The desire to know one's genetic origins and the bionormativity response

When I ask the question, 'Why do many donor-conceived people want to know who their genetic parents are?' I tend to get one of two responses. The first, which I'll call the Incredulous Response, goes like this: 'What?!? How is the answer not obvious? You have to be utterly obtuse to think that there's a question worth asking here. How could someone not want to know?' Usually, when people respond in this way, they aren't just thinking about the important medical information that can come with knowing who your genetic parents are. They also think that this information is, on its own, fundamentally important and properly theirs. Unsurprisingly, people who have the Incredulous Response think that anonymous gamete donation should not be allowed.

The second reaction, which I'll call the Bionormativity Response, goes like this: 'We live in a society that unjustly values biogenetic ties and an ideal of the family that is constructed around those ties, in other words, a bionormative society. Little wonder, then, that people whose families are not constructed around those ties feel like they're missing something.' The idea is that people place too much emphasis on the significance of genetic ties, treating genetically-related families, in the words of philosopher Charlotte Witt, as 'the gold standard or platonic form of the family' and genetic relatedness as a kind of Rosetta stone for self-understanding.

People that have the Bionormativity Response are suspicious of donor-conceived people's desire to know their genetic origins because they see it as a product of a problematic, perhaps even oppressive, set of beliefs and practices that society would be better off without. Supporters of the Bionormativity Response typically don't think there is anything wrong with anonymous gamete donation.

The Incredulous Response invites us to see the desire to know as something basic and natural, like our desire for air or water: just as our desire for air is built into our biology and is connected to our basic needs as the kinds of creatures we are, so too (according to this way of thinking) is people's need for genetic knowledge. Denying people access to this knowledge is denying them something that everyone needs.

The Bionormativity Response suggests that the desire to know is neither basic nor natural. Rather, it invites us to see the desire as a product of a culture that overemphasises the significance of genetic ties and ancestral lineage. In such a culture, people that lack genetic knowledge are wrongly made to feel like they are missing something crucial, something they cannot be complete without. If the Incredulous Response sees the desire to know as a basic, natural need, then the Bionormativity Response sees the desire to know as akin to problematic gendered desires – like a girl's desire to be model-thin or a boy's desire to never cry – which are cultural products tied to oppressive worldviews and that we would be better off without.

Who is right? I believe there is something wrong with anonymous gamete donation because it frustrates the significant interest that many donor-conceived people have in knowing who their genetic parents are.

But I also believe that the Bionormativity Response gets many things right. I think it rightly puts pressure on the idea that the desire for genetic knowledge is natural, basic and unproblematic. It invites us to scrutinise our own – and the culture at large's – convictions about the significance of genetic ties and to hold open the possibility that they are not as important as we tend to think. Indeed, I think it is very plausible that the desire to know is ineluctably shaped by, if not entirely a product of, a culture that relays a message – in ways subtle and not – that people who lack genetic knowledge are missing out on something that is crucial to flourishing.

My focus here is on the desire to know your genetic origins, but I don't think the desire to know is in any way special or unusual in being a cultural product. I think more or less all of our desires are mediated by the culture around us: they would not be the desires they are without the cultural context that gave rise to them. Crucially, this doesn't mean they have their basis only in culture. The idea, rather, is that the specific form they take is a product of culture.

Seeing the desire to know your genetic origins as a cultural product does not mean that it is less real than so-called 'natural' desires. It also doesn't mean that it is not worthwhile or should be abandoned. But it does encourage us to look carefully at the cultural forces that shape it and to recognise that the desire may not be inevitable in the way that the Incredulous Response suggests it is. If the desire to know is a cultural product, then a change in culture – away from one that unjustifiably values biogenetic ties – could result in a change in people's desire for genetic knowledge, either in its prevalence or in how strong the desire is.

My own view is that the desire to know is a cultural product, but that it is not like many gendered desires. The latter are often problematic through and through, and we would be better off without them. But even if the desire to know is not problematic in this way – even if it expresses a desire to know something that is worth knowing – it is, in my view, amplified and interpreted in problematic ways because of bionormativity.

For me, that means there are twin tasks in thinking about – and making policy recommendations concerning – gamete donation: we must take seriously many donor-conceived people's strong interest in having genetic knowledge, while simultaneously working to change the bionormative culture that shapes that desire in the first place.

How might we do that? I'm not sure… except that I think the way not to do it is to promote practices of anonymity and non-disclosure. These practices, in my view, ultimately serve to reinforce the view that biogenetic ties are profoundly important by treating them as too significant to be open about. If I'm right about that, we end up in a somewhat ironic spot: one way of tackling bionormativity is by promoting honesty and openness in gamete donation.

Professor Groll is the author of Conceiving People: Genetic Knowledge and the Ethics of Sperm and Egg Donation (use code AAFLYG6 for 30 percent off). He is a professor of philosophy at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota and an Affiliate Faculty Member in the Centre for Bioethics at the University of Minnesota. Daniel is a known donor for close friends with two children.