Hawaii's new act redefining parenthood has disturbing implications

On January 1, 2026, Hawaii’s Act 298 went into effect, broadening legal recognition for "intended parents" who obtain children via in vitro fertilization (IVF), sperm/egg donation, and gestational surrogacy — and it has disturbing implications.

Key Takeaways:

• Hawaii's new Act 298 states that people who use reproductive technologies such as IVF, gamete donation, and surrogacy will legally be considered "intended parents," though they may not be genetic or adoptive parents.

• The Act aims to provide 'equity' to same-sex couples but fails to consider the natural rights of children.

• By separating reproduction from its natural moral limits, Hawaii reinforces the erroneous view that life itself can be engineered, edited, and disposed of at the whims of others.

The Details:

The new law ensures that “intended parents,” regardless of gender or marital status, obtain legal recognition to be regarded as the “rightful parents” of children conceived via reproductive technologies. However, beneath its appealing language, the Act promotes a disturbing view about the notion of parenthood, commodifies human life, and erodes the sanctity of natural conception.

In essence, Act 298 reflects the pinnacle of decades of medical and social trends that view reproduction as an issue of personal convenience instead of a sacrosanct responsibility.

The Act:

• Repeals the 1973 Uniform Parentage Act and redefines the notion of parenthood to include “intended” parents in order to “reflect modern family structures and reproductive technologies,” such as “surrogacy” and “Assisted Reproductive Technologies (ART) - e.g., IVF, sperm/egg donation, embryo transfer,” according to a social media post by the Hawaii State LGBT Plus Commission. 

• Establishes a legal status for individuals who act as parents but are not necessarily genetic or adoptive parents, including ensuring equal legal recognition for parents in same-sex relationships. 

Attorney Carol Lockwood, whose law practice covers adoption and assisted reproductive technology law, claimed that the goal of the Act is "to make it more equitable to infertile and LGBTQ+ families and to reflect developments in Assisted Reproductive Technology and surrogacy."

The law focuses solely on protecting the adults involved in such transactions — not the children.

The Big Picture:

In years past, IVF, egg and sperm donation, and surrogacy were considered extraordinary options to address cases of infertility. Yet these practices are now promoted as fashionable trends and lifestyle choices, typically divorced from the moral and emotional consequences they involve. 

Achieving 'equity' by ignoring human rights

At the crux of IVF lies the deliberate creation, selection, and destruction of embryos. The process typically necessitates fertilizing numerous human eggs in a lab, transferring a few into a woman’s womb, and freezing — or disposing of — the rest. Each frozen or discarded embryo is a unique, living human being in its earliest stage, endowed with its own DNA and the potential to grow into a full human being. 

Nonetheless, Hawaii’s Act 298 does not admit that these embryos are subjects worthy of moral consideration. Rather, they are treated as genetic material and property belonging to “intended parents,” instead of as valuable human beings with rights.

The Act claims to highlight 'equity' — particularly for same-sex couples and single individuals hoping to have children. But neither equity nor equality cannot be attained at the expense of rejecting natural truths and biological realities.

The children created by these technologies are not treated as equal human beings with inherent rights.

Inclusion through exclusion?

What is more, childbirth and parenthood are not subjective processes and goals to be achieved merely via paperwork, monetary transactions, and technology.

In view of this, Hawaii’s efforts to recalibrate the notion of parenthood via legal means may seem “inclusive” and “compassionate,” but it eventually devalues motherhood and fatherhood to solely “legal ownership titles.”

Reality Check:

By separating reproduction from its natural moral limits, Hawaii reinforces the erroneous view that life itself can be engineered, edited, and disposed of at the whims of others. In this sense, every IVF clinic that freezes thousands of embryos for future use and every surrogacy contract reaffirms this anti-life mindset. 

When legislation such as Act 298 champions practices that destroy embryos, exploit women, or obfuscate the bonds between parents and their biological children, ethical consumerism (the notion that parenthood can somehow be manufactured in a laboratory) takes precedence over natural moral considerations. 

Although Act 298 may seem to merely overhaul Hawaii’s legal framework, it ominously indicates a deeper cultural rupture from upholding the importance of family and the sanctity of life.

While the law’s recognition of “intended parents” might streamline court proceedings, it obscures the moral conscience of a society that now legitimizes and embraces the deliberate creation and destruction of life for personal desires. 

The Bottom Line:

Once a land steeped in respect for ancestry, family, and the cycles of life, Hawaii is presently at a moral crossroads. To endorse practices that regard human life as a commodity — and women’s bodies as tools of production — is to dismiss the very cultural tenets of its identity.

Such a development certainly does not bode well for protecting vulnerable human beings or the natural family.