“Families we choose” on Facebook

notes about Home Insemination, tempting and donors

Abstract

The present paper deals with "Home Insemination" in human beings. Unlike what occurs in clinics and professional assisted reproduction centers, under the label of Home Insemination, informal and home alternatives rest for the reproduction and constitution of family arrangements. Supported by various materials (thematic groups on the Facebook platform, reports, documents and videos on the YouTube platform), the objective of this article is to analyze the ways in which this reproductive alternative has been presented and what contributions it adds to thinking about topics dealt with under the rubric’s kinship, science and technology. To this end, intellectuals such as Kath Weston, Marilyn Strathern, Charis Thompson and Claudia Fonseca were consulted as a source of inspiration. Allies and other references that I quote in a specific moment, these intellectuals provide the theoretical framework through which I try to understand the Home Insemination and some of its particularities. The analyzes carried out suggest that, in the choices and practices carried out in the search for the “dream” of motherhood, tempters and donors negotiate bonds of belonging. To this end, they act both by "naturalizing" aspects that escape biogenetic ties, and by denying what could be considered natural and irrevocable. If in some moments more emphasis or value is attributed to biogenetic aspects, this does not prevent that, in a simultaneous and proportional way, it is invested in the production of many other forms of connection and belonging.