Podcast host Michael Knowles of The Daily Wire spoke at Clemson University on Wednesday about the commodification of children.
During his lecture, The Daily Wire host said children have become "commodities to be bought and sold" with the rise of in vitro fertilization (IVF) and surrogacy. Knowles noted a connection between homosexuality with IVF and surrogacy.
“If men and women really aren’t different, then moms and dads really aren’t different, and if moms and dads really aren’t different, then why would anyone need, or even want, to have both of them?" Knowles said. "What’s the difference between a family and a couple of fellas if that premise is true?”
Knowles stressed the importance of both sex parents being in a child's life and said the removal of a child from their biological mother was inconceivably cruel. The Daily Wire host further said a child without their biological mother used to be a "rare tragedy."
“I do not primarily blame the homosexuals of either sex for this awful situation.” Knowles said. “They are simply following a 60-year series of delusions that our culture and politics have promoted to their logical conclusion.”
The Daily Wire host clarified the "primary culprit" of IVF and surrogacy was "morally" and "precisely ... capitalism."
"Unconstrained by morality, and more precisely still, the commodification of children… Capitalism, circumscribed by morality, is as fine a method for producing morality as has ever been discovered," he elaborated. "Capitalism, unconstrained by morality, is a monstrosity.”
Knowles criticized the process of IVF as some embryos are indefinitely frozen or disposed of, which The Daily Wire host said was a callous disregard for human life. The podcaster also compared the morality of IVF with rape and said, although life can be conceived through both acts, they were morally wrong.
Children should be seen as a "blessing" rather than a "thing" to be commodified, Knowles concluded.
The Clemson Young Democratic Socialists of America opposed Knowles' Wednesday event in an Instagram post.
"We are disgusted at the decision by Young Americans for Freedom to have Michael Knowles, a fascist that has called for the eradication of trans people to Clemson University," the post read, encouraging students to reserve a ticket to either "attend" or "fill the arena in the hopes that his speech yields as little participants as possible."
"Be there on December 6th and help show this a--hole that HE AND HIS BELIEFS ARE NOT WELCOME AT CLEMSON UNIVERSITY," the post concluded.
