Child Support From a Sperm Donor

Somebody placed the following item between the news about the dead woman Texas tried to keep on life support and Huckabee’s ridiculous comments about women’s out-of-control libidos:

Kansas judge rules sperm donor is liable for child support payments even though he and the two moms signed a document ahead of time renouncing his involvement in any child.

How these news items are connected is a mystery. Of course, people cannot sign away the essential rights of other people. The judge was absolutely right to make these rulings.

Here is what a less tendentious article about this case says:

A filing Wednesday by the DCF argues the sperm donor contract overlooks “the well-established law in this state that a person cannot contract away his or her obligations to support their child.”

The right for support belongs to the child, not the parents, the filing says.

Well, duh. Many people still think that the words “child support” refer to the money a man pays to a woman. They seem to be incapable of realizing that women are not legally considered to be children any longer. As for children, we all know that, in this country, they are only considered people with rights and needs of their own before they are born.

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34 responses to “Child Support From a Sperm Donor”

Titfortat

January 28, 2014

Terrible decision by that judge.

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Clarissa

January 28, 2014

Children’s rights are a concept that is basic for a civilized society.

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Titfortat

January 28, 2014

It opens the door for every sperm donor, egg donor and persons giving up their children for adoption to be held financially accountable. Terrible decision by that judge.

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Clarissa

January 28, 2014

Precisely! More children will have their basic necessities provided for. How can that be a bad thing?

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1. X
  
  April 22, 2023
  
  If a child’s custodial parent can adequately support a child by themselves, then I see no need to force a sperm donor (or for that matter, a non-custodial parent who conceives the child through sexual intercourse) to pay child support, especially if the child’s two parents had a prior, pre-sex agreement not to seek child support. If circumstances will change and the child will genuinely need the extra money, though, then they should be entitled to it. Though I would prefer a stronger social safety net as a better alternative to this.
  
  But Yeah, anyway, plenty of custodial parents are capable of financially supporting their children by themselves. Though obviously this isn’t always the case.
  
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Titfortat

January 28, 2014

Because in most(Vast majority) of the cases they already have their basic necessities(and more) provided for. This will in many, many cases just end up being a cash grab. Think of it, a 13yr old giving up an unwanted baby for adoption and then many years later being on the tab for financial support. Freaking ludicrous decision by that judge.

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Clarissa

January 28, 2014

From the linked article: “The state was seeking to have Marotta declared the child’s father so he can be held responsible for about $6,000 in public assistance the state provided, as well as future child support.”

Have you seen the statistics on child poverty in this country?

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cliff arroyo

January 28, 2014

I wouldn’t confuse the state going after this guy’s money with concern for the child. It’s in the interest of the state to find some guy some place for some reason and make him financially responsible.

And too often the support is simply paid to the custodial parent with no real oversight about what it’s being used for, the child certainly has no control over the money, a parent (who too often has a proven track record of bad decision making) is.

The real take away from these stories is that men should not donate sperm under any circumstances if they’re not willing to be on the financial hook for a child so produced.

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Clarissa

January 28, 2014

The state’s motivation is less important than the result. In Russia for instance, the motivation behind the ban on international adoption was horrible but the ban itself is sorely needed and serves a great purpose.

I agree with what you say about sperm and egg donations. Anonymous donations are, in my opinion, a violation of human rights and the rights established in the Declaration of the Rights of Child. Which the US hasn’t adopted, of course.

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1. Stringer Bell
  
  January 28, 2014
  
  “The state’s motivation is less important than the result. In Russia for instance, the motivation behind the ban on international adoption was horrible but the ban itself is sorely needed and serves a great purpose. ”
  
  Damn right.
  
  http://gawker.com/how-parents-use-facebook-and-yahoo-groups-to-sell-adopt-1278659585
  
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2. X
  
  April 22, 2023
  
  With anonymous donations, at least the children could find out more about their parents and ancestry through DNA testing and checking for the DNA of closely matching people to identify potential relatives of theirs. I would strongly prefer it if sperm/egg donors were not anonymous, but I still think that being conceived from an anonymous sperm/egg donor is better than not existing at all.
  
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X

April 22, 2023

Yeah, this is my own beef with child support: Custodial parents who aren’t on welfare are under no legal obligation to seek child support, and even when they do seek child support, there’s no guarantee that the extra money will actually get spent on the child (or on adjacent things, like food and housing). The custodial parent could end up spending the very same amount on the child, including on food and housing, before and after they will seek child support and simply use the extra (child support) money to line their own pockets. There’s nothing that would prohibit them from doing this, after all. And if they do this while previously promising (before sex and/or before sperm/egg donation) not to seek child support, then this does strike me as being very problematic.

I consider the Straub v. BMT by Todd case to be a disgrace and have literally e-mailed a couple of the judges from that case telling them as much.

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Titfortat

January 28, 2014

This will open the door for parental rights over donated sperm and eggs. Think about it, if you can put someone on the hook financially for donating sperm or eggs, logically they would be able to then sue for parental rights. Do we really want to open Pandora’s box in this regard?

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Clarissa

January 28, 2014

“Think about it, if you can put someone on the hook financially for donating sperm or eggs, logically they would be able to then sue for parental rights.”

– Of course. I think that’s a great thing. Again, thinking from the perspective of the rights of a child, a child always benefits from having access to both parents.

“Do we really want to open Pandora’s box in this regard?”

– Why on Earth no?

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Titfortat

January 28, 2014

a child always benefits from having access to both parents.(Clarissa)

Really, so if they are drug addicts, mentally ill, etc……. What about families that raised their adoptive child from birth and the child and parents(as in the ones who raised them) don’t want that information available. In your scenario they would have no choice. There is SO much bad that can come from this decision. I believe it far outweighs any good that might happen. As Cliff said, rarely would it be the child looking for money to help themselves, nor would they be the ones able to spend it until they reached 18yrs.

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Clarissa

January 28, 2014

“Really, so if they are drug addicts, mentally ill, etc……. ”

– I don’t think that mentally ill people and drug addicts are subhuman.

“There is SO much bad that can come from this decision. I believe it far outweighs any good that might happen.”

– You keep repeating this but you are yet to name a single bad thing.

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1. X
  
  April 22, 2023
  
  Mentally ill people are not subhuman, but if giving them access to their child will put the child in danger, then it’s obviously not a good idea to give them access to their child, at least not without extremely massive mental health treatment and/or medications beforehand.
  
  Though it’s worth noting that mentally ill people are probably very unlikely to ever become sperm/egg donors.
  
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Titfortat

January 28, 2014

I just did. That maybe adoptive kids and parents don’t want that information shared.

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Clarissa

January 28, 2014

Children don’t want to know who their parents are? Really? The knowledge of inherited health problems is of no use to them? They just actively refuse all that knowledge that can be potentially crucial to their health?

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Titfortat

January 28, 2014

What if the sperm donor was a rapist?

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Clarissa

January 28, 2014

Have you seen Law & Order: SVU? The whole show is centered around the protagonist who was born as a result of a rape and who searches for her father all her life. This is the most realistic and poignant part of the entire series.

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Titfortat

January 28, 2014

What if it was the mother who was raped and gave the child up because of the emotional damage that was done and clearly did not want her to be known. You so simplistically think its all just about finding your biological parents and everything will be just fine. I would have thought you of all people would understand “once size does not fit all”. We have a family member who recently had some encounters with a child that was given up when she was 16. It did not turn out well at all.

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Clarissa

January 28, 2014

I was always very consistently in favor of defending the rights of children and seeing them as human beings with their own interests and needs.

“What if it was the mother who was raped and gave the child up because of the emotional damage that was done and clearly did not want her to be known. ”

– Not once have you tried to look at this from the perspective of the child. Can you imagine what it means never to know your own mother? Never to be able to touch her, see her, hear her voice, not even once. To know nothing of her, of her family history. How can that possibly be a good thing?

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1. cliff arroyo
  
  January 28, 2014
  
  Did you ever read Innocent Blood by PD James? A favorite book of mine by a favorite author, you remind me a little of Philippa.
  
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  1. Clarissa
    
    January 28, 2014
    
    Yes, I love the author, and I know I read the book but that was a while ago. Is that where a girl looks for her mother who is a serial killer or something?
    
    I’m like Sherlock Holmes, I erase all non-essential information.
    
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2. Titfortat
  
  January 28, 2014
  
  Neither are you thinking of the child, at least not fully. What happens if the child meets the mother who gave her/him up and then rejects them again? What if they end up saying vile, nasty things to the child? You are just assuming its going to be some enriching, enlightening moment for all involved. Again, our family just went through something like were talking about and I reiterate, it did not go well. My father died before I ever got to develop any memory of hugging, kissing or touching him. I am fortunate to have the luxury of knowing about him from my family and he was a good man. I cant imagine if I had no knowledge and then found out he was Ted Bundy or some other not so nice person. There are so many scenarios where it could easily “not be a good thing”
  
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  1. Clarissa
    
    January 28, 2014
    
    ” What happens if the child meets the mother who gave her/him up and then rejects them again? What if they end up saying vile, nasty things to the child? ”
    
    – That is a crucial part of human growth. I have felt rejected by my mother a hundred times and have heard really vicious things form her. But I would never lament knowing her, knowing about her, and having her in my life. Human experience always includes pain and suffering. But that’s an integral part of what makes us human beings.
    
    ” You are just assuming its going to be some enriching, enlightening moment for all involved”
    
    – Tragedy is often more enriching and enlightening than tranquility.
    
    ” I cant imagine if I had no knowledge and then found out he was Ted Bundy or some other not so nice person. ”
    
    – Would you really prefer that somebody decide for you whether you should have access to this information that concerns only you? Really? You’d give somebody else this enormous power over your knowledge of your personal history?
    
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3. Titfortat
  
  January 28, 2014
  
  It might be the child who doesnt want the biological parent seeking them out. You would obviously deny them their right to not want that information given. Good to know.
  
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  1. Clarissa
    
    January 28, 2014
    
    The right to immaturity is something new, but I’m sure it will be gaining in popularity. 🙂
    
    Jokes aside, I can only imagine such an attitude being a result of abuse and/ or brainwashing from custodial parents. No other explanation comes to mind.
    
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January 28, 2014

H’mm. Well, given the general US climate of unwillingness towards governmental assistance of the poor, laws which attempt to push the burden of support of children from society towards individuals are logical.

In the UK, sperm donation can be anonymous – until the child is 18, then the child can obtain details about the donor. Formal donation results in legal severance, same as with adoption. Adoptions can be fully anonymous – but that is very, very rare and has to be court ordered. What happens in the majority of cases if the biological parents do not desire contact once the child turns 18 is to have a “no contact” notice put upon the adoption register. The child still receives a minimal amount of info, but not enough to trace the bio parent.
There is no capacity to force donors to support children resulting from donation – but then despite our current government’s best attempts, most people support child benefit as a social good. There is however, some case law suggesting non-formal sperm donation may create a legal relationship, up to and including requirements of support for the resulting child, even if you have a ‘donation agreement drawn up by a lawyer. It’s something still in flux – current legal advice if you go the non HFEA donation route, is for the donor parent to give consent for adoption by the donee parent.

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n8chz

January 28, 2014

This seems to me a very bad precedent for gay rights. Where there are rights there are responsibilities. A lesbian couple who explicitly agree to the full responsibility of supporting their child and then shirk that responsibility by filing for child support are beneath contempt, and more to the point, give lesbians (and TBLG in general) a bad name. A court that does not hold adoptive parents and other non-traditional parents to the full weight of their parental responsibilities disrespects them. Since responsibilities are inextricably packaged with rights, by calling someone’s responsibilities into question, we call their rights into question.

As for the children, their right to discover the identity of any genetic parents who have surrendered their parental rights is separate from their right to be supported by their legal guardians.

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Clarissa

January 28, 2014

“A lesbian couple who explicitly agree to the full responsibility of supporting their child and then shirk that responsibility by filing for child support are beneath contempt, and more to the point, give lesbians (and TBLG in general) a bad name.”

– They cannot waive the child’s rights and their explicit agreement is meaningless. Filing for child support is in the best interest of the child and this should always, always come first. These are good parents because they put the child’s interest before their political activism or anything else. Just imagine a person who sits there thinking, “Nah, I guess little Emily should just go on without braces if that will cause problems for the LGBT movement.” Can you imagine a parent like that?

“Since responsibilities are inextricably packaged with rights, by calling someone’s responsibilities into question, we call their rights into question.”

– I don’t see where anybody’s responsibilities were called into question. The custodial parents are not freed from the need to provide for a child by the existence of child support.

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cliff arroyo

January 28, 2014

“Is that where a girl looks for her mother who is a serial killer or something?”

Close. She’s an 18 year old adopted by a wealthy university professor (ha!) who decides (thanks to retroactive legislation) to look up her birth parents and instead of the romantic nonsense that she’d imagined finds out that her dead father had raped a child that her mother subsequently killed (and her mother will soon be released from prison).

Parts of it assume a familiarity with the moors murder cases which I didn’t have when I first read it.

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Clarissa

January 28, 2014

Yes, I now remember, albeit somewhat vaguely. She was the most obnoxious protagonist id ever seen. 🙂

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