Parallel Worlds

For a long time, I've been curious about what it would be like to be involved in our country's breeding institution. Ever since I was in high school, when the Fertility Benefit Act was first passed, this strange world has existed alongside my own. This world and my own life have often felt like they're running in parallel; close enough that they're never out of sight, but also never touching.

For all this separation, the FBA has had an undeniable effect on my life. When the 2044 Unretirement Amendment retroactively made breeding registration permanent, mine was one of 20 million American families affected. My mother, in an unsuccessful effort to give me a sibling, had joined the register for the minimum duration of six months in 2041. When the Unretirement Amendment was passed, she had just been promoted to a management position in her job at a major construction firm. Within another two months, she had to quit due to the demands of breeding.

My father applied for a breeding licence after that, but like 85% of applications in the first five years of the FBA he was rejected due to a failed fertility test. He re-applied every year for the rest of his life, but always his fertility test came back negative

My parents both came from very large families, well established prior to the fertility collapse of the '20s. Both the youngest, my mother had seven siblings and my father had nine. Between them, they had five brothers. From 2044 to 2050, all five of them applied for a breeding licence. Only one passed the fertility exam, but his licence was rescinded at his two year audit because he had only sired three children. When he re-applied the next year, he was rejected due to a failed fertility test.

Regardless of whether or not you have had direct involvement with the FBA, many of you will be familiar with stories like mine. Whether they are your own stories, or those of your friends and families. While the FBA does seem to have stabilised America's population over these decades, it has wreaked havoc on many families. It seems so paradoxical for breeding to break up families, given that historically marriage was seen as the stage in life at which people would begin to have children. The way the law ignores the bonds of marriage has been both critical to its success and instrumental in the family unit's downfall.

We are a broken people, many critics say, but all agree: it is due entirely to the Fertility Benefit Act that we will be able to survive into the next century.

This conflict has left me wondering for a long time about my part in it all. Is it an evil system, or is it just what we need? Am I right to not get involved, or do I owe it to my fellow humans to do my part? Every time I see my doctor, they try to get me to apply. Well, I finally relented. Time to see for myself, I decided.

I'll spare you the suspense up front. As of June last year, I have been granted a 24 month Provisional Breeding Licence. Here's what the process was like.

The government's PSAs never seem to stop telling us how to apply, so you probably already know that the first step in getting a breeding licence is to visit a registered health clinic or pharmacy in your area. My local pharmacy is part of the programme, so when I was filling a prescription I told them that I'd like to apply for a breeding licence.

I was taken to a private, sterile-looking booth in the back of the store and left with a stack of pornographic magazines, a small plastic jar, and instructions to leave the area immaculate after I was "done".

Masturbating in the back of a pharmacy was a very awkward experience. Giving a stranger a jar of your sperm after you both know that you just masturbated in the back of their workplace is worse. I understand now why the government encourages applications so much, because that awkwardness made for a high bar for entry.

My sperm was delivered, along with a form containing my details, and it took two weeks for the results of the fertility test to come back. In that time, I'd managed to convince myself that I was being ridiculous. With my family history, it was seriously unlikely that I would be granted a licence. So when the positive result arrived, I was very surprised. It wasn't until this point that I learned how much more of a process there is to getting a breeding licence.

Over the next two months, I had to have a psychological assessment (at my own cost — another hurdle) and take a number of written tests. I was told this was all to make sure that my intentions in gaining a breeding licence were to use it to breed, and that I wasn't going to turn out to be a waste of time and money for the NIH.

I admitted to them that, if successful, I was hoping to write about my experiences here. I'm not sure if that counted for me, against me, or not at all, but at the end of it all I received an email assigning me a handler and setting up my first meeting.

I've agreed not to identify my handler, but she is an older woman with no children of her own, who has worked as a handler since the FBA was first passed into law. At our first meeting in June, she explained my responsibilities to me again, told me about the auditing process I would have to go through, and gave me my Provisional Breeding Licence. If I kept on track for the next 24 months, I was told, I would be given a more permanent licence and would only be audited every five years.

To pass the first major audit, at the two year mark, I would have to sire seven children. Of course, it would take a single woman close to a decade — at least — to give birth seven times, so my best chance is clearly to impregnate seven separate women. Though in 2050–2055, over one in four pregnancies in America have ended in miscarriage, so more likely I would have to impregnate nine or more women to keep my licence, all within enough time for them to give birth before June 2057. This was what my handler recommended I aim for.

It's no wonder the FBA has all but destroyed the concept of getting married to start a family.

Those of us who are licensed have a few options for finding women on the breeding register. The NIH has an app called BreedMate that we're encouraged to use, where we can do things like look up nearby breeders. We can also just ask women if they are on the register, as it is a felony to lie about whether or not you have a breeding licence or whether or not you are on the register.

As perhaps a last resort, there are also the breeding wings of America's prisons, often filled with women who have lied about not being on the breeding register.

In the seven months since being granted my licence, I have interviewed a number of women from across the USA who are on the breeding register about the role the Fertility Benefit Act has played in their lives. After each interview, I had sex with them, and I've also written about that experience to show you what it can be like to have a breeding licence.

Elleny Clark

Elleny (23) has been something of a poster girl for the FBA in her home city of Fairmont, West Virginia. She joined the register on her 18th birthday — as soon as the law would allow — and within a month had a confirmed pregnancy. With twins, no less. When I spoke with her last August she was well along into her fifth pregnancy.

Matthew Gladstone: Thanks for agreeing to speak with me Elleny. I want to start with a fairly open-ended question. How has the Fertility Benefit Act affected your life?

Photo: Kyle Douglas

Elleny Clark: Oh, wow. Well, I guess then I'd have to start with my Mom. See she never wanted to be registered, but she got lucky and got pregnant by mistake with my brother Tyler. You know he's the only person in his class at school with a full blood sibling? Anyway he was born in, he's 10 now so he was born in 2045. So Mom got registered since she got pregnant.

Anyway she had to quit her job, but she also got a benefit for having Tyler so it weren't all bad. Dad tried to get a licence and he passed the fertility test, but they rejected him since he just wanted to breed Mom and thought the licence would just mean he wouldn't have to like, wait in line you know?

But yeah, there was a line sometimes. Not like, huge, but I remember one time when there were four men all waiting in our living room for their turn.

So anyway, I was 13 when Tyler was born, so I'd just hit puberty. As I grew up sometimes the men who came to see Mom asked about me and how old I was and if I was registered too you know?

Oh real quick one thing. One of the men who came to breed Mom was my maths teacher Mr Williams and that was real weird. He only came over once, though.

Anyway, so some of the men were asking about me and stuff. And then my friend's brother Peter gets a licence, and he's a bit older than me so I was still 15, and he comes around but someone was with Mom. And anyway when you grow up with all that sex you get real curious, and he was the closest to my age of any of them men who came to our house. So while Mom was busy we went up to my room and we had sex

Mom found out right away, but she wasn't even mad. She just told me I should wait, and if I wanted to get registered I could do that when I turned 18. So I did my best to wait, and it turns out I'm not too great at it but I did turn 18 eventually.

So I still live with my mom and dad and with Tyler, and now men who come to the house are sometimes here for me and sometimes for Mom, and sometimes they come back the next day or whatever for the other one of us. And it's pretty great. I've been pregnant most of the time since then, but I don't want to keep any of my babies so I put them up for adoption.

Photo: Kyle Douglas

MG: You've had five children now—

EC: Number six on the way.

MG: Five children, number six on the way. Your time on the breeding register has been remarkably successful, and I know you've been shown off as a bit of a role model of a breeder in your community. Do you feel a lot of pressure?

EC: Usually it's fine. I mean I'm just letting my body do what it was made for right? Getting pregnant's never been a problem for me, but honestly I do worry that one day I might have a miscarriage. My momma's had six miscarriages since she had Tyler, and I pray every day that my baby will be safe.

MG: You also mentioned that you've been pregnant most of the time since you joined the register. Do you ever feel like the act lets people take advantage of you by still requiring you to cooperate with licensed breeders' sexual requests while you're pregnant?

EC: Okay well there's one thing that I probably need to say. I love having sex. If I couldn't get pregnant at all I'd still want to have sex, so why shouldn't I want to have sex if I can't get pregnant because I already am pregnant?

MG: Well, I've heard that some men with licences might request some more painful stuff if they're not thinking about impregnating you.

Photo: Kyle Douglas

EC: Are you that sort of man, Mr Gladstone?

MG: I don't mean to be.

EC: Okay. Well most guys are pretty nice and want us both to have fun. There is one guy I know, and I won't name names but he's an older gentleman, who does that sort of thing you said. I usually see him once or twice a month, but he only comes to see me when I'm pregnant and he only ever asks for anal sex.

MG: What do you think of that?

EC: I mean it's not my favourite, but if he does enough to keep his licence then who am I to complain? Not like I'm not used to it at least. Most guys who come to see me will sometimes ask for anal or a blowjob or whatever and just switch when they're going to come. So it's fine.

MG: You're very young to have had so many children. What effects has it had on your body?

EC: Well they were all C-sections of course. I've seen Mom's big scar from me but all of mine have healed well, you can barely tell now. As breeders we're really discouraged from vaginal births. I know my breasts have changed a lot from my pregnancies but you know, I'm happy with my body.

MG: I've heard you're something of a political activist, as well?

EC: Oh now I wouldn't use that word. But I do think we need to make some tweaks to the law. The main thing that worries me is all the people who are old enough to have sex and to have babies, but for some reason that don't mean they're old enough to register. I don't think that's fair. That's why I'm supporting the campaign to amend age of consent laws to work with the FBA instead of against it.

Elleny is a very beautiful young woman, and a generous lover. Being so used to being pregnant, she prefers to have intercourse while on her hands and knees, with the man behind her, and she wears a bra to support her breasts.

It's no wonder she's been so successful as a breeder. Her mother, Lucy Clark, told me her daughter sometimes has sex with as many as a dozen men in a single day. Because all of her births have been surgical, her vagina is still very tight. I normally pride myself somewhat on my stamina, but Elleny had me done within three minutes.

Melissa Fernley

Melissa (31) is one of the few women on the breeding register with a successful career. A senior sales rep living in San Francisco, she has been on the register for 16 months and has not yet become pregnant.

Matthew Gladstone: Hi Melissa, thanks for agreeing to this interview. I want to start by asking you how the Fertility Benefit Act has affected your life?

Photo: Trish Talbot

Melissa Fernley: Hi Matthew. I was pretty young when the FBA was first passed, but I remember how it felt like everything changed just before I started high school. Since then, sex has become a much more open thing, and I think that can only be a healthy thing for society. Since I was born, our society has gone from openly vilifying promiscuous women to effectively government-funded promiscuity.

I joined the register last year for a few reasons. One of course is that it's the right thing to do, just like being an organ donor. But also I wanted to celebrate this era of, I don't know, honest sexuality. I want to be a part of it.

MG: Unlike the vast majority of women on the breeding register, you have maintained a successful career. How have you been able to do this?

MF: If anything, I've found that being on the register has helped my career. I work in what's still a pretty male dominated industry, and having a breeding licence is a big status indicator in our culture. So a lot of the people I deal with through work are licensed.

I haven't been registered that long in the grand scheme of things, but already it's got me a bit of a reputation in the industry. This might not be surprising, really, but it turns out men are much more willing to negotiate fairly after they've had an orgasm.

The other thing that's helped is of course a bit sad too, which is that I haven't gotten pregnant yet.

MG: Many women on the breeding register have had to leave their jobs because of the demands of breeding. Do you not find your work interrupted in this way?

MF: There's something to be said for working in an office building with restricted access. Each morning and each night I drive in my private car from the gated car park beneath my apartment building to the gated car park beneath my work. Both my apartment and my work need swipe cards to get to my floor. So there aren't that many opportunities for me to be interrupted unexpectedly during my work day.

I'm not completely closed off, though. A few weeks ago my neighbour across the hall found out I'm on the register, and he's got a licence. I've had a few late night visits from him, and I mean I wouldn't date him but he's been nice enough.

There are a few people on my floor at work with licences, but they have more interest in me working without interruption. The only time I've had any issues at work was at our Christmas party last year.

Photo: Kyle Douglas

MG: What happened at your work Christmas party?

MF: Are you sure you want to hear about it? It's not very glamorous.

MG: Only if you feel comfortable talking about it.

MF: Yeah it's okay. I've been getting therapy this year so I can talk about it. It's just, yeah. Okay, well first my boss asked me into his office, which only has windows between it and the main area, and had sex with me there where everyone could see in. I'm not any sort of prude or anything, but a lot of the people I work with aren't involved in the breeding system and I wasn't too happy with them being able to watch that.

Then, after he was done but before I was finished cleaning myself up, one of his bosses came in. He told me he didn't want "sloppy seconds" so made me bend over the desk and face the office while he had anal intercourse with me.

By this point, people from other floors had started gathering on ours, since that's where the main Christmas event was. So I don't know who the next man was, but he told me to hold my mouth open and he held my head and basically just had sex with my throat. He was really rough, and after he ejaculated I threw up on the floor of my boss's office. My boss told me to clean it up, then came back before I was done and had sex with me again.

Photo: Kyle Douglas

After that they all left me alone for long enough that I could finish cleaning up and come out again, but by then my boss's boss was getting pretty tipsy and very handsy. I went to leave but he followed me to my car and had anal sex with me again before I could leave.

MG: Thank you for telling me that. We can take a break if you need to.

MF: Sorry, I didn't mean to get emotional. Like I said, I'm getting therapy to help with it. I like sex as much as the next woman, but that night was very rough and wasn't what I wanted at all. I don't need a break though, we can keep going.

MG: You've been on the register for almost a year and a half, but still no sign of pregnancy. Are you worried that you might have fertility issues?

MF: It's only been sixteen months, I'm not too worried yet. I read that only half of registered women get pregnant in their first year on the register. With any luck, you'll be the one to get me pregnant after this interview.

MG: We don't have to go through with that if you don't want to. I know the night you just told me about was an upsetting subject.

MF: No it's okay, I've been looking forward to it. Anyway I'm not worried yet. Right now being registered feels more like a skill or a tool that I have access to, rather than something weighing me down. And unlike you with your licence I can't get kicked off the breeding register if I don't breed successfully.

There have been a couple of rough patches, sure, but overall that has been good for me.

Editor's note: Five months after Melissa Fernley was interviewed, she was convicted of illegally using contraceptive drugs while on the breeding register. She was sentenced to 10 months in the breeding wing of San Francisco General Hospital, and is required to regularly take hormone-based fertility and aphrodisiac drugs under supervision for the next five years.

Melissa is clearly very comfortable with her body, and though she wasn't immediately comfortable with Kyle chaperoning us through our intercourse she did ask if she could pose nude for him for photos to appear in the article.

She is a petite woman, who enjoys wrapping her legs around her partner during intercourse. She is shrewdly submissive and, I think, quite a master manipulator. She had an orgasm before I did, from rubbing her clitoris while I penetrated her, and after that she turned all her attention on me.

After 15 minutes of intercourse without me ejaculating, she offered to give me a blowjob to help me get closer. She masturbated during this, moaning a lot, and I barely managed to make it back inside her vagina before ejaculating after a couple of minutes of this.

Fiona Jones

Fiona Jones (29) works as a model in Los Angeles, and has a very large social media following.

Matthew Gladstone: Hi Fiona, thanks for taking time out of your schedule to talk to me. I'd like to start by asking you how the FBA has affected your life?

Photo: Kyle Douglas

Fiona Jones: Thanks Matthew. I was born into a very religious family, that worked hard to keep me insulated from the effects the FBA was having on our society when it was first implemented. I was home-schooled, and my parents taught me that fornication — having sex with someone you're not married with — is sinful and that the end days were near. I didn't really have many interactions with people outside of my extended family while I was growing up.

I actually ran away from home when I was 17, after one of my uncles sexually assaulted me and my parents refused to do anything about it. I didn't really know what I was running into when I ran away, I was very naive. I guess things could have gone a lot worse for me. I made my way to a women's shelter where I stayed for a few weeks, and I started getting sick. Throwing up a lot, that sort of thing. They helped me get to a doctor, who made me take a pregnancy test.

That was positive, and by this time I'd passed my 18th birthday, so I automatically got put on the register. I miscarried a few weeks later.

I guess I got lucky after that. All things considered, my life could have taken a much darker path. But Lecia — my first agent — found me and offered me a gig modelling. So instead of a life breeding in the shelter, I've managed to have a successful career.

MG: You mentioned that you miscarried, have you found success in your breeding since then?

FJ: No, I've only ever managed to get pregnant that one time, from my uncle. I've been on the register for over a decade now, I've long since come to terms with the idea that my first miscarriage made me barren.

I guess the upside is that my modelling doesn't get interrupted by pregnancy, though in a way that's kind of a shame since pregnant models can get paid pretty well.

There's definitely a downside though. After a few years, you get a reputation as being barren, and when men aren't trying to get you pregnant they can sometimes be pretty rough.

Photo: Kyle Douglas

MG: How do you deal with that?

FJ: Under the law there's not too much I can do really. Thankfully, all of my long term breeding partners are respectful and always want me to enjoy the experience as much as them, so most of the time there's no problem. Usually the guys who are rougher will only see you once, I guess part of that is because it most open happens at cons and the like.

MG: You say that's usually the case, have there been any exceptions?

FJ: Yeah. There was one guy. He'd been stalking me for a year or so, and was mostly just an annoying creep but not dangerous. He'd do stuff like try to get a peek at me while I was being bred, you know? Which, by the way, I try very hard to maintain my image. You won't find any photos of me naked online.

But anyway, this guy was just an annoying creep, but then he got a breeding licence. This was in, it would have been in 2047—

MG: That's the year the "Pervert's Incentive" Amendment was passed.

FJ: Yeah. It turned out that was why he had applied for a licence. I don't know how he managed to pass the psychiatric tests honestly. But for two years he followed me around making really degrading sexual requests that I couldn't legally refuse to cooperate with anymore.

I tried to get a restraining order against him after about a month. I know you can't normally get a restraining order against a breeding licence holder if you're on the register, but we made the case that he made it nearly impossible for other men to breed me due to his constant attention.

MG: Were you granted the restraining order?

FJ: No, I wasn't. He argued that I was clearly barren so there was no harm in what he was doing. So it didn't stop until he failed his audit two years after getting his licence.

So basically for two years I had this creep. And I should tell you, he was gross. I mean he always smelled terrible, he was a lot older than me, and he was not at all attractive. And for two years just about every day he would show up and ask me to let him fuck my ass and I'd either have to let him do it or risk going to a prison breeding wing where he'd show up and do it anyway.

I don't think he ever once put his penis in my vagina. It was almost always my ass, and when it wasn't my ass he would ask me to let him fuck my throat. Again, I had to let him.

I don't think there is any better way to ruin a girl's makeup than to fuck her in the throat. Have you ever tried it?

MG: Only once or twice.

Photo: Kyle Douglas

FJ: Well you've probably seen then how it smears spit all over the lower half of her face, and makes her cry away any eye makeup she had on. I started to pray that this day, he would show up and ask to fuck my ass, because at least then I could still do my job afterwards.

And that lasted two years. But honestly, it's the only serious trouble I've had. Like I said before, usually guys who just want to use my body to get off only do it once, and they don't tend to show up right before a shoot.

MG: Do you think the Pervert's Incentive was a mistake?

FJ: I don't know. I've read that we were in danger of not having enough successful breeding men to keep our population stable. I mean I'm not naive, I know why it was implemented and I know it's had more effects than just a couple of bad years for me.

If there was any mistake. I think it's that they didn't also tighten up the psych tests to stop guys like that getting licensed. But overall? It's probably done more good than harm.

MG: You mentioned before that you put a lot of effort into maintaining your image. But you've also said fans with breeding licences can do some pretty nasty things with you at public events. How do you balance that?

FJ: Very carefully. It's definitely not easy. I have to choose which cons I go to based on their breeding policies, I stay by my stall the whole time and always have it set up right next to a private breeding tent, and I always have to arrive very early and leave very late. It can be pretty exhausting, but even so I find cons can be pretty fun.

MG: What about in your work? Surely some of your colleagues have licences, and there are always cameras around.

FJ: Everyone I work with is great about it. A lot of photographers are licensed and will want to have sex after the shoot, but they're mostly long-term partners who I actually know very well. Everyone there respects how I want to control my image.

When we went to have sex after the interview, Fiona asked if I would like to try "using her throat". She assured me that she was now quite good at receiving that sort of attention, that she would enjoy it, and that she trusted that I wouldn't hurt her.

To do this, she lay on her bed on her back, with her head hanging off the side, and guided me to penetrate her throat. With one hand she reached back around me to hold my buttocks and help control my pace, while she rubbed her vulva with her other hand.

She hadn't lied about being good at it, and several times she used her hand to show me that I could safely increase my pace or thrust harder.

It took about 10 minutes before I felt confident to thrust into her like this hard and fast enough to bring myself to orgasm. As I grew close, she pressed a fingertip against my anus, which I will readily admit I enjoyed.

She had warned me before we started that I should pull out before I ejaculated so it would go into her mouth instead of potentially down her windpipe, but I confess in the moment I forgot this until after I started to ejaculate mid-thrust and instinctively pushed myself as deep inside her as I could manage.

I had to apologise profusely through her coughing fit that followed. She was right that the act entirely ruined her makeup. I can understand now why some men might prefer this to vaginal sex, in cases where impregnation is not possible.

Ocean Liu

Ocean Liu (34) immigrated from China when she was 18, and now lives in Houston, Texas, with her long-term boyfriend, Adam, and their golden retriever, Poyo.

Matthew Gladstone: Hi Ocean, thanks for agreeing to speak with me today. I start each of these interviews by asking how the Fertility Benefit Act has affected your life, but in your case it's a little more complicated. Could you please tell me how both the Fertility Benefit Act here in America and China's Breeding Policy have affected your life?

Ocean Liu: Hello Matthew. Before we start, I would just like to say thank you very much for this interview. My experiences with China's Breeding Policy have had a very strong effect on my life, both in China and here in America, so I hope you don't mind if it's quite a long answer.

MG: Not at all, please go on.

Photo: Ocean Liu

OL: Okay. Although I have spent longer living under the rules of the FBA, my life has been influenced much more by China's Breeding Policy. Growing up in China, every girl is taken from her home after she turns 16, and made to go to a breeding camp. Life there is very strict, I suppose it is similar to attending boarding school. While you are there they continue your education, you wear a uniform, and you sleep and eat with the other girls.

But in another way it is like being conscripted into an army. You spend a year at that camp, and in that time they train you to be the best breeder you can possibly be. They control your diet, put you through a tough exercise regime every day, and make you take a lot of pills and injections.

They never told us what the drugs were for, but from the way we changed at that camp we all thought they were for helping us maintain an ideal weight and for increasing libido. I suppose they probably were also aimed at improving our fertility.

After a year, when you are 17, they move you to another camp. When I was taken to my second camp, I didn't know anyone there, and I was given very little opportunity to speak with the other girls there. This was the breeding camp, which they had spent the previous year preparing us for. Unlike the first camp, here we were given our own rooms. We ate and slept there, and the only time in which I could interact with any of the other girls at the camp was during the morning exercise routine. But after that, we were confined to our rooms for the remainder of the day.

Everyone had to stay at this camp for a year, unless they became pregnant. It was explained to me that, if I was found to be pregnant, I would be taken to another camp for a year before returning here to start my year of breeding service again. This is how China ensures the most fertile women are able to continue being bred for the longest. I did not get pregnant during my year here, but I saw many women who I think would have been in their thirties or even forties during the group exercise every morning, so clearly it must work.

Because I did not get pregnant, after I turned 18 I was returned to my family home. Re-integration was… difficult. For the past two years I had been trained and conditioned that my interactions with men would all be sexual, and my libido was still very high from the camp's drug regimen. On several occasions during my first few months back I presented myself to my father without thinking about what I was doing. My mother was very worried by this, and encouraged me to travel to America to live with her sister until I could break this conditioning.

Photo: Adam Zhen

My mother chaperoned me to my aunt's house here in Houston. It was a difficult and embarrassing journey. My mother had puchased a chastity belt to protect me, but when we arrived in America the metal in it set off security alerts. I remember this encounter very clearly, because of how incredibly embarrassing it was. They patted me down, then took me to a private room when I refused to remove the bulky item around my pubic area. There, they made me remove my pants to see what it was. They tried to speak to me for a long time but I understood very little English then. It wasn't until another guard finally entered the room with my mother's key and gave it to me that I could remove the chastity belt.

Standing there with my bottom half naked and two of the guards in the room being men, I had an overwhelming urge to present myself to them. So, I did. They seemed shocked, but conversed and eventually the woman and one of the men left the room. The man who was still there showed me a card, and I could read English better than I could understand it so I did recognise the words "FBA", though at the time I didn't know what that meant.

He had sex with me there in that room before eventually returning me to my mother. I could tell she was very upset, but she didn't ask me what had happened.

So that is how I arrived in America. My mother delivered me to my aunt's home before she returned to China, and there my aunt started trying to untrain my conditioning from the breeding camp. Before very long, though, I started showing signs of pregnancy.

There was a lot of discussion in my family around if I should stay in America, knowing I would be made to join the breeding register if I remained, or if I should return to China where I would likely struggle to overcome my conditioning.

In the end, I made the decision to stay. I wanted do my best to use what I had learned in China to be a very good breeder under the American system.

I guess the rest is history? That was the first of three successful pregnancies I have carried here. A few years ago I met Adam for the first time when he came to breed me, and we fell in love.

MG: It's very interesting that, over a year in a breeding camp, you didn't get pregnant. But then after your first sexual encounter in America you were successfully bred. What do you put this down to?

OL: I think the reason is the men. In China, every man is told to breed and every woman is told to breed. Here in America, only some men are told to breed, and they have to be tested for fertility. I think that almost all of the men who tried to breed me in my room in the camp would have been infertile, but the man with the breeding licence in the airport would have been fertile.

MG: It sounds like you think China might benefit from following a more American model, then?

Photo: Adam Zhen

OL: Well, in one respect. I think the way they encourage every man to breed, even though almost all of them are infertile, is a bad decision. But there are less fertility problems in women and China is very good at turning us into good breeders.

America has lots of advertising telling women to join the breeding register, but most never will. I know some are made to join because they get pregnant, but realistically this is very rare. I think America can learn more from China than we can learn from America, in that it needs to make more effort to teach girls to be good breeders.

You were telling me before the interview how the breeding system here has felt like it is separate to your life. That is the problem — people can step aside from it. It would be better for Americans to see breeding as their duty, instead of something to choose if it suits them.

MG: It's interesting to hear you say that. Now that you've been living in America for 16 years, I'm sure you've seen just how much of a cultural shift we have seen in this area. We've seen this, for example, with the Unretirement Amendment 12 years ago and the Pervert's Incentive Amendment nine years ago. Some states have proposed laws for pre-registration of girls who are under 18, so they will automatically join the register once they are old enough. Do you think this cultural shift has been moving, and is continuing to move, in the right direction?

OL: Hmm, this is a hard question. One thing that I have certainly noticed here in America that was not the case in China is how much men here desire blowjobs and anal sex. In China, everyone knows that it is our duty to breed. In America, I think many men with a licence see it as a license to have sex more than a licence to breed, and just that they have to breed so they can keep it.

The Pervert's Amendment is the perfect example of this, and I think it was a bad idea. It focuses on the men, but like I said earlier having more men is not the answer. America needs to focus on teaching its young women to be breeders, and to move away from this fascination with non-breeding sex.

Editor's note: The above interview has been edited for clarity. Due to a medical emergency, Kyle Douglas was unavailable to chaperone intercourse between Ocean Liu and Matthew Gladstone, so they did not have sex after their interview as originally intended.

It's only been seven months since I gained my licence, so I haven't yet ticked off any of the requirements of my audit. I hadn't realised just how anxiety-inducing these first months of being licensed would be, where I know my responsibilities but have now way yet to know if I am meeting them.

At first, my ability to work while fulfilling my responsibilities as a licensed breeder were helped but us hiring a woman on the register to clean our home and cook meals for us, but once she became pregnant I knew that continuing to have sex with her would not help me hit my audit targets. The same story has been repeated with each of the women with whom I have had any sort of breeding arrangement, and in each case I can only hope that their pregnancy was my doing.

I had hoped, perhaps, that my working on this article might help me out, but as you will surely have realised by now I didn't have any opportunity to impregnate the women I interviewed here. The irony is not lost on me.

The journey has also been difficult for my wife. Though she has long wanted us to have a child of our own, she does not want to join the breeding register so can't risk getting pregnant. We had assumed, given my family history, that I was infertile, but when I was granted my licence that changed things for us. As a man with a breeding licence, I'm legally prohibited from using any contraceptives. Which wouldn't be a problem if we didn't also live in Virginia.

Unlike most states, here in Virginia birth control is outlawed for everyone, regardless of whether or not you are part of the breeding system under the FBA. So if my wife and I are to have sex, we risk either prison or making her a breeder for life.

My wife has accepted that I have a responsibility, as a fertile man, to breed as many women as possible. But it has been more difficult to accept that, unless we mean to risk prison or sexual servitude, our sex life has been relegated to oral or anal sex only. I hope it will not be the case for us, but again this only makes me think of how the FBA has destroyed historic ideas of what it meant to be a family in America.

There is a silver lining, however. It is thanks to the incentives and strictures of the FBA that we do not have the aging — and dying — population seen in those more liberal nations that refused to implement a breeding programme after the fertility collapse. And for all the damage the FBA might have done, it still has not entirely killed the dream of a family.

My wife and I now hope that, one day, we might be able to adopt a child that I have sired.