Transgender man gives birth and wants to be recorded as baby's father

Birth certificates aren't a perfect genetic record. That's not their purpose. Many people have no details of their biological father on their birth certificate.

Only the woman who gave birth to the baby is given on the certificate, though it may not have been her egg that was used to conceive the child.

Feels like some people are looking for reasons why this is a problem.

Wouldn't the child be told that they were born to a woman just like everyone else. But then that woman decided they wanted to be a man and so that is how they now identify. The child doesn't need to be deceived in this - they can be told the truth.

We have no idea what the child will be told. We do know that if this case succeeds, the legal document recording the child's birth will say a man gave birth to her - there isn't a space for a note about identification and feelings etc. That is a deceit. Whether or not she will be told the truth by her parents is a matter of supposition.

It's weird but I really can't understand why it's a big deal or other people care.

There are surely many far more important issues about how you are raised than what appears on your birth certificate, something that children aren't even really aware exists until they are old enough to understand the situation anyway.

Its not a difficult issue to understand - the dad was born as a woman. Didn't want to be a woman anymore. Had a baby because they wanted one and are biologically able. Raised that baby as its father. It's highly unusual but a simple enough story. I don't get how that's going to "mess up" anyone.

Presumably their belief is that it will be more consistent for the child to have the person they grow up with as "dad" listed as a father not a mother on their birth certificate. To be honest I don't think it's all that important but it feels like a decision for the parent to make.

At the end of the day we know nothing else about this person or their set up and we shouldn't be judgmental. Maybe they will be a terrible parent. Maybe they will be a fantastic parent. What has it got to do with them being trans? What has it got to do with what's written on a piece of paper in a file in a cupboard somewhere?

During their formative years this kid is simply going to have been raised by their dad. Like a lot of children of single parent families.

People used to cry out in outrage about the first IVF babies or the first babies to be raised by gay parents too.

I'm not sure (unless I've missed it somewhere) that the child is being told they weren't born to a woman?

Wouldn't the child be told that they were born to a woman just like everyone else. But then that woman decided they wanted to be a man and so that is how they now identify. The child doesn't need to be deceived in this - they can be told the truth.

The legality of all this does seem a minefield. It's interesting hearing everyone's views.

Although ChattyLion I'm not sure it is necessarily against the interests of children. It would need to be explained when they're at the right age but in and of itself I don't think it need be a problem.

The law is a set of commonly agreed beliefs, at any one time and in any one place, about the best way to operate society for the common good. Lots of loopiness passes through the net but this idea seems particularly outrageous and unlikely to prevail.

Agreed. There are legal fictions about status or relationships between people which can be useful and protect some people.

Whereas this set of ideas:
-of being able to legally self identify into being a father when you biologically can’t possibly be the father (.. and I don’t accept that it’s more important to lie because you feel you are a man at the time you give birth..), or

• of being able to legally self identify out of being a mother,

^^ is against the interests of children.

The closer the law gets to validating delusion, the closer we get to enabling any lie to be legally validated.

The law validates myriad lies! The law is not some repository of absolute truths. You only need to move to another jurisdiction and live there for a while to find yourself forced into accepting things (that everyone takes for granted) that you “know” to be “untrue”.

Just to note the other thread on this case:
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3271483-Baby-could-become-first-person-born-in-England-or-Wales-without-a-legal-mother?watched=1&msgid=78490392#78490392

Except that the DNA would still be identifiable even if the Duchess of York had identified as a man in the mid 15th century. It would have had no effect on the ability to identify Richard III.

...and after, for several millennia. smile

in the brave new world, the bones of Richard III would never have been identified - his matriarchal line would never have been acurately recorded in the first place.

jakobssonlab.iob.uu.se/pdfs_Jakobssonlab/Skoglund_etal_JAS_2013.pdf

Sex is fixed at conception, and cannot be renegotiated later. It is fixed until death.

...and after, for several millennia.

Well the government saw fit to abandon collecting accurate sex data. Why do we need to know? Women are a feeling after all!

Here in Canada birth certificates are well on their way to becoming works of fiction. Adults can already easily change the recorded sex on official documents usually just by filling in a form. I don't think it is possible to have your male child recorded as female, but recently a parent (a non binary transman and presumably the mother of the child as no other parent has been mentioned) managed to get a 'unspecified' health record for their child after having an unattended home birth. The legal case for this was supported by someone who uses no capital letters which is a strong indicator of being a freeman on the land. Health cards tend to be used as primary ID here until driving licenses are issued (in my province the two are combined) so this is quite important. If the parent is like this couple and indicators are that this is the case then the child will probably be home schooled and allowed to pick their own gender.

www.cnn.com/2017/07/04/health/canadian-baby-gender-designation/index.html

www.thestar.com/news/gta/2016/07/11/baby-storm-five-years-later-preschooler-on-top-of-the-world.html

Personally I think birth certificates should be accurate biological records, although I know in practice on the male side that has often not been the case.

Sex is fixed at conception, and cannot be renegotiated later. It is fixed until death.

Good point - perhaps it isn't relevant to record sex, I hadn't thought of it that way I'd just accepted it as the norm! You couldn't record gender identity at birth anymore than you could record sexual orientation at birth though as you don't know what they are.

Beauty
Nice try, but not good enough I'm afraid.
Sex is the only defined characteristic. Anything else is just in the mind.

Why is sex important to record and not gender identity? I thought the accepted view these days is that sex is irrelevant, and gender identity is key. So really, why would anyone need or want to record the baby's sex? Why does anyone need to know that minor biological fact?

The closer the law gets to validating delusion, the closer we get to enabling any lie to be legally enabled - why would sex be the exception?

Lack of foresight by the judges in 2004 (don't worry, we don't foresee lying about the sex of 2000 men being significant enough to have repercussions - duh) has led to the situation where females literally are no longer recognised in law and are disconnected from every law previously pertaining to them.

Lack of foresight in ratifying the lie that a person who has conceived, gestated and birthed a child is the 'father' leads to a similar legal disconnect between exclusively female functions and the legal definition of female.

We are unpicking ALL meaning of male and female in our laws - whilst the actual injustices of sex continue in real life, unabated, unrecognised, and unaddressed.

If you can see it but can't speak it, you can't address it.

I really want the adults to take charge now. This has gone so far beyond reason.

... a

Mother and father should be on birth certificate. Soon I will be wondering if a can call myself and woman or not... this world gone nuts!!

Ha ha - of course! But good point - it's right that sex should be listed and not gender. My baby is due later this year the sex will be listed but who knows what gender it will have in 20 years!

And their sex. But maybe that should be left off these days until the baby is old enough to inform their parents of their gender identity.