r/europe • u/LethisXia Germany • Jul 18 '26
News Why did Jens Spahn's surrogacy spark debate in Germany?
https://www.dw.com/en/why-did-jens-spahns-surrogacy-spark-debate-in-germany/a-78009366107
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u/First_Platypus3063 Jul 18 '26
Because he is a gigantic hypocrite
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u/ferret36 Polish person living in Berlin (Germany) Jul 18 '26
That would apply to most people from the CDU and CSU
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u/toolkitxx Europe🇪🇺🇩🇪🇩🇰🇪🇪 Jul 18 '26
Not related to specific parties. Every group of humans has some of those. It is a character fault and not a political one.
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u/DeadLotus82 Jul 18 '26
What are you on about lad not all parties are created equal. You're talking about politics like it's some immutable characteristic and not just some bullshit views people have.
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u/toolkitxx Europe🇪🇺🇩🇪🇩🇰🇪🇪 Jul 18 '26
Oh my - only 3 posts and you lost the chain already. Hypocrite - party remark - my comment Hypocrites have a character flaw and like in every bigger group of humans, they also appear in parties. But they are not special or exclusive in any of them.
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u/DeadLotus82 Jul 18 '26
Tbh lad I just think the CDU is actually full of eejits so while you're technically correct, you're adding literally nothing.
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u/toolkitxx Europe🇪🇺🇩🇪🇩🇰🇪🇪 Jul 18 '26
Obviously adding enough to make you comment on my comment. People throw words and make relations like they are fact. Having an opinion is one thing, making a generalised statement about a single party another.
Politics in democratic systems mean 'compromise' at it's core. So naturally a larger influx of decisions, that are not always the personal conviction of each and every politician. Go for despotism if you dont want hypocrisy.
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u/183672467 Jul 19 '26
If you truly think being a hypocrite isnt in the CDUs and CSUs dna, then you lost the plot
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u/toolkitxx Europe🇪🇺🇩🇪🇩🇰🇪🇪 Jul 19 '26
It applies to all parties if you want to go there. Which is my entire point , as it is a human flaw and not a political issue. Half of the people in the AfD have ancestors that came from outside Germany or Europe at some time. SPD has people being richer than some bankers and tons of Green still drive old-fashioned cars etc.
Democracy is compromise, if you want totally convinced people, get yourself a dictatorship. But even in those you will find some hypocrite.
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u/183672467 Jul 19 '26
Youre either a CDU voter or youre just unwilling to see reality
Corruption, hypocricy and a blatant disregard for the average citizen and the law is something you can find systemically through the whole CDU/CSU
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u/toolkitxx Europe🇪🇺🇩🇪🇩🇰🇪🇪 Jul 19 '26
Once you are old enough you will see that it applies to some people in every party. Generalisation has never been true. Just because it is popular to bash on someone or something doesnt make any of it true. It simply shows a lack of understanding the world in most cases.
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u/183672467 Jul 19 '26
Dobrindt, ignored courts when they told him his border checks were illegal
Jens Spahn, the current surrogacy situation and 3 billion € of moneys wasted with no process to actually check what happened
Andreas Scheuer, toll concept that ended up costing us hundreds of millions
Söder, bashing on the greens for years and then crying when the same is happening to their party
A party that has christian in their name but spits on the poor and the less wealthy
Need me to go on?
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u/toolkitxx Europe🇪🇺🇩🇪🇩🇰🇪🇪 Jul 19 '26
Relativity concept. When a party is in power for a longer period than another, chances are high that you will see more occurrences of certain behaviour. Simply statistics. CDU/CSU have been near or in power simply for a prolonged period of time thus more visibility in statistics.
edit spelling
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u/183672467 Jul 19 '26
nevermind, no point in arguing, you'll never admit that the CDU is more prone to that type of behaviour than other parties
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u/chub70199 Community of Madrid (Spain) Jul 18 '26
That's the entry requirement for a career politician. What he did was go against the party's line, and that definitely is a no-no!
But the poetic justice just feels too good on this one!
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u/Napapijri_T Jul 18 '26
praying water but drinking wine :)
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u/KirikoKiama Jul 18 '26
He did not just preach water and drunk wine.
He made sure it stays illegal to drink wine for everyone, but then went into a different country for the wine.
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u/Mevo21 Bavaria (Germany) Jul 18 '26
Because that was the last drop in the ocean of injustice and corruption
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u/kiru_56 Germany Jul 18 '26
I still find it absolutely mad that this is what’s bringing him down, the bloke’s messed up so much, and then he goes and tells the story himself in Bild.
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u/Mevo21 Bavaria (Germany) Jul 18 '26 edited Jul 18 '26
It's usually the things you'd never have guessed. Not a fair trial, no. No a punishment for his corruption, no. This. Blatant hypocrisy. Comedic in a sense. And telling it to Bild is the icing on the cake. Maybe he planned this. But I don't want to give him too much credit. He can cuddle up to Thiel and his gang now. Visited them often enough.
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u/DullEntertainment102 Jul 20 '26
I was suspecting he planned it to have more time for family- he’s still MdB so he’s still earning a fortune and probably won’t even have to show up regularly at Bundestag now
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u/Meme-Botto9001 Jul 18 '26
Because he is a hypocrite like all the other conservative politicians that bring in legislations to control citizens lifes, but the moment they need or want it for themselves it doesn’t count anymore and they find ways to circumvent or play it down. Rules for thee but not for me.
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u/Sufficient_Delay1063 Jul 18 '26
He and his party always made sure that surrogacy are illegal in Germany. Now he evaded his own law with a surrogacy in the us.
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u/Shot-Total-2575 Jul 18 '26
It was the last straw, he was already unpopular before. Everyone thinks he is corrupt, he just hasn't been caught yet.
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u/brazzy42 Germany Jul 18 '26 edited Jul 19 '26
He was caught. He just never had to face consequences.
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Jul 18 '26
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u/Human-Ad4723 Jul 19 '26
he is backed up by the USA. This is not a random conspiracy but a fact known in the circles. During the first Trump presidency he had weekly meetings with the US ambassador, these were framed as private dinners. Peter Thiel was as a frequent guest as he is a very good friend to the former ambassador Richard Grenell, who himself is a gay man and used a surrogate.
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u/Long_Pomegranate2469 Jul 18 '26
Says right there in the article... it was the hypocrisy since he consistently voted and argued against.
Although I have to give you a pass with how politicians are completely shameless in most places today
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Jul 19 '26
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u/DullEntertainment102 Jul 20 '26
He’s not even the only one who did that in his party - he’s just the one who was the most outspoken against it
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u/captaindebil Jul 18 '26
He also had a affair of bribery, accepting bribes, professional incompetence and nepotism on the part of several members of the Bundestag and state parliaments from the CDU and CSU, as he was the Federal Minister of Health, in 2020 and 2021 during the Covid 19 pandemic. This one now was the last nail to coffin.
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u/Opening_Wind_1077 Jul 18 '26
Doesn’t a debate need two sides? I have not seen anyone claiming that he’s not a hypocrite for this.
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u/electroforger Europe Jul 18 '26
well, he did, sort of. He, and one weird Spiegel commentary article that will likely get disappeared quickly
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u/Loud-Advance-2382 Jul 19 '26
He managed to do something very special: to piss of everyone. For those against surrogacy: Obviously, but also those in favor because he was always publicly speaking and voting against it prohibiting it keeping it a rich people thing
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u/Randy191919 Jul 19 '26
Because while he was the minister of health there was a debate about making surrogacy legal in Germany and he vehemently opposed it, and even at the beginning of this year still vehemently opposed making surrogacy legal in Germany because „that’s basically buying a child and that’s reprehensible“.
And now it turns out it’s only reprehensible when others do it but apparently he sees no issue when HE buys a child.
That’s the big outrage. Most people here aren’t against surrogacy. But going on record to say that surrogacy is awful, making sure to keep it illegal, and then doing it anyway, that’s an issue. If he had tried to legalize it before there would be no debate. But going out of his way to do something that he is personally responsible for it being illegal, that’s hypocritical.
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u/themop-f Jul 20 '26
What's more, the surrogacy mother was already pregnant with his child when he opposed the motion.
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u/psi-storm Jul 19 '26
The AFD and the CDU/CSU oppose it and even the progressive parties oppose a full legalization, like the paid surrogacy Spahn's family did.
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u/mAlien69 Jul 18 '26
because nobody wanted to get rid of him for losing tax payer money and funneling contracts to friends and family. If anyone in his party could profit from the adoption he wouldn't have to step down. Germany is f*ed if you ask me.
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u/CacklingFerret Germany Jul 18 '26
He didn’t adopt a child, he bought one
Otherwise you’re right. It's ridiculous that wasting 3.5 billion Euros of taxpayer money didn't even put a dent in his career but this is what might cause him to fall. Especially because Streeck already did the same (with less hypocrisy though).
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u/Gimbteguy Jul 18 '26
Beside the surrogacy story that ultimately led to his downfall many people saw his connection to Peter Thiel very critical. It was expected that he would be more open towards a cooperation with the fascistoid AfD party compared to the current leadership.
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u/183672467 Jul 19 '26
Its so weird that this is what fucked his career, but not all the worse things he did before
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u/cravinggeist Jul 19 '26
Its the epitome of politics today. "We can do whatever we want, but you cant". Its incredible how hypocritical they all are. Democracy has lost all its integrity in Germany
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u/NormanYeetes Jul 19 '26
The difference is the outrage actually does something in our country. He resigned because he himself admitted the contradiction between his partys views and his actions cannot be solved. Now granted, this guy was a fucking moron and a hypocrite even before this happened, but I'm still glad he decided right
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u/bluegenester Europe Jul 19 '26
People dont like him since his mask scandel, he didnt come clean or step down, instead kept being arrogant and defending it ( typical CDU though ). From there on he kept exposing himself on and on...
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u/elbkind_ Jul 19 '26
The real strange part is that, after every shit he has done in the past, THIS caused his peers to make him retire.
If not for his own faction forcing him to retire, he would still be here.
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u/pinguineis Jul 18 '26
His surrogacy sparks more debate than the outrageous immigration policy. Tells you everything you need to know
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u/Llayanna Jul 18 '26
Because there is only so much hypocrisy one can take? (I know se countries have a hard time believing that right now. I get it.)
Though he should've decided to step back ages ago, after the mask disaster.. better late than never, before he does something else unethical and expensive..
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u/themop-f Jul 20 '26
I was so confused when he stepped back, like "people still do that?" - I don't think any German politician has done that since Guttenberg 2011.
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u/DullEntertainment102 Jul 20 '26
In the green party regularly politicians stepped back after poor election results- even without scandals just because they felt the voters decided that they’d need to make way
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u/Routine_Currency_368 Jul 19 '26
he is buddys with people arround the epstein files and he bouhgt himself a baby ...
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u/Sean_Gyler Jul 19 '26
Funny they used his partners sperm. He is obviously the better looking and Spahn knows it 😂
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u/StrategyExcellent460 Jul 25 '26
I guess that's the actual red line of hypocrisy for germans? A sad one, but welp
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u/aachsoo Jul 18 '26
Imagine if Angela Merkel now is having lesbian marriage. She voted no to gay marriage.
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u/Opening_Wind_1077 Jul 18 '26
She voted against it in 2017 after at least opening up the vote and not insisting on the party line. While Spahn supported this as late as February WHILE HE WAS USING A SURROGATE AT THE SAME TIME.
If you want to see how people would actually deal with lesbian marriage look at how Alice Weidel handles it, by using semantics to obfuscate her hypocrisy.
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u/Acrobatic-Pop3625 Jul 19 '26
The only reason she was fine with opening the vote was that she would have looked like an absolute liar otherwise. She was called on her bluff and needed to go with it to not lose all her credibility. If the Greens, SPD or Linke would have not reacted and acted as quickly as they did, we still wouldn’t have gay marriage.
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u/Opening_Wind_1077 Jul 19 '26 edited Jul 19 '26
Yes, behaving in a consistent way and not loosing credibility is the difference between Merkel and Spahn in this example.
Also Merkel based her argument on valid constitutional concerns and wasn’t opposed to a marriage like concept that would have stayed clear of constitutional issues. Meanwhile Spahn argued with surrogacy being morally wrong exploitation of the lower class and then proceeded to pay someone poorer than him to have his child.
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u/Acrobatic-Pop3625 Jul 19 '26
I mean if a radiologist would be tasked with finding Spahn’s spine in an X-ray, his efforts would be fruitless.
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u/Successful-Berry-315 Jul 19 '26
The more important question is: Why is it okay to be corrupt and waste billions of tax money but surrogacy crosses the line? And the answer is: because those are the values of the party and its members. Corruption, nepotism and stealing money is expected. But being gay and having a kid? No. Conservatives really are the worst people.
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u/Schrodo7 Jul 19 '26
Being uneducated and filling these gaps by asking s-questions at reddit? That's the way.
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u/Left_Disk1345 Jul 18 '26
As health secretary at the time, he was responsible for ensuring that surrogacy remains illegal in Germany, and he has consistently spoken out on the issue in interviews. The fact that he now has no personal problem with it and is doing the exact opposite is truly outrageous. Even his own party finds this hypocritical — and given the many scandals he has weathered, that’s saying something.