We’ve all heard the old saying: “You never know when you’re going to need a fertilized egg.” Wait, is that not an actual thing? Okay maybe not, but it seems Colombian actress Sofía Vergara thought it would be a good precaution to take when she left a handful of embryos on ice at a Beverly Hills reproductive facility. The little multicellular diploid eukaryotes in question were the product of an in-vitro fertilization carried out with ex-fiancé Nick Loeb, and understandably things went south when Vergara and Loeb called off their engagement, leaving their ungestated children in legal limbo.
As one might expect after a breakup, Vergara’s solution was to simply destroy the eggs rather than having children with an unwanted ex, but Loeb has proven to be pretty attached to the little guys (or gals). In fact, he has taken up a “right to life” stance in the court battle for their zygotes, and unwittingly recruited the moral support of America’s pro-life movement despite his shaky legal grounding.
And apparently some of these folks care so deeply about Vergara’s DNA that they waited for her outside of Mann’s Chinese Theater during the premiere of current fiance, Joe Manganiello’s latest feature Magic Mike XXL. Their rallying cry: “Unfreeze your daughters. Unfreeze your heart.” It is not clear whether the Embryo Defense forces reached a revenue-share agreement with Toni Braxton before hoisting their banners, but their tender exhortations and genuine concern must have been very moving for Vergara.
I guess everyone has a right to an opinion about the issue, but this one is a real head scratcher. The protestors went as far as writing the words “Embryo Defense” on Vergara’s star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Why spend so much time worrying about other people’s reproductive minutiae? Also, how do they know that the frozen cells are actually female? X-ray vision? Psychic powers? Or just plain crazy?