The dating site BeautifulPeople.com generated buzz this January by deleting the accounts of 5,000 people the website's other members judged too fat to date. Now the Danish service is back in the headlines thanks to its new virtual sperm and egg bank, designed to link would-be parents — hot and homely alike — with good-looking sperm and egg donors registered with the site. Is there anything wrong with screening donors in the hopes of ensuring attractive offspring? (Watch a Fox report about the "fertility forum")
This new service is even creepier than the site itself: There is certainly value in helping infertile couples and single women have children, says Brenna Ehrlich in Mashable. And it's awfully generous of BeautifulPeople.com to offer people who aren't "hotties" themselves access to its smoking gene pool, but "this whole venture is wandering toward the realm of eugenics — if not prancing right into it."
"Dating site launches online sperm and egg bank for 'beautiful people'"
Humans already screen by looks: "This is what mating is all about," says Shawn Alff at Creative Loafing. Whether in the real world or online, humans choose procreation partners based, to some degree, on how they look. This online service merely tightens the equation by focusing entirely on physical appearance. But buyer beware — these days, what you see may be good plastic surgery, not natural beauty.
"BeautifulPeople.com starts its own online sperm and egg bank"
"Superficial" people aren't attractive, anyway: "A lot of people may find this idea offensive," says Sandy Maple at Babble's Strollerderby. "I can't manage to work up any outrage over it." It's laughably "preposterous" to suggest that there's anything superior about "the genetic material one might cull" from people superficial enough to join this website. Remember, "shallow is never attractive."
"Fertility service for beautiful people"
