Their nose tip is a common genetic trait.
I was struck by the the ears, of those visible, except for two, they were very uniform.
Sperm-Donor Siblings: A Family Portrait
21–30 of 68 posts
Re: Sperm-Donor Siblings: A Family Portrait
#22Sorry is this is off-topic, but given the context, why are so many of them posed in seemingly erotic ways? It isn't just the women either look at Nik Morgan, 21 near the bottom (no pun intended).
Yeah, the photography choices are so odd. It made the presentation awkward and uncomfortable.
Yes, that's why it's genius.
Re: Sperm-Donor Siblings: A Family Portrait
#23It seems to me that being a sperm donor is an absurdly good evolutionary strategy.
Sort of, but from what I have heard, being a donor is also absurdly competitive due to the low marginal cost to the donor. Every prospective parent wants their child's donor-father to be a 4.0 GPA valedictorian ivy league graduate, captain of the football team, leader of men, captain of industry. Or maybe visionary researcher, famous scientist. Or perhaps top-billing hollywood actor, or decorated military hero. And, behold, because the parent can be choosy about the donor, they actually can have that.
So in the end being a donor isn't really the key strategy here, it's just a force multiplier for highly successful men who have always had fantastic odds for passing on their genes to multiple mothers (even in nominally monogamous societies)
Re: Sperm-Donor Siblings: A Family Portrait
#24The essay's author talks a little bit about how he and some of his half-siblings feel a sense of loss, or that something feels missing, or that they wished they had a father. But the essay never really touches on whether they _resent_ the fact that their parent or parents made the choice to have them conceived through artificial insemination from an anonymous donor. Obviously, if that hadn't happened, they wouldn't b…
Well. You can hear my voice. I'm the child of a sperm donor. I didn't learn about it till I was 18... which was more than a bit strange. The emotions that come from the combination of society's familial expectations, your own complicated family, and just the general fact that it's nice to be alive is a really strange cocktail. But... I'm not sure resent is a word that I would ever use, even in my bizarre situation of…
Do you think things would have been different for you, if you knew about it since you were a child?
I'm a 35 years old male that can't have kids. Not possible, say the doctors. I love children and me and my wife are considering using a sperm donor.
Should all work as we hope, we are not sure how to approach exactly this situation of telling our child about it. At first I thought we should just keep it a secret, but the more I read on the subject, the more I think this is a mistake. The thing I fear the most is that my kid would grow to resent me no matter what I do, because ...you know, I'd not be the 'real' father.
EDIT: This is a throwaway account.
Re: Sperm-Donor Siblings: A Family Portrait
#25Aside from the bizarre, uncomfortable poses in the photographs, the subjects all look somewhat dejected, as if their existence in this world is very clinical. Not sure if that’s what the photographer was going for but kudos to him for keeping such a consistent style across multiple loosely related people. I imagine it could be like herding cats.
Seems like that was the photographer’s goal
Re: Sperm-Donor Siblings: A Family Portrait
#26Ok, that is an interesting diversion on a Friday. I too was struck by the odd poses, some of them seem to me as if they are trying to evoke a sexual response although given their consistency I attribute it primarily to the style the photographer imputes on his work. Given all the internal dialog he includes I'm pretty sure the similarity of emotions is intentional.
That said, the most interesting thing for me in the article was the chain of events, same sex couples wishing to conceive, selecting a sperm donor with a 'good' track record, results in the same donor being preferentially selected. Given that the children share common activities (the article mentions camp for same sex families) and the kids socialization there, it would seem there is a higher than otherwise risk of developing a relationship with a half sibling. That has got to be emotionally challenging if you discover it later. Understanding ones own genetic history is a thing in isolated populations like Iceland but I can easily see it being overlooked in a larger more diverse population. I have never considered that burden that would be imposed on future children conceived in this way, but in hindsight it makes sense. Somewhere there is the most "popular" donor of the most used donation service who could have hundreds? thousands? of children out there.
Re: Sperm-Donor Siblings: A Family Portrait
#27It seems to me that being a sperm donor is an absurdly good evolutionary strategy.
Sort of, but from what I have heard, being a donor is also absurdly competitive due to the low marginal cost to the donor. Every prospective parent wants their child's donor-father to be a 4.0 GPA valedictorian ivy league graduate, captain of the football team, leader of men, captain of industry. Or maybe visionary researcher, famous scientist. Or perhaps top-billing hollywood actor, or decorated military hero. And,…
I don't think this is true. There are ads for becoming a sperm donor on the Seattle light rail.
Re: Sperm-Donor Siblings: A Family Portrait
#28Earlier quoted context omitted.
Sort of, but from what I have heard, being a donor is also absurdly competitive due to the low marginal cost to the donor. Every prospective parent wants their child's donor-father to be a 4.0 GPA valedictorian ivy league graduate, captain of the football team, leader of men, captain of industry. Or maybe visionary researcher, famous scientist. Or perhaps top-billing hollywood actor, or decorated military hero. And,…
I don't think this is true. There are ads for becoming a sperm donor on the Seattle light rail.
I don't live in Seattle- do big shot lawyers & doctors happen to ride the light rail to work? :)
Re: Sperm-Donor Siblings: A Family Portrait
#29Aside from the bizarre, uncomfortable poses in the photographs, the subjects all look somewhat dejected, as if their existence in this world is very clinical. Not sure if that’s what the photographer was going for but kudos to him for keeping such a consistent style across multiple loosely related people. I imagine it could be like herding cats.
> Not sure if that’s what the photographer was going for
Interesting that the photographer was the author here.
Some of these poses strike me as downright bizarre, but they also remind me of the kind of thing you'd see in magazine shoot.
Re: Sperm-Donor Siblings: A Family Portrait
#30If this writing is at all representative of Gen Z it's going to be a VERY interesting cohort. I sense some extreme social alienation lurking.