8. The Tools We Use

In the final episode of her ten-part investigation of the online sperm donor marketplace, Dr Aleks Krotoski looks for a way to make this network safe for the recipients, the donors, and ultimately, the donor-conceived children. The internet has opened up the door to these informal connections, and so who is responsible what happens there? Is it Facebook, where the majority of the exchanges take place? Is it for the regulator to crack down on illegal trades? Or is it up to the criminal justice system to draw boundaries around this activity?Aleks discovers that, as with so many aspects of our lives, the digital revolution has pushed us right up to the boundaries of what we can and cannot do - and how quickly good intentions combined with tools to rule the world can get lost in selfish goals.

The online sperm donor marketplace operates across websites and social media, but most of the matches are made on Facebook Groups. Adam, ‘Kyle’ and Christina are three of the people in charge of the world’s biggest donor groups who spend their free time trying to keep the peace. But numbers have grown exponentially over the last two years of lockdown, and they are swimming up a current of consequential decisions. Does the technology give them enough to keep out the bad apples?Presenter: Aleks Krotoski

Beth Gardiner knew what the problem was with the online sperm donor marketplace - there was no community. People looking for sperm connected with people offering it on personals ads or email groups. There was no information - about fertility, about cycles, about problematic donors. And so, when she started the Known Donor Registry in 2010 as a hub of information for people who wanted a known donor, she included two technological features of great online communities - a forum and a real-time chat. And for a while, it worked wonderfully.But Beth’s online passion project was interrupted by a technological glitch. And at the same time, a Goliath of the social networking world was tempting everyone away.Presenter: Aleks Krotoski

In the UK, any man who donates sperm through a licensed fertility clinic in the UK must waive his right to anonymity. Any children his donations produce can find out his identity when they turn 18.When this law passed in 2005, donor numbers dropped by almost 90%. Men, it seemed, didn’t want to be known. They flocked instead to the online sperm donor market, where another kind of donor was looking for the opposite. They wanted to be known from the time a child was conceived, but the new law didn’t let them.In this episode, Dr Aleks Krotoski meets Louise McLoughlin, a donor-conceived child whose biological father had been told by the clinics where he donated in the early 1990s that he would always be anonymous. She campaigns for the rights of donor-conceived children to know the identity of their genetic parent from birth. Louise has a conversation with donor Alex, who’s looking for a recipient on Facebook to help him achieve his family dreams.

‘James’, ‘Kyle’, Adam and Tyree are sperm donors who advertise themselves on unregulated online donor exchanges. They are some of the more prolific donors on the scene - they have at least one hundred between them, but some of them likely have many more. They say they are driven to help women create babies through a sense of altruism - giving the gift of life. But after their first few donor-babies were born, these men began to optimise their bodies and their methods of donation to be a product that gives results every time they are asked to help. It’s a hobby that can take over a man’s life.But why, when they are supposed to be “known”, are prolific donors less likely to meet their donor offspring? At what point do the children that prolific donors help create become a photo that can be used to advertise for the next recipient who comes along? When do these kids become another line in a spreadsheet in a game of numbers donors play one another? In this episode, Dr Aleks Krotoski speaks with these men to understand the motivations of prolific donors, and to try to get to the bottom of where they think other donors’ bad behaviour comes from.

The online fertility marketplaces promise free access to sperm and the opportunity to include a donor in a child’s life from the beginning, but they come with dangers too. Women report harassment, sexually explicit messages and pressure for sex. But because they are asking for sperm, some say they feel powerless to report these activities to the authorities. Drew, a long-time donor, tries to raise awareness about the few problematic donors who harass and abuse women in the online donor network, and hosts a support group on Facebook where the women can share their stories of less-than-positive experiences. Meanwhile, former recipient Veronika lurks in the online groups and sends private messages to women she sees speaking with the donor she claims attacked her.But the way the online marketplace is set up favours the donors, rather than the women who seek them and the people who speak out.Presenter: Aleks Krotoski

In 2014, a woman came to London to receive sperm from a donor she found online. Later, he was convicted in a criminal court on two counts of sexual abuse against her. In court, it was argued that the donor, a university professor and popular member of the sperm donor marketplace, had taken advantage of his position of power - he had control over the thing she was desperate to have.Dr Tanya Palmer, a legal scholar at the University of Sussex, has argued that the UK criminal law lacks legislation over what she describes as chronic sexual abuse - acts that on their own are not offenses, but taken together can be seen as an ongoing assault of a person’s ability to give consent. In these marketplaces, she says, prolific and long-term donors are determining what new recipients should agree to, and what they feel they can say no to as well.Presenter: Aleks Krotoski

Kim and Aaron have chosen James to be their donor. He’s exactly what they’re looking for - the physical features, the profession, and dozens of photographs of donor-conceived children on his Facebook profile page that prove he can get women pregnant. Even better, the couple don’t even have to meet him in person to conceive - he will ship his sperm to them via the post, and they can inseminate in the comfort of their home.But as the months pass without success, despite repeated attempts, they are becoming disheartened. They come to meet him for an in-person donation, which raises the possibility that Kim could receive his sperm through “natural” insemination, or sex - a red line for Aaron, but not for her.Dr Keenan Omurtag, a fertility specialist, guides us through what we know - and importantly, what we don’t know - about conception.Presenter: Aleks Krotoski

Donor Alex has found a match with prospective parents MJ and Milo. He found their ad for a sperm donor on Facebook - they listed their needs and wants, hoping for someone to be involved in their child’s life. The trio have chatted on Facebook and on Zoom, and their ideas appear to align. But this is a commitment that lasts much longer than the time it takes for Alex to donate - are they willing to work together as relative strangers connected by genetics for at least the next 18 years?Natalie Gamble sees these kinds of families in her family law practice often. She recommends people who are about to embark on this lifelong journey get everything worked out before a child comes into the picture.Presenter: Aleks Krotoski

It costs £1000 for a vial of sperm from a licensed sperm bank, and one vial rarely does the job. But is price the only reason people go to the online fertility marketplaces?For both Erika and Alex, knowing the other genetic half of their biological children is what took them to the internet's sperm donation marketplace. Erika, founder of the parenting connection site Pride Angel, wanted her child to know the donor. She also wanted the rest of the donor's family to be involved. Meanwhile, Alex recently joined Facebook's online donor groups because he wanted to know the people who will be raising his offspring, and maybe get the opportunity to visit every once in a while.Shadow donor networks have been around for decades - excluded by clinics because of their sexuality, their marital status, or their desire to know the child - people whispered to friends and friends of friends at dinner parties and lecture halls. But with the dawn of the internet, these networks have expanded. Now, to access them, you simply need a web browser and a social media account.Dr Aleks Krotoski has been tracking these sperm donor groups since 2018, and has seen both the rewards and the risks. Yes, there is the opportunity to meet a donor and the child's future parent, but this is an unregulated market dealing in a regulated material. Compelled to this underground world, the people who offer and receive put themselves and their future children in danger of exploitation and disease. In this episode, Aleks asks, just because the internet lets us do it, should we?