Is Ed Houben Europe's Most Virile Man?
By BBC,
BBC News
| 03. 19. 2014
In a farm house in north-western Germany, heated by a lively fire in a wood-burning stove, a bulky and bespectacled Dutchman - he freely admits he is a bit on the heavy side - makes his way upstairs to the baby's room.
Ed Houben has come to see his daughter for the first time.
He talks gently to the six-week-old baby, and little Madita looks up at him. She is, he says, his 98th child.
Mr Houben is a "charitable sperm donor". He helps lesbian couples, single women and heterosexual couples with fertility problems to have children free of charge.
He started out in 2002 donating sperm to a sperm bank.
But his sperm donating career (he has a day job, by the way, as a tour guide) really hit its stride when the Netherlands, like many other European countries and Canada, banned anonymous sperm donation and he started offering his services for free on the internet.
'Looking for Ed'
He now donates his sperm in the "traditional way". Using the apparatus God gave him rather than a syringe. "Much...
Related Articles
By Grace Won, KQED [with CGS' Katie Hasson] | 12.02.2025
In the U.S., it’s illegal to edit genes in human embryos with the intention of creating a genetically engineered baby. But according to the Wall Street Journal, Bay Area startups are focused on just that. It wouldn’t be the first...
Several recent Biopolitical Times posts (1, 2, 3, 4) have called attention to the alarmingly rapid commercialization of “designer baby” technologies: polygenic embryo screening (especially its use to purportedly screen for traits like intelligence), in vitro gametogenesis (lab-made eggs and sperm), and heritable genome editing (also termed embryo editing or reproductive gene editing). Those three, together with artificial wombs, have been dubbed the “Gattaca stack” by Brian Armstrong, CEO of the cryptocurrency company...
Alice Wong, founder of the Disability Visibility Project, MacArthur Genius, liberationist, storyteller, writer, and friend of CGS, died on November 14. Alice shone a bright light on pervasive ableism in our society. She articulated how people with disabilities are limited not by an inability to do things but by systemic segregation and discrimination, the de-prioritization of accessibility, and the devaluation of their lives.
We at CGS learned so much from Alice about disability justice, which goes beyond rights...
By Adam Feuerstein, Stat | 11.20.2025
The Food and Drug Administration was more than likely correct to reject Biohaven Pharmaceuticals’ treatment for spinocerebellar ataxia, a rare and debilitating neurodegenerative disease. At the very least, the decision announced Tuesday night was not a surprise to anyone paying attention. Approval...