Does Priyanka Chopra Deserve Hate Because She Had Her Baby Via Surrogate?

The striking Priyanka Chopra surrogacy update has fired up internet trolls who are finding it hard to digest that the superstar took an unconventional route to motherhood. Criticism directed the 39-year-old's way ranges from accusing her of 'using' another person's body in a bid to save her own from the pressures of pregnancy, to questioning the kind of mother she will become since she hasn't birthed the baby herself.

In what turned out to be a well-kept secret, Chopra and her husband, singer Nick Jonas dropped a surprise announcement Friday on social media, saying they were overjoyed at having welcomed their first child via surrogacy. "We respectfully ask for privacy during this special time as we focus on our family," they said in a short joint statement.

The couple married in 2018. There are certain reports confirming they are blessed with a daughter.

Easily one of the most famous global celebrities today, Chopra with her news of motherhood was bound to evoke a strong reaction. She holds influence both in India and the United States with a staggering body of acting, singing and entrepreneurial work. Therefore, the attacks coming her way are multifold too.

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"Rich people pay poor people to have kids for them so their bodies don’t get wrecked," one Twitter user wrote, commenting on the hotly trending subject of Chopra and Nick's surrogacy child. "Not rich people trying to convince us that they don’t opt for surrogacy for vanity purposes. It’s exploitative & unethical," another wrote.

"This is very wrong trend and a attempt to change working of nature ...by using power and money... If you can't suffer 9month for your baby then you don't have any right to be mother," one remark read. And there are tens more, similar in tone. 

Another bunch is furiously Googling what exactly surrogacy is. Meanwhile, there is immense support for the new parents too. While some are pointing out Chopra's age in relation to the possibility of pregnancy risks, many others are defending the couple's right to choose.

Chopra is not the first mega-celebrity to embrace motherhood through surrogacy. Kim Kardashian welcomed her third child Chicago via surrogate in 2018. Shah Rukh Khan also popularised the idea of surrogacy in the mainstream back in 2013 with his son AbRam, born via surrogacy. Here are more names.

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So why is there so much hate coming the way of Chopra and Jonas? Does the route one takes towards parenthood define the kind of parents they will be? Why must the lack of a 'natural birth' render other motherhood journeys unnatural? Should the social media audience feel so entitled as to speculate about a woman's capabilities of raising a child that wasn't delivered from her body?

Could it possibly be that the deluge of judgment coming Chopra's way is an extension of the outrage around the other stereotypes she has overstepped? Of marrying a man younger than her and of another nationality, of making it big as an independent, successful woman, of speaking her mind candidly.

Does the route one takes towards parenthood define the kind of parents they will be?

For the gatekeepers of culture, Chopra is not a lone target. All adoptive mothers, foster mothers, single mothers, stepmothers, mothers after 40, divorced mothers come within the purview of traditionalist trolls frothing at their mouths about how the 'purity' of motherhood - under the most ideal circumstances of age, place, family - is being destroyed.

But, just as trans activist Gauri Sawant once said in an &t=601s">interview with SheThePeople, "You don't need a uterus to be a mother," it would be best that people accept parenthood comes in a million ways, none inferior to another.

Views expressed are the author's own.