What can we do to stop Jewish Polygamy?

amother

Mon, Jan 19 2015, 10:28 pm

To Opinionated; your snide tone is unwarranted. why in the world would I be anything but honest ? maybe you should change your name to 'Suspicious' I don't remember where I read about this subject but I read a lot of journals and so I can easily forget. it seems I touched a nerve here, but it is surely unintentional and I do not judge anyone since I have no clue what I would do in their place.
I am posting the article below for your reading pleasure.

The Sperm-Donor Kids Are Not Really All Right

A new study shows they suffer.

By Karen Clark and Elizabeth Marquardt, Karen Clark and Elizabeth Marquardt, Karen Clark and Elizabeth Marquardt, Karen Clark and Elizabeth Marquardt, Karen Clark and Elizabeth Marquardt, Karen Clark and Elizabeth Marquardt, and Karen Clark and Elizabeth Marquardt llustration by Robert Neubecker. Click image to expand.

The Kids Are All Right, due out in July, is being praised for its honest portrayal of a lesbian couple, played by Julianne Moore and Annette Bening. But what seems most revelatory about the movie is its portrayal of their two teenage children who track down their sperm donor biological father and insist on forging a connection with him. Finally, we have an exploration of how children born from such procedures feel, because in fact it turns out that their feelings about their origins are a lot more complicated than people think.

Each year an estimated 30,000-60,000 children are born in this country via artificial insemination, but the number is only an educated guess. Neither the fertility industry nor any other entity is required to report on these statistics. The practice is not regulated, and the children's health and well-being are not tracked. In adoption, prospective parents go through a painstaking, systematic review, including home visits and detailed questions about their relationship, finances, and even their relations life. Any red flags, and a couple might not get the child.

With donor conception, the state requires absolutely none of that. Individual clinics and doctors can decide what kinds of questions they want to ask clients who show up at their door. They don't conduct home studies. No contacts are interviewed. If clients can pay their medical bills, most clinics could care less about their finances. The effects of such a system on the people conceived this way have been largely unknown.

We set out to change that. We teamed up with professor Norval Glenn of the University of Texas at Austin to design and field a survey with a sample drawn from more than 1 million American households. One of us (Karen Clark) found out at age 18 that she had been conceived through anonymous sperm donation in 1966. The other (Elizabeth Marquardt) has completed studies on topics such as the inner lives of children of divorce and has been profoundly absorbed by the stories of adult donor offspring since she first began hearing them in comments to posts she wrote on the FamilyScholars blog in 2005.

Our study, released by the Commission on Parenthood's Future last week, focused on how young-adult donor offspring—and comparison samples of young adults who were raised by adoptive or biological parents—make sense of their identities and family experiences, how they approach reproductive technologies more generally, and how they are faring on key outcomes. The study of 18- to 45-year-olds includes 485 who were conceived via sperm donation, 562 adopted as infants, and 563 raised by their biological parents.

The results are surprising. While adoption is often the center of controversy, it turns out that sperm donation raises a host of different but equally complex—and sometimes troubling—issues. Two-thirds of adult donor offspring agree with the statement "My sperm donor is half of who I am." Nearly half are disturbed that money was involved in their conception. More than half say that when they see someone who resembles them, they wonder if they are related. About two-thirds affirm the right of donor offspring to know the truth about their origins.

Regardless of socioeconomic status, donor offspring are twice as likely as those raised by biological parents to report problems with the law before age 25. They are more than twice as likely to report having struggled with substance abuse. And they are about 1.5 times as likely to report depression or other mental health problems.

As a group, the donor offspring in our study are suffering more than those who were adopted: hurting more, feeling more confused, and feeling more isolated from their families. (And our study found that the adoptees on average are struggling more than those raised by their biological parents.) The donor offspring are more likely than the adopted to have struggled with addiction and delinquency and, similar to the adopted, a significant number have confronted depression or other mental illness. Nearly half of donor offspring, and more than half of adoptees, agree, "It is better to adopt than to use donated sperm or eggs to have a child."

The stories that donor offspring tell about their confusion help to illustrate why they might be, as a group, faring so much worse. Christine Whipp, a British author conceived by anonymous sperm donation more than four decades ago, gives voice to the feelings some donor offspring have of being a "freak of nature" or a "lab experiment":

My existence owed almost nothing to the serendipitous nature of normal human reproduction, where babies are the natural progression of mutually fulfilling adult relationships, but rather represented a verbal contract, a financial transaction and a cold, clinical harnessing of medical technology.

Lynne Spencer, a nurse and donor-conceived adult, speaks eloquently of losing trust when her parents did not tell her the truth about her origins, and she suspected the secret:

When you grow up and your instincts are telling you one thing and your parents—the people you are supposed to be able to trust the most in your life—are telling you something else, your whole sense of what is true and not true is all confused.

Others speak of the searching for their biological father in crowds, wondering if a man who resembles them could be "the one." One donor-conceived adult responded to an open-ended question on our survey by writing: "Sometimes I wonder if my father is standing right in front of me." Still others speak of complicated emotional journeys and lost or damaged relationships with their families when they grow up. One wrote at the end of our survey: "I still have issues with this problem and am seeking professional help. It has helped me to become a stronger person but has scarred me emotionally." Another said, "[I am] currently not on seeing or speaking terms with family because of this."

Listening to the stories of donor-conceived adults, you begin to realize there's really no such thing as a "donor." Every child has a biological father. To claim otherwise is simply to compound the pain, first as these young people struggle with the original, deliberate loss of their biological father, and second as they do so within a culture that insists some guy who went into a room with a dirty magazine isn't a father. At most the children are told he's a "seed provider" or "the nice guy who gave me what I needed to have you" or the "Y Guy" or any number of other cute euphemisms that signal powerfully to children that this man should be of little, if any, importance to them.

What to do? For starters, the United States should follow the lead of Britain, Norway, Sweden, and other nations and end the anonymous trade of sperm. Doing so would powerfully affirm that as a nation we no longer tolerate the creation of two classes of children, one actively denied by the state knowledge of their biological fathers, and the rest who the state believes should have the care and protection of legal fathers, such that the state will even track these men down and dock child support payments from their paychecks.

Getting rid of the secrecy would go a long way toward helping relieve the pain offspring feel. But respondents to our study told us something else too: About half of them have concerns about or serious objections to donor conception itself, even if parents tell their children the truth. Our findings suggest that openness alone does not resolve the complex risks to which children are exposed when they are deliberately conceived not to know and be known by their biological fathers.

At the very least, these young people need acknowledgement of reality as they experience it. Donor offspring may have legal and social parents who take a variety of forms—single, coupled, gay, straight. But they also have, like everyone else, a biological father and mother, two people whose very beings are found in the child's own body and seen in his or her own image reflected in the mirror.

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Karen Clark and Elizabeth Marquardt and are co-investigators, with Norval D. Glenn of the University of Texas at Austin, of "My Daddy's Name Is Donor." The full report is available at FamilyScholars.org.

Tablepoetry

Tue, Jan 20 2015, 12:14 am

Interesting study. However.....

First, it's a very shallow study. OK, let's assume their results are solid, and children raised by biological parents are the best adjusted, adopted children have problems, and sperm donor kids really struggle.

But why would you assume it's because they're donor kids? Aren't the populations totally different? I would assume that parents who managed to adopt a child, with the long wait and tough criteria, are a solid group of stable folks, with a strong socio-economic background.
OTOH, absolutely anyone can have a donor kid....there are amazing people who choose to do so, but there are also people with serious issues who didn't manage to find a partner. Obviously not the same.

In other words, I think that the problems weren't because they were donor children, but because of the parents and environment of SOME of these kids (obviously, not all). Amother, your suggestion that being a second wife would solve these problems, is, IMO, off the mark, because the issues don't stem from the mode of conception but from the people doing it.

Second, it's pretty clear the study is likely funded by some right-wing conservative group bent on saving the traditional family in America.

Tablepoetry

Tue, Jan 20 2015, 12:17 am

amother wrote:

Table, you are a nice lady... very civil in your comeback.
I agree with what you said, except that my DH is decent... does not meet my needs in any way but he is not a bad guy for someone less emotionally needy than I. If I were approaching forty and single, I would do a cost/benefit analysis and would probably settle for an ok guy rather than live a life alone, without a hope of having children.
Artificial insemination is not a better solution because then one is condemning their children to a rootless kind of life... and that may be unfair.
in any event, I'm running to work, but would appreciate more discussion about this later if you are amenable to that.
we have a major problem In our society and we do need to find better solutions....
thanks for being nice in your disagreement....

You are suggesting women share their husbands, especially the inadequate ones. In other words, men will become something like breeding stallions, good for conceiving kids, but not necessarily for much else.
(A second wife certainly can't expect a man to support her financially or emotionally if he couldn't manage to support the first one).
How is that much different than using a sperm donor?

Ruchel

Tue, Jan 20 2015, 5:01 am

What about the many countries where adopted children don't know about their bio parents unless bio parents chooses to leave them something for when they turn 18 and child chooses to go get it?
What about the children from IF complicated procedures?
What about the children from non satisfying relationships?
Who decides that apart from obvious facts like "able to feed and clothe them", "not running around naked saying they are a hen", the adoptive parents are objectively better than the rest of the population? More moneyed indeed... but....

amother

Tue, Jan 20 2015, 6:26 pm

This thread is about solutions as to how to stop Jewish polygamy from happening. Any suggestions?

gittelchana

Tue, Jan 20 2015, 6:46 pm

amother wrote:

This thread is about solutions as to how to stop Jewish polygamy from happening. Any suggestions?

I don't think it's actually happening anywhere.

rimon613

Sun, Dec 06 2015, 3:10 am

The best way to not allow Jewish polygamy to come back is that us women will make is very clear to the world that we will never put up with it.

2cents

Sun, Dec 06 2015, 9:33 am

It's hard to believe that something that us viewed as immoral, illegal, and strange by society at large will suddenly become mainstream.

Halachically, also, I can't see mainstream (ashkenazic) rabbanim overturning rabbeinu Gershon's ban for the general public for something that seems to be motivated by lust for immorality.

Also, a husband in a normal modern day marriage feels/should feel that his wife is his soulmate, exclusive love, and best friend. There's no opening really to even think about wanting a second wife.

From what I've read about Arabic countries that still have polygamy, the husband-wife relationship is nonexistent on an emotional level, and it's a sign of prestige and being a settled, prosperous man when you take a second wife. That's not what jewish marriages look like today.

Isn't there an added line in Ashkenazic kesubas that says that the husband vows not to take another wife?

imasoftov

Sun, Dec 06 2015, 11:33 am

Since we haven't heard of any cases since this thread started nearly a year ago, I think we can pat each other on the back and say "job well done".

zaq

Sun, Dec 06 2015, 11:37 am

2cents wrote:

Isn't there an added line in Ashkenazic kesubas that says that the husband vows not to take another wife?

No. See below. From Chabad.org

English Text:

On the [...] day of the week, the [...] day of the [Hebrew] month of [...], the year [...] after the creation of the world, according to the manner in which we count [dates] here in [...], the bridegroom [...] son of [...] said to this [...] daughter of [...], ?Be my wife according to the law of Moses and Israel. I will work honor, feed and support you in the custom of Jewish men, who work, honor, feed, and support their wives faithfully. I will give you the settlement of [...] silver zuzim, which is due you according to [...] law, as well as your food, clothing, necessities of life, and conjugal needs, according to the universal custom.?

Ms. [...] agreed, and became his wife. This dowry that she brought from her father?s house, whether in silver, gold, jewelry, clothing, home furnishings, or bedding, Mr. [...], our bridegroom, accepts as being worth [...] silver pieces (zekukim).

Our bridegroom, Mr. [...] agreed, and of his own accord, added an additional [...] silver pieces (zekukim) paralleling the above. The entire amount is then [...] silver pieces (zekukim).

Mr. [...] our bridegroom made this declaration: ?The obligation of this marriage contract (ketubah), this dowry, and this additional amount, I accept upon myself and upon my heirs after me. It can be paid from the entire best part of the property and possessions that I own under all the heavens, whether I own [this property] already, or will own it in the future. [It includes] both mortgageable property and non-mortgageable property. All of it shall be mortgaged and bound as security to pay this marriage contract, this dowry, and this additional amount. [it can be taken] from me, even from the shirt on my back, during my lifetime, and after my lifetime, from this day and forever.?

And the surety for all the obligations of this marriage contract (ketubah), dowry and the additional sum has been assumed by [...] the said groom, with the full obligation dictated by all documents of ketubot and additional sums due every daughter of Israel, executed in accordance with the enactment of our Sages, of blessed memory. It is not to be regarded as an indecisive contractual obligation nor as a stereotyped form.

And we have completed the act of acquisition from Mr.[...] son of [...] our bridegroom, to Ms. [...] daughter of [...], regarding everything written and stated above, with an article that is fit for such a kinyan. And everything is valid and confirmed.

[...] son of [...] Witness

[...] son of [...] Witness

zaq

Sun, Dec 06 2015, 11:41 am

dup

Last edited by zaq on Sun, Dec 06 2015, 11:59 am; edited 2 times in total

youngishbear

Sun, Dec 06 2015, 11:46 am

imasoftov wrote:

Since we haven't heard of any cases since this thread started nearly a year ago, I think we can pat each other on the back and say "job well done".

This.

octopus

Sun, Dec 06 2015, 11:48 am

To the ppl that like to say that polygamy will help the shidduch crisis: that's very short-sighted thinking. We also have a marriage crisis- overload of shalom bayis problems and broken families. Polygamy will only contribute to that and probably help destabilize families. Also, you don't think some evil jerka-zoid will tell his wife, "you better let me take another wife, or I will divorce you!"

penguin

Sun, Dec 06 2015, 12:04 pm

Quote:

Isn't there an added line in Ashkenazic kesubas that says that the husband vows not to take another wife?

No, that's in Sefardi kesubos (not sure if all eidot but I know on Syrian ones) and I think it's only that he can't take another one without her permission. Perhaps one of the ladies here can quote hers.

Ashkenazim are covered by Cherem Rabeinu Gershom. Even though it officially expired, it's now considered firmly entrenched (minhag?) and I doubt anyone is agreeing to override it today, except in specific cases via a Heter Meah Rabbonim.

Sadie

Sun, Dec 06 2015, 12:08 pm

penguin wrote:

Quote:

Isn't there an added line in Ashkenazic kesubas that says that the husband vows not to take another wife?

Hm I have an eidot hamizrach ketubah but I can't read it! Maybe I should have had the thing translated so I would know what I was getting into.

FranticFrummie

Sun, Dec 06 2015, 12:08 pm

I don't understand why anyone feels the need to "stop" polygamy. If it doesn't affect you personally, what's the big deal?

I keep telling DH to get another wife to help me out with the housework (and because I have zero zex drive.) LOL

He keeps telling me he can't afford another wife. He does say that if he ever decides to get another wife, he'll let me choose. Wink

2cents

Sun, Dec 06 2015, 2:10 pm

penguin wrote:

Quote:

Isn't there an added line in Ashkenazic kesubas that says that the husband vows not to take another wife?

Nope, it most definitely is not in some or all sfardic kesubos (many Syrian pskai halacha are influence by rav moshe. Maybe that's why they have this?). I had learned in high school that it was added to the ashkenazic kesuba as a result of rabbanim Gershon's gezairah. I know of a wedding where the chuppah was held up because the ashkenazic fil was demanding that that line be added and the sfardic chosson refused. (Many many years later, the chosson explained that he thought that if the kallah couldn't trust him then, when would she trust him?)
At the end, R'Heinemen solved it by making a verbal agreement between the two, and the chosson and FIL shook on it.

1ofbillions

Sun, Dec 06 2015, 5:13 pm

From what I understand, polygamy is not supposed to be the norm according to halacha. It's really just kings that are supposed to consider it as a viable option. Does anyone else remember learning this in school?

Sun, Dec 06 2015, 5:56 pm

2cents wrote:

It's hard to believe that something that us viewed as immoral, illegal, and strange by society at large will suddenly become mainstream.

[quote]

Being gay 100 years ago....

amother

Linen

Sun, Dec 06 2015, 5:59 pm

1ofbillions wrote:

So why does virtually every male in the torah have more than one partner? They are not all kings.