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DNA and Online Search Finds Birth Parent
stuyman writes "NewScientist is reporting that anonymous sperm donation is not so anonymous anymore. An enterprising 15 year old tracked down his biological father, an anonymous sperm donor, using an online genealogy service and an online information service."
This would be quite creepy if the (father) had never actually formally donated sperm. (ie. someone has picked up a condom or tissue, and impregnated themselves with the sperm.)
...and good money for it, too. It would be worth it for me. If you want anonymity, don't donate sperm.
..an answer to the proverbial question, "Who's your daddy?"
18 years, 18 years,
She got one of yo kids got you for 18 years
I can just picture someone tracking down an anonymous sperm donor and trying to get child support out of them. Or is this subject covered in the contract you sign at the clinic?
I wonder now that Anonymous Sperm Donors can be tracked down, if Anonymous Cowards can also be tracked down?
Uh...
What exactly is wrong with donating to a sperm bank? It allows people to have kids that might otherwise not be able to.
And what exactly is wrong with using the money for beer? Beer is good.
And how exactly could the child become emotionally scarred? By finding out at least one of his genetic parents is not part of his family? Why exactly does that matter? He has (presumably) two parents who love him and wanted him enough to go to extraordinary measures to have him. Isn't that good enough?
And if he didn't know that he was a sperm bank baby, and it does scar him, isn't it the fault of his parents that actually take care of him, for not telling him before he found it out on the internet?
Could you please expound on what, exactly, is wrong with this situation in your view? I can't figure it out beyond the possibility that you want to whine about 'them damn college students!'
I've come for the woman, and your head.
All you had to do was ask.
As the article pointed out, this has greater ramifications than in paternity cases, though perhaps even they didn't carry it far enough.
"Police could perform similar searches [using crime scene evidence]to identify a criminal's surname, giving vital leads in a case."
Or someone who cared enough could do so with, say, a hair found in a library book (or in any number of other places where anonymity might ordinarily have been presumed).
Jeff
What I'm noticing here is that these records have had to be held since around 1980... which suggests that it never really was that anonymous. I mean, back in 1990 you could still get DNA testing done (for a price).
I'll subscribe to Slashdot when I see a month without a dupe, a typo, or an article the "editors" didn't read.
...Imagine a beowulf cluster of anonymous sperm donors.
You know, and I'm only speaking for myself here, if my biological offspring were with it enough to do this by themselve(s) then I would actually love to hear from them and see where it went from there. Seriously, the best complement a child can pay to a parent is being exceptionally competent within the age they live in. This kid is definately an Information Age personality. Cool kid.
Shh.
I read about this guy who heard that his uncle's former frat brother had uncovered a bequest from a distant relative including an encoded message that revealed the location of Atlantis, and of Jimmy Hoffa.
Fer real.
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
Y'know, I've been considering donating sperm, 'cause I fit a profile (I'm tall, pale and went to plenty of school). Where does one sign up to donate? Err, sell, rather. Beer money and all.
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
Naturally, it might depend on the particulars, but all said, finding out that you're adopted is often traumatic for kids. If you found that dad was only after beer money and never gave you a second thought, it wouldn't exactly help you cope with that. It might hurt some more than others, but I just can't see it helping anyone.
A lot more apealing than giveing blood... Get paid to jack off? Just set up a nightly pick-up route in the freshman dormatories of any college!
A quick google search of the guys name after a google news search of the terms "sperm" "oral" and "child support"
"Sic Semper Tyrannosaurus Rex."
This kid was quite the sherlock holmes. At least his father has that to be proud of.
Come on! This was donated sperm, no adoptions took place, and who's to say what the doner spent the fee on? The beer suggestion was just speculation. Maybe the doner spent it on rent, a CD, dinner, any number of things.
"Who are in control, they are not in control of anything - they don't even control themselves!" - Glen Beck
Whats the deal with this, im young, tall, white, middle class, no major health conditions in my family history, 160 something IQ, enroled in college... I bet i could make some decent $. Need to buy an engagement ring, but wouldnt that be weird telling her how i got the money...
"Sic Semper Tyrannosaurus Rex."
Beautiful DNA - is there anything it can't do?
You make it sound like someone went out and got someone pregnant for beer money. You don't actually fuck someone at a sperm bank. There's plenty of horrible parents in the worldI think people donating to sperm banks are somewhere at the end of the list of parenting problems.
I listened to an interview with a guy that runs a sperm bank, and he said that until laws were changed to allow people to donate for money, most all sperm used for artificial insemination was either that of the physician or from one of the interns.
steve
Oh, you're not stuck, you're just unable to let go of the onion rings.
Although I'm not racist and I don't agree with any of these stereotypes, that was REALLY funny. And I'm not going to let political correctness get in the way of me saying: Mod parent up.
Le français vous intéresse?
In regards to Burens comment "I'm now going to have to ponder whether I want to do somemthing like this, or whether I should. I don't know yet because I have no idea whether they would want to be contacted."
Do it, or spend the rest of your life wondering. You will always regret not taking the action, to do something that you know you should have done.
Who cares if they want to know you? YOU WANT TO KNOW THEM!
Sig- http://www.dreamhost.com/rewards.cgi?ayefly
for hacker of the year. tres cool.
Why is it so important to you that your submission is the one that gets accepted?
Sperm Bank and especially adopted children should *NOT* be permitted to find out who their biological parents are. This is absolutely ridiculous. Your parents are the people who raise you. I have personal experience with this as I'm 25 years old and just found out a year ago that I have a half brother. (My mother had another child she gave up for adoption when she was a teenager)
Back when they gave him up for adoption the law was that the child could NOT ever find out who their biological parents were. (note this is in Canada) Then a few years ago they change the law.... and the guy goes out and contacts my mother out of the blue. You have no idea how many problems this caused in my family. Suddenly my mother gets all emotional - wants myself and my brothers to meet him, blah blah blah. How do you think my father feels about all this?! He's not my brother. My siblings are the people I grew up with. This guy is a total stranger to our family. My father is supportive of my mother but clearly could've done without this giant mess. Myself and my 2 other brothers do not like the idea.
*THINK* Before permitting these people to contact their biological parents! It destroys families. Adopted/Sperm Bank children should love their parents just like I love mine. I don't love my parents because they gave birth to me... I love them because they took care of me.
I submitted to AskSlashdot a piece on what I saw as the future ability of police to use this type of extrapolation to DNA finger people who aren't actually in a DNA database directly and the privacy rights implications. . The rejected submission is in my February journal entry: "DNA Incrimination by Extrapolation"
Letter To Iran
You have to be white? (Well I dunno how it's here in Sweden, but i find it lil strange. Hmmm, two "white" parents and a "dark" child, kk maybe theres a point there. On the other hand a "colored" pair getting a "white" child from donation... Maybe the donations should be labeled.)
Another way to look at it is donors are helping someone who would otherwise not have their own child to love through a theraputic process that allows the reciever to conceive. Whether or not you agree with the ethical/legal concensus achieved so far is a different argument. Onwards, if the child feels a need to contact me in the first place because its a human and being human it may feel some qualitative feeling of comfort in meeting the next person up in it's lineage that goes back in an unbroken chain to algae give or take a billionish years ago. Your right, I would be a donor not a parent - but if the child wanted to see me I wouldn't be so callous as to not give it an audience.
Shh.
A case of too much Slashdot reading, methinks.
Stuck down a hole! In the middle of the night! With an owl!
How many people like me glanced quickly at that headline and saw "DNA and Online Search Finds Birth Patent"?
The scariest thing is if it really had said patent I wouldn't have found it that implausible.
No, your children are not the special ones. Nor are your pets.
In these child support cases, the only thing concerning the judge is the interest of the child. Crime means nothing. So, the guy is doomed to lose in family court.
He should try a civil suit for damages though. Punitive damages would be neat. Every month he pays her, and every month she pays him. If triple damages are awarded, he could make out pretty well.
Just for revenge, criminal charges of fraud would be fun too. That's yet another court.
First something quite like original Babel fish, then these singing mice, and now tracking down anonymous fathers. Well, what Arthur Dent donated was just his DNA, but similiarity is striking, isn't it?
Be careful out there - not everything might have been done by college boys wanting beer money, as this proves: http://gsimg.giustyle.net/comic1.jpg
Sometimes, it might be better NOT to know a few things.
I had to read the headline twice. The first time it didn't make much sense to me, as I read, "DNA and Online Search Finds Birth Planet" :P
I thought, uhm why? I, for one, am fairly sure I was born here on earth.
Any technology distinguishable from magic, is insufficiently advanced.
To start using better encryption on your spooge.
The standard 46 character, trinary variable encoding is kinda weak....
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
Read a little close:
He said he didn't find out about the child for nearly two years, when Irons filed a paternity lawsuit.
The man's name was Phillips.
--- I wish I could hear the soundtrack to my life. That way I'd know when to duck.
A more famous case is the former German tennis star Boris Becker.
Just google for "Boris Becker" "broom cupboard"
In short: after losing a match at Wimbledon he took comfort in a quick BJ from a Russian model who impregnated herself (BJ happened in a broom cupboard of a restaurant, hence the query terms) .
Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!
I read it as "Birth Patent" the first time too. That gives me an idea for Slashdot's next April 1st edition... Headlines and article text that change everytime you click on them/do a mouseover/etc.
I'm a big tall mofo.
Last rumour I heard my father left his second wife and was shacked up in a trailer in the desert with some babe not far from Mexico.
I am a reporter for the George Washington University Hatchet. In every issue we run several ads for sperm banks and egg donations. a recent article by a fellow writer addressed this. I know that some people may not want to meet their offspring in 15 years, after they've settled down with a spuse and started a family of their own.
Information wants a fueled airplane waiting at the hangar and no one gets hurt.
You don't actually fuck someone at a sperm bank.
Oh.
Whoa.
I guess I'll be canceling that appointment, then.
Women donate eggs to other women/couples. What if a child found out they were from a donated egg? Is the woman that gave up the egg also an evil person who, as some posters have implied, gave up a child for beer money?
I think in the case of egg and sperm donation, a background check should be done before the people dontate, once the donation is given, NO identifiable data should be linked to it. Keep record of the race of the person, their education, and maybe some other general points to help a person choose good seed, but no names and no birth dates.
To whoever modded me flamebait:
Try to learn how to laugh at things. Laugh at Whites. Laugh at Blacks. Laugh at Americans. Your life will be a lot more fun.
As an intersting aside, I have no doubt that this would be +5 funny if it was making fun of Americans, Irish, or Whites in general.
Le français vous intéresse?
A DNA-fingerprint isn't like a finger-fingerprint, since once databases get a good sample of the population DNA, they can get close to identifying anyone from DNA evidence alone. The fact that a kid tracked someone down who wasn't in the database suggests that, as these databases mature and become cheap, individuals will be able to track each other down from their DNA. Didn't get her phone number? Look for a strand of hair. And better not use the restroom at the car dealership if you don't want to start receiving targeted advertising...
You don't actually fuck someone at a sperm bank.
Oh...
I guess maybe that explains all the screaming and kicking and scratching yesterday.
-
- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
Y'know, 'cause he wants to be "ready" if someone responds seriously to his comment.
If you want to count errors, the last sentence is a fragment, not a complete sentence.
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
Nobody here wants to adopt black children; they'd rather have white kids. When sperm-shopping, the same pressures apply. I exaggerate, of course, but the pressure is there. It's stupid and it's pointless, but it's there.
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
What you are giving (egg, sperm) contains itself all the data needed to identfy you .....
Actually, it's unlikely that the grandparent post was referring to a female sperm donor being tracked down by her offspring.
.... Who's your daddy?
This is my opinion. To make sure you don't steal it, it's covered by the DMCA.
I can see it now. A bunch of towels that I made sperm donations to will sue me for support.
This is bad. Real bad.
only if you have other DNA to compare to. Everyones DNA isn't on record somewhere.
I've got 20 bucks we see this on a CSI episode within a year.
Actually, according to the research presented in the book "Freakonomics" by Levitt and Dubner, chapter 5, it really only matters who your parents were, not really how they raised you.
So yeah, umm, handing out genetic material is more important than being there later. Sorry.
Everything you know is wrong, Just forget the words and sing along.
(Yes, people who aren't identical twins or clones have unique DNA sequences, but the amount of DNA actually tested isn't an entire sequence but certain sets of markers.)
Does-it really matter? What's the problem to be in love with your 'half sister'?
I remember having seen a TV program where a brother and a sister were raised in different family, when they met, not knowing that they were related, they fell in love. They learned after that they were related but they decided to go on nonetheless: they're still together, married with normal children.
So first the odds are very low, second even when it happens the real problem is more on the 'psychological' part than on any real problem: if the couple above hadn't learn that they were related they would have been no different than any other normal couples..
They may indeed not have problems with their degree of consanguinity, and I can imagine that it does happen (unbeknownst to anyone) from time to time. But even a 1/8 common genetic consanguinity (first cousins) can lead to some very serious recessives being expressed, which would be unlikely to pair up with two random people. Even among first cousin marriages, the risk is about double that of two distantly related or unrelated people (4-6%, as opposed to 2-3%). This is not unreasonable, but with a 1/4 commonality, the risk is going to go up considerably more than that -- not sure if it doubles, or squares, or what exactly, but it's going to be northward of 10%, and you just might want to be paying attention at that point. I'm not arguing that it just SHOULDN'T BE DONE, but it certainly should not be dismissed as completely irrelevant either.
Mal-2
How is the Riemann zeta function like Trump rallies? Both have an endless number of trivial zeros.
Jeez, if you don't want to have anything to do with the kid, say "Beat it." Some people want to know; if it's important to them, let them try to find out. If you haven't got whatever it takes to handle a potential contact sometime, then don't donate. Simple.
Though his donor had been anonymous, his mother had been told the man's date and place of birth and his college degree. Using another online service, Omnitrace.com, he purchased the names of everyone that had been born in the same place on the same day. Only one man had the surname he was looking for, and within 10 days he had made contact.
Under the right circumstances, a small amount of seemingly insignificant information can be quite powerful. In this case it was a date of birth, a place of birth, and the existence of a college degree. Did anyone originally think that the donor could have been tracked down via that information? For more anonymity, the information provided about sperm donors might have to be reduced.