a service provider with access to a completely underground industrial chain. The second comprises intermediary agencies that provide access to service providers in either mainland China or overseas. Both are registered as health consulting services or medical devices companies and are not licenced to provide medical treatment.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 415)]] ^b6645e ‘Shenzhen and Guangzhou are located in the Pearl River Delta Metropolitan Region, the largest economic hub in China.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 416)]] ^40f9a1 ‘Internal regional variation within China should not be discounted, as every region has its own distinctive cultural and socio-political history that shapes local life.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 416)]] ^6212e5 ‘Importantly, queer lives are not only sexualised and gendered but also classed (Taylor 2010; Engebretsen 2013).’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 416)]] ‘Founded in Guangzhou in 2008, PFLAG China has grown to be one of the largest Chinese LGBT non-profit organisations.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 417)]] ‘By becoming the major sponsors, private ART companies have used LGBT events to approach potential clients and have linked the topic of queer parenting to the use of ART.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 418)]] ‘The term ‘rainbow baby’ initially referred to a baby born after the loss of a previous baby due to miscarriage, stillbirth or infant loss. Over the last few years, gay and lesbian bloggers, LGBT organisations and private ART companies in China have come to include reference to both ‘rainbow family (caihong jiating)’ and ‘rainbow baby (caihong baobao)’ in Chinese LGBT slang. At another PFLAG China event, the host asked a gay father who had had a son through surrogacy, ‘why did you want a rainbow baby?’ In this context, ‘rainbow baby’ has become a term exclusively for babies born through ART and free from association with hetero-reproductive relationships.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 418)]] ‘Chen and her partner Liu became co-mothers through IVF in 2016. Using their eggs and the same man’s sperm, Liu gave birth to twins. Such a process is referred to as AB *luan* (egg) B *huai* (conceive) in lesbian communities.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 418)]] ‘A survey conducted by *Gayscript* magazine4 in 2018 indicates that surrogacy has become the ideal choice for Chinese gay wannabe fathers.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 418)]] ‘ART has often been considered the ideal conjugal practice since within it, a same-sex couple form an exclusive co-parenting relationship, while other practices usually involved another opposite-sex biological parent who cannot simply be “kicked out” of their familial life.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 419)]] ‘Unmarried Chinese individuals are not legally permitted to use ART services in accredited clinics. So, if wannabe parents want to employ ART without getting married and without getting into legally grey territory, they have had to do so through cross-border reproductive tourism.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 419)]] ‘While some single lesbians may choose to employ IUI, middle-aged respondents often found the success rate of IUI unsatisfying and turned to IVF. Many lesbian couples in Guangdong sought out reciprocal IVF as their first choice so as to become co-mothers.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 420)]] ‘Chen’s HH company and many other Chinese ART companies promoted ‘guaranteed success’ IVF (starting from ¥120,000/$18,800) and surrogacy (starting from ¥650,000/$102,000) packages, promising clients ‘unlimited’ treatment cycles until success. The client could choose the sex of their children by upgrading to a more expensive package. Chen also introduced some LGBT-exclusive packages, including ‘A(B) *luan* B *huai*’ for lesbian couples (starting from ¥150,000/$23,500) and ‘twin surrogacy with two biological fathers’ (starting from ¥ 750,000/$117,700) for gay couples. Fees were not fixed however and often depended on negotiation between the salesperson and the client.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 420)]] ‘Although a large amount of money circulates in the Chinese ART industry, contracts between private ART companies and clients are invalid under Chinese law.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 420)]] ‘Each friend-respondent recounted how they made their investigations and decisions in selecting the sperm/egg donor. They looked at the egg/sperm donor’s skin colour, height, educational background, career, health and other characteristics. Respondents emphasised that they were willing to pay more for ‘high-quality’ eggs/ sperm donors who were models, university graduates, pilots and so on.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 421)]] ‘Min, a university professor in Shenzhen, selected a Chinese egg donor studying in the USA because he did not want his children to look ‘different’. His concern resonated with several lesbian respondents: having a mixed-race baby meant other people would be curious about the baby’s biological parent, which might cause gossip and trouble, especially for people working in state-owned organisations.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 421)]] ‘\[…] other respondents revealed that employing ART to have children took much longer than they expected, and the process was far from risk-free in terms of money spent and parenthood recognition. Many of them changed their initial schedule, ART agencies and clinics, and egg/sperm donors, or even stopped the procedure for health, legal and economic reasons.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 421)]] ‘For Chinese queer parents seeking children without entering a heterosexual marriage, the legal challenges faced while seeking to register the birth and hukou (household registration) are similar to those straight people encounter with ‘out-of-wedlock’/‘outof-quota’ births. Every Chinese citizen is required to register in one hukou booklet which contains personal details including name, date of birth, family members and permanent residence; more importantly, hukou links accessibility to citizenship rights and state benefits such as public schooling, housing, and healthcare. Without two married parents who comply with birth regulations, the newborn child would likely be classified as an ‘unplanned’ child and risk becoming a legal nonperson (Greenhalgh 2003).’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 421)]] ‘In my research, queer parents who used ART were only able to register their ‘unplanned’ children after either paying a considerable amount of money or through social connections (guanxi) with local officials. Many of them received inconsistent guidance from different local departments and spent weeks or even months amassing the documentation required by officials. Some queer parents who employed ART in the USA therefore chose to let their children have US citizenship and sent them to private international schools in Guangdong, which were far more expensive than public schools.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 422)]] ‘Gender norms often shaped friend-respondents’ experiences as unmarried parents. In explaining their unmarried births to others, lesbian mothers showed more concern than gay fathers, since being recognised as an unmarried parent in the workplace and the neighbourhood could be more problematic for women.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 422)]] ‘Gay fathers I met did not think it was immensely difficult to explain where the child came from. For instance, Tian pretended to be a single heterosexual man who had had a romantic affair with a foreign woman when he brought his newborn son from Cambodia to China. When he went to the police station to register *hukou* for his baby son, he told the officials that the mother did not want the child and showed them a statement written by the birth mother as proof. The overseas birth certificate and the birth mother’s written claim were provided by the ART agency, which included them as a part of their service.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 422)]] ‘The concerns lesbian mothers had involved not only social attitudes, but also social policy regarding unmarried childbirth. The social security departments in many Chinese cities were reported as refusing to issue a maternity allowance to unmarried mothers since they were against the family planning policy.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 422)]] ‘Nevertheless, Pam and other respondents told me they would rather be recognised as single parents than childless queer people, by colleagues and relatives, as the latter were considered more deviant.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 422)]] ‘In July 2021, the State Council published a decision to promote long-term and balanced population development; this decision allows a married couple to have three children and abolished social maintenance fees and other penalties on hukou registration. That said, although the penalties for ‘unplanned’ births have been removed, unmarried Chinese citizens are still not allowed to use IUI/IVF in accredited hospitals.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 423)]] ‘The experience of queer parents who employed ART echoed Chen’s saying, which is “wait until you are wealthy enough to have children”.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 423)]] ‘The emerging trend of pursuing ART among queer people should not be reduced to the individual desire to have biological offspring (Mizielinska 2022). Instead, Chinese queer people’s desire to use ART is also connected to their parents’ or partners’ (or partners’ parents’) aspirations for children and family (Lo, Chan and Chan 2016; Tao 2021). After all, having children is about ‘being a family, being together with children, and having someone to refer to as one’s own’ (Folger 2008, 135), queer and straight alike.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 423)]] ‘Queer subjects who lacked the financial capital, knowledge and agency to make the “right” reproductive decision are largely excluded from rainbow parenthood. As Kong (2010, 12) suggests, being gay in mainland China “has slowly shifted from the medical and deviant discourse of homosexuality to a new type of cultural and urban citizenship emphasising ‘quality’ *(suzhi*), individuality, difference and modernity”.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 423–424)]] ‘Bell and Binnie (2000) remind us that while we are all sexual citizens, we are not all equal sexual citizens.’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 424)]] ‘With the emergence of ART, queer people can become parents without heterosexual intercourse and without entering any form of marriage. At the same time, the high costs of IVF-related services and the extended timeframe required for such procedures arguably reproduce a social stratification of sexual citizenship with respect to the process of having children. As many studies indicate, access to ART remains largely restricted to the global elite class (Twine 2015; Mamo and Alston-Stepnitz 2015).’ [[Tao, ‘Desirable Future or Unaffordable Hope’, 2022|(Tao 2022, 424–425)]]