BY COLLEEN CARROLL CAMPBELL
It is a sign of the times that most of the uproar over Evans’ strange scheme has focused on her violation of the rights of her dead son, who never consented to posthumously father a child, rather than on the welfare of the child who would be conceived through the union of a dead man’s sperm and the egg of a surrogate mother he would likely never know.
Many children enter the world in less than ideal circumstances, and many adopted and orphaned children struggle with the unfulfilled desire to know the birth parents who placed them for adoption or died before they were born. Yet the strange new scenarios made possible by today’s reproductive technologies have created an entirely new class of offspring: children intentionally conceived from the gametes of men or women they will never meet and often born into intentionally fatherless or motherless families.
As Elizabeth Marquardt, author of the forthcoming study, "My Daddy’s Name Is Donor," has noted, these children differ from adopted and orphaned children in that they know "that the parents raising them are also the ones who intentionally created them with a severed relationship to at least one of their biological parents."
That knowledge can make a donor-conceived child’s natural longing to understand his origins particularly painful and confusing. While few such children have a back-story as strange as the one Evans may someday tell her grandchild, a growing number are voicing feelings of anger, sorrow and confusion over the circumstances of their conception — feelings overlooked for decades by glowing media reports about their overjoyed parents and "miracle" births.
This is especially true of the estimated 1 million American children conceived with the help of sperm donors. Many such children have embarked on desperate searches for their biological fathers and half-siblings using such online outlets as the Donor Sibling Registry. Their motives vary, from a yearning for a father figure or more complete medical history to a fear of accidentally committing incest with a half-sibling with whom they unknowingly share the same biological father.
Their searches often end in frustration. Few men want to connect with the dozens or even hundreds of children spawned from sperm donations they made in exchange for beer money back in college. Nor do most sperm banks want to risk spooking potential sperm donors by foregoing donor anonymity. Unlike adoption policies, which increasingly honor an adult adoptee’s right to know about his biological parents and genetic history, America’s largely unregulated fertility industry remains much more focused on adult desires than children’s needs.
That frustrates donor-conceived children like Katrina Clark, who noted in a 2006 Washington Post op-ed that "we didn’t ask to be born into this situation," deprived from birth of "the right to know who both of our parents are." Clark eventually found her biological father online when she was a teenager, but she felt crushed when he told her, shortly after they established contact, that he had grown tired of "this whole sperm-donor thing."
Plaintive stories like Clark’s, and bizarre scenarios like the Evans case, remind us that it is a mistake to consider only adult desires when deciding whether or how to use today’s reproductive technologies. The rights and needs of children deserve consideration, too — even before those children are conceived.
Colleen Carroll Campbell is an author, television and radio host, and St. Louis-based fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. Her website is www.colleen-campbell.com.
Thought provoking article, because i would have opted for adoption. its better to love a person who is already in this world than bringing some one else to be loved.
but as i am unmarried i cant say how a person feels about his/her biological child, hence i can say that your article is thought provoking and what i would have done.
Wish you love, peace and happiness.
Trisha
"This is the true joy in life, being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one. Being a force of nature instead of a feverish, selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy"
GB Shaw
Isn't it interesting that this happened in Texas? The very state that traumatized over 400 children en mass on a false call and cost 12 million dollars to find one teen they could say they rescued one year ago.This is the same state that wants to pay major incentives to have unqualified people recruited into CPS system but will not spend the money to care for childrem properly. Isn't interesting how the mother was honored as the mother but the adoptive mothers in Texas are discounted as not the real mothers. Texas calls adoptive mothers legal only.
Anne Heiligenstein and Governor Perry are proud of the way they treat families in Texas yet they both hide behind government immunity in the abuses of children and families. I find it most fascinating and would love to see others opinions of what uniquely internecine schizophrenic behaviors in Texas.
I pray the universe shines the light of truth into all the toady holes of deception here
Cheryl
Hi Trisha,
Thank you for your note. I'm not sure what you ment when you said "hence i can say that your article is thought provoking and what i would have done."
Thank you also for your kind wishes!!!
Love, peace and happiness to you as well!
-Karen
Hi Cheryl,
Yes, there are all kinds of contradictions and injustices in the world. It seems to be such a helpless situation and I feel very powerless. No one can save the world but little things matter, like sharing eye contact and a smile with a stranger walking down the street. It's contagious. Maybe that person will do the same for others they pass on street and they will all share it in turn with their family when they come home at night. Who knows?
In the meantime, I focus my efforts on building awareness of the consequences of sperm/egg/surrogacy conceptions that intentionally separate children/people from half or all of their kin.
Sometimes I feel like I am shouting into the wind. But you heard! Maybe there will come a time when the subject comes up with a friend or loved one and you might share what you learned and feel. Maybe they will pass it on as well. Maybe it will make a difference.
-Karen