A Stitch in Haste

Reason Magazine asserts that the current unregulated nature of the fertility industry is a good thing — that there is a basic right to donate or obtain sperm and eggs anonymously for the purposes of conceiving children and that there should be a right to buy and sell (as opposed to just "donate and obtain") sperm and eggs anonymously:

To anyone with an affinity for government regulation, the fertility industry is a monstrous organism evolving in the shadows of legislative neglect. Donor agencies largely set their own rules for the sale of genetic material: Some cater to same-sex couples, others strictly to heterosexual married ones. Many cap egg donor compensation at a paltry $3,000; others let donors set the prices, encouraging Olympic athletes and Ivy-leaguers to ask for many times that amount. Some agencies demand anonymity, others will fly donors across the country to meet hopeful parents. At its most individualized, egg donation is contractual agreement between donor and recipient, with the agency acting as broker.

Makes sense to me. Private people entering into private contracts related to (very) private matters.

Just one small detail is left out — the kid:

Even if the clinics work up the nerve to reveal their preferred solution, it's not one that will satisfy the grown children of anonymous donor agreements, who, according to the [New York] Times, suffer from something called "genetic bewilderment." But in this one aspect, perhaps, growing up the child of newfangled fertility advances isn't so different from growing up the old fashioned way.

This is, of course, utter nonsense.

There's a lot more at stake here than "genetic bewilderment." Disease screening and tissue or organ donation are also at stake. Medicine is increasingly becoming "applied genetics" and the idea that a person's desire, indeed his need, to know his biological lineage is not just a question of psychological well-being but of physiological well-being.

Another small detail is ignored by the pro-anonymity crowd, one that libertarians have no business overlooking. It is a basic principle of law, ethics and common sense that one person may not waive the rights of another. Yes parents have a limited exception regarding their minor children, but that exception abruptly ends when the child becomes an adult. Would anyone seriously argue that 60-year old parents can waive the rights of their 30-year old children?

Strictly private fertility contracts negotiated in a strictly private (i.e., unregulated) setting are all well and good, but no contract is ever binding on someone not a party to it. It is never proper libertarianism to claim that someone can be bound by a contract they never entered into, or that a third party's rights are "no big deal."

Children have a fundamental right to know the identity of their biological parents upon reaching the age of majority, pre-birth contracts to the contrary be damned.

That's my ruling — any dissents?

UPDATE: Defcon:blog has a thoughtful response, but also see my comment at his blog.