Sex/uality Artifacts

Hey guys! My name is Jessica Mason and I showed the trailer of Delivery Man and discussed assisted conception. In the movie, Vince Vaughn donates his sperm six hundred times and there was a mix up with the clinic he donated on and they overused his sperm. The result of this was that he then had 533 children, not really realistic but it’s a very cute movie. So throughout the movie, his children get together to try to figure out who their father is, potentially ruling against the anonymity clause. During this time, Vince Vaughn looks at each of their profiles and help a couple of them in the process, without them knowing that he’s the father. The court ended up ruling that he did not have to reveal his identity, but he could receive $200,00 due to the damage and publication his reputation was receiving. He then turns down the money and reveals himself, and decides to be the father of all 533 children.

When discussing different types of assisted conception and sperm donation, I thought of this movie and how Vince Vaughn goes from being an unknown donor to a known donor. You also see what it kind of does to the children of someone who donated their sperm. It also kind of shows how easy it is for someone to donate sperm but not so much eggs. It’s kind of rare for someone to donate their eggs for conception.

Another clip I wanted to show but wasn’t able to was the movie, Baby Mama. In this movie, Tina Fey tries everything to get pregnant, She spends thousands of dollars on InVitro fertilization and others. We discussed how there’s on a 20 something percent chance of conception in most treatments and 40 percent with InVitro, that’s a lot of money to kind of gamble on and the movie kind of shows the struggles she faces. Her other alternative was to hire a surrogate mother, Amy Poehler, and pay a lot of money when there’s no guarantee that the mother will hand over the baby. It’s a comical movie but also emphasizes on how hard and expensive it can be to try to have a baby. I thought that these two movies tied in well with our class discussion.

Dr. Rainey did bring up a question about Delivery Man raising any concern about donating and if it bothered clinics or not. When researching, the only thing I found criticism about it not being plausible and that it was false, one statement said, ” In the U.S. most sperm banks restrict each contributor from creating no more than 25 families, and some even place the limit at 10″. The article was stating how they do limit the amount that can be donated and also have restrictions as to who can donate. Before these regulations were put into place, one man from New York fathered 150 children. That then raised concerns about the long term affect of families and also the spread of genetic diseases. This article just kind of backs up different clinics and answers questions that were raised when this movie was released.

Article: http://www.nbcnews.com/health/delivery-man-debunked-not-just-any-guy-can-be-sperm-2D11640450