Venus Rising

This week on Venus Rising, Kallie sits down with Isabella Malbin, founder of Whose Body Is It? Isabella is a self-described radical birth keeper, hypnotist, and radical feminist. In 2020, she was kicked out of a fertility awareness teacher training program for using the words “woman” and “mother,” which were deemed “trans-exclusionary.” Since then, she’s become passionate about illuminating the ha...

Maggie was a young, bright-eyed college student when she was first recruited as an egg donor. She eagerly signed up to donate her eggs with plans of helping families while earning some money for her future. Instead, she got stage 4 invasive ductal carcinoma, a diagnosis she is certain she acquired as a result of multiple rounds of egg donation. Her painful experience was documented in our 2015 doc...

In today's culture of echo chambers and censorship, at the CBC, we remain fiercely committed to civil discourse as one of the precious few avenues to true and lasting change. It is in that spirit that we bring you this week's episode of Venus Rising. Today, Kallie sits down with Valerie Landis, a fertility representative whose three time personal experience with egg freezing has fueled her passion...

We're kicking off the new year with an exciting new episode of Venus Rising! Join us as we sit down with Gail Pascoe, an Australian woman who has spent the last six years researching the cash-driven sperm donation industry and the many ways it is failing donor-conceived children. Gail's interest in the subject began when she made what she considers the appalling discovery that her own daughter, co...

On today’s episode of Venus Rising, Jennifer sits down with Julia Derek, author of “Confessions of a Serial Egg Donor.” When Julia moved from Sweden to New York City as a young adult, she found herself in need of an income source as she waited for her green card. That’s when she discovered egg donation, ultimately undergoing twelve rounds in the span of four years. In today’s episode, Jennifer spe...

This episode is for all of our film buffs out there! Today Jennifer interviews Barry Stevens, a Toronto documentary filmmaker and screenwriter. Barry won a drama Gemini award for The Diary of Evelyn Lau starring Sandra Oh in her first role, then switched to non-fiction, as a writer on the International Emmy-winning documentary, Gerrie and Louise. One of our favorite films of Barry's, Offspring, is...

Today Jennifer brings her dear friend, Karen Hoffman, on Venus Rising to talk about her personal journey with infertility. Karen has an international background, having lived and worked on three continents. She was born and raised in South Africa, where she earned her Bachelor’s degree University of Pretoria. Subsequently, Karen moved to London, where her infertility journey began, followed by her...

Are you struggling with infertility or gynecological issues such as PCOS or endometriosis? Do you feel like typical infertility treatments are failing women and couples? Are you interested in freezing your eggs? Are you in the medical field or just interested in women's reproductive health? If so, today's episode is especially for you! Today we meet with Dr. Naomi Whittaker, a brilliant physician...

2020 has been deemed the year of the nurse and the midwife. For this reason, we couldn’t let 2020 come to an end without interviewing midwife and family nurse practitioner, MaryLou Singleton. MaryLou has practiced as a midwife for over 20 years, attending over 1000 planned homebirths in the Albuquerque area. She now runs an independent clinic, Enchanted Family Medicine, where she provides womb-to-...

Welcome back to Season 2 of Venus Rising! This season is full of special guests and personal stories you won’t want to miss, so subscribe today! Today, Jennifer talks with Alicia Gruber. Alicia, a mom of two and military wife, has experience as a surrogate mother and also runs multiple surrogacy support groups. As you know, Venus Rising exists to help educate the masses, even when speaking to thos...

Jennifer Schneider, M.D., Ph. D., is a physician certified in Internal Medicine, Addiction Medicine and Pain Management. She is the author of 15 books and has published numerous articles in professional journals. Not only is Jennifer impressive academically, but she is also a loving mother. This is the intersection where the CBC and Dr. Schneider meets. Jennifer’s daughter, Jessica, is featured in...

Today on Venus Rising we have the opportunity to shine the spotlight on our founder and president, Jennifer Lahl. A few weeks ago, the wonderful women at The Free Birth Society invited Jennifer to speak on an episode of their show, The Free Birth Podcast. Jennifer sat down with Emilee Saldaya to discuss several different topics including the launch of the CBC, the deeply concerning language in sur...

As you shelter in place or quarantine yourself from friends and family, allow us to bring author and activist, Julie Bindel, into your living room for a powerful and inspiring discussion about her life’s work and passion. Since she was just 17 years old, Julie has been active in the global campaign to end violence towards women and children. She has authored over 30 book chapters and reports on a...

Our guest today on Venus Rising is Scott Newgent. At the age of 43, Scott made the decision to medically transition from female to male. In 2017 Scott underwent phalloplasty which led to a massive pulmonary embolism. Scott nearly died of an infection which lasted 17 months. During recovery Scott spent hours reading about transgender health, only to discover how little was known about the physical...

If you’re a book worm, an aspiring writer, a feminist, or any combination, then this two-for-one episode is for you! Today we have the privilege of speaking with two radically brilliant women in one 45-minute episode. Susan Hawthorne and Renate Klein join Jennifer to talk about their journey creating and running an award-winning independent feminist press. Spinifex Press, founded in 1991, is an in...

On Venus Rising we talk a lot about surrogacy, but we haven’t brought you a real, honest interview with a woman who’s living the life of a surrogate. All of that changes today. ‘Lynn’, whose name has been changed to protect her identity, sits down with Jennifer for an authentic discussion about her ongoing experience as a commercial gestational surrogate. What started as a desire to help others ha...

Today on Venous Rising Jennifer speaks with a Ph. D. candidate who is researching female body sex dolls and robots. Specifically, how men conceptualize these products and the implications of this kind of technology for women. Allow us to introduce you to a very influential activist and write, Ms. Caitlin Roper. Ms. Roper is also very active in campaigning against the sexual exploitation of women a...

We are overjoyed to finally introduce our next guest on Venus Rising, Nick Isel. At age 15, Nick learned that he and his sister were donor conceived. Nick is one of 215 babies known infamously as “Nobel babies”; products of eugenicist Robert Graham’s Repository for Germinal Choice, a California-based sperm bank known as “The Nobel Bank”, claiming to only to accept “genius” sperm specimens. Nick Is...

Today we travel to Canada to speak with Alison Motluk, a Toronto-based journalist with a special interest in reproductive technology. Alison writes on a broad category of topics and issues, but today we talk to her about third-party reproduction and the changes in Canada's Human Reproduction Act. Alison’s written in publications such as New Scientist, The Economist and the Globe and Mail. Alison a...

Happy New Year! We are jump starting this year with an eye-opening and powerful interview about freezing eggs and egg banking. For the first time, Jennifer sits down with Crystal Schnurr, a women who decided to freeze her own eggs for later use. Please join us as Crystal opens up with Venus Rising and tells us about her journey of freezing her own eggs.

We have a very special guest with us today! Matt Doran bravely shares with us his very personal story of growing up and finding out that he was a ‘donor’ conceived human being. Matt is both an aerospace mechanical engineer as well as an advocate against donor conception. Matt created and founded the first free worldwide social network for ‘donor’ conceived people, sperm/egg/embryo/surrogate ‘donor...

Kallie Fell returns to Venus Rising as our guest to discuss her work and involvement at the Center for Bioethics and Culture. As you may know from her first guest appearance, Kallie started her professional career as a research assistant at the Women’s Reproductive Health Research Center at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Kallie has since switched careers, but is still very passionate about...

In this episode, Jennifer Lahl has the privilege to sit down with lawyer, public advocate and award-winning author, Wesley J. Smith. Wesley Smith has authored or co-authored numerous books and has written hundreds of articles on bioethical issues and the importance of being human (human exceptionalism). His writing has appeared nationally and internationally in Newsweek, the New York Times, the Wa...

Today we speak with cultural and medical anthropologist, Diane Tober. Dr. Tober is an Assistant Adjunct Professor at the University of California, San Francisco Institute for Health and Aging and faculty at the Bixby Center for Reproductive Health. Her work and research is focused on gender and sexuality, the commodification of the body, science and technology studies, bioethics, and social and re...

On this episode of Venus Rising, we sit down with our own, Kallie Fell a Bay Area labor and delivery nurse, to discuss the very basics of women's reproductive physiology. Before she was a nurse, Kallie was a scientist in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Vanderbilt University utilizing a M.S. degree in Reproductive Physiology from Purdue University. While assisting in the investigatio...