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The American Fertility Association Blog
Tyra Update - Part Deux
January 23, 2008 - Wednesday
Posted by admin
To our extraordinary members:
We wanted to share our experience of you in the wake of our response to the calls, emails and blog entries we received about the taping of the Tyra Banks Show segment on infertility. The whole episode obviously struck a chord deep within this community. The blizzard of cyber-notes sent to us about our stance regarding the show’s alleged mishandling of the issue has been overwhelming. Thank you!
Thank you for your letters, both affirming and critical of our actions. Because what’s most important in all this is that you’ve spoken up, engaged with us and your peers about topics as sensitive and critical as fertility, infertility, assisted reproductive technologies, family-building, individual choice and public perception.
What can we say? You are remarkable.
Just to update you: Like you, we’re awaiting the airing of the show. We do believe in their right to produce whatever they want. We also believe in our right to respond. Now, everything we know comes from people who’ve told us what they witnessed at the toping. The reports were infuriating. So in the interest of getting a clear picture, we phoned the producers, hoping to hear their perspective. We’re still waiting for a return call.
Now, perhaps, as two of you have written, we jumped the gun with our open letter of protest to the show’s senior producer. If we did—great! Nothing would make us happier than to be mistaken about the Tyra Banks Show. We’d gleefully offer an apology. All we’re after is fair and intelligent treatment by the media. There’s no question but that we’ll fight for that and fight hard. (We’ll keep you posted as the situation unfolds.)
By the sheer volume of your correspondence to The AFA, it’s clear that you want the same. Your activism and input are essential to keeping the media, politicians and regulators on the ball and honest. So we want to take this unique opportunity to urge you to continue this dialog with and through The AFA. It’s so important that we communicate among ourselves, a kind of de facto think tank. To that end we’ll be publishing as many of your notes as we can fit in the next issue of Connections and putting all of them up--pro and con--on our blog.
It’s your voices, your opinions, ideas, experiences and observations that help The AFA shape its perspectives, educational initiatives and policy agenda on everything from compromised fertility, access to health care, treatment affordability and insurance to sexual and reproductive health and the pursuit of family-building. It’s your insights that make the difference.
Yes we are an educational organization, full of top-notch information free to everyone. But The AFA is also an energetic advocate for enlightened policies to guarantee the basic human right to have family. That means that we not only work on infertility and its ripple effects, we also tackle social, legal and political issues through the lens of fertility preservation and prevention. That includes, but certainly isn’t limited to, access to scientifically based sex education, an environment free of fertility-damaging toxins and efforts to promote all forms of family-building. Our goal is to elevate our issues into the mainstream national discussion about reproductive health and rights. Our goal is to be in the room when policy is made, not merely to respond after the fact.
So tune in and jack in. Ask questions. Send your personal stories for The AFA blog or our publications. Share your take on the medical, social, political aspects of infertility, fertility, third-party reproduction, adoption, foster care. After all, it’s about creating a family. It’s what you’re about. It’s what we’re about. We’re in it together. Let’s keep the connections open.
With warm regards,
The AFA Staff
Categories
Fertility •
Infertility •
Reproductive Technologies
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Trampling on Trust
January 21, 2008 - Monday
Posted by admin
As many of you know, The AFA makes every effort to assist the media when reports, stories and programs deal with infertility, reproductive difficulties, fertility preservation and protection. We were approached by the Tyra Banks show senior producer who pitched one segment about women who pursue ART despite repeated let-downs and perhaps impossible odds. We sent a notice to you asking if you’d be interested in participating in that show. Since then, reports have flowed back to us --it appears the taping revealed another agenda entirely. If that’s the case, we are furious on your behalf and ours. There is no excuse for a duplicitious solicitation. Below is the open letter we’ve sent to the Trya Banks senior producer and the first wave of responses from you. The emails are flowing in. As we get permission we’ll post more as they come in. Mind you, this blog is just the beginning of the long and robust dialog we at The AFA hope to continue with you about the issues that spark your interest and ignite the vital communications we all need. So let’s keep talking.
Ms. Radecki,
The American Fertility Association is writing in response to the numerous calls, emails and blog links we’ve received about the Tyra Banks Show you’ve produced about “infertility.”
We gladly assisted you in your effort to recruit people who’ve stuck with Assisted Reproduction despite long-shot odds and the painful difficulties associated with compromised fertility for an installment of your show. Your detailed query asked for contact with women who could speak emotionally and articulately about their determination and their struggles (see below). It is your right to interview willing and informed participants as you see fit. Here we underscore informed. Your show is not a news show, but rather planned entertainment. Nowhere in that initial letter or in numerous subsequent conversations did you even hint that what you were intending was a set up for “spontaneous” interventions and the subsequent damaging conflagrations.
Let’s be clear. If you’d honestly put forth your mission, stating that the Tyra Banks Show was interested in emotional confrontations, people willing to defend to family, friends and the world their particular quest for biogenetic children, we’d have put out your solicitation to our membership just the same. We believe in the intelligent decision-making capacities of the people The American Fertility Association serves. However, it now appears you were running a bait-and-switch operation designed to exploit well-meaning and, apparently, the most vulnerable among this group of patients simply to re-create a by-now tired and trite TV rite of public humiliation. That is simply reprehensible.
It is unfortunate that the prism through which The Tyra Banks Show chose to view the delicate and complex subjects of reproductive difficulties and associated medical treatments yielded very little about those topics. Instead, we are told, the focus was on manufactured conflict and hysteria. You could just as well have targeted any other poorly understood condition or disease and produced the same segment.
We regret that we have exposed our membership to such tactics. Despite urging that you treat reproductive difficulties with sensitivity and thoughtfulness—even if that yielded tough grilling and a feisty give-and-take, you chose to tread the same histrionic ground that’s pretty well trampled by now.
The Staff of The American Fertility Association
Categories
Adoption •
Fertility •
Infertility
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New Hosting Company
January 8, 2008 - Tuesday
Posted by admin
We’re switching to a new web hosting company to better serve you. We’ll be back next week.
Thanks for your patience!
Categories
Adoption
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