Lesbian mothers should be on birth certificates

You totally missed the point of what I am saying. I agree, the mother is the one whose womb the baby came from.

The sleight of hand is the one that makes the claim that the birth certificate holds special powers. It reminds me of people saying that doctors ‘assign sex at birth’ as though babies have no sex until the official ‘assigns’ them one. Clearly a falsehood.

The birth certificate is not an ownership document.

Babies are not devoid of a parent with responsibility for them until a registrar ‘assigns them one’ on their birth certificate. Parents are not able to neglect and mistreat their children and they are not prevented from parenting prior to registering the birth and having their ‘parental responsibility assigned’ on a certificate.

The birth certificate is the baby’s identity document. It documents their name, the date, the place of birth and whose womb it came from and if the dad sticks around, he is documented too.

This is a record of who the baby is. It’s identity.

The parents may use the baby’s birth certificate to prove they are the parents, but it is not the certificate itself which gives the parents their responsibility to the child. Nature and biology gave them that, and the certificate is just a record of it.

If this is your summary, you have no engaged in any discussion in this thread in good faith.

The argument is that

1. birth certificates currently confer parental responsibility. The woman who gave birth and per partner are automatically included on it as the people who will care for the child from birth. It is in the child’s best interest to give the people caring for them parental responsibility.
2. Because (whether you agree with it or not) the adults named on a birth certificate are automatically conferred parental responsibility, it is not in the child’s best interest to include gamete donors.
3. The identity of a donor can be (and is) formally recorded in medical documentation other than the birth certificate, so there is no need to overhaul the birth certificate.
4. If you want to overhaul the current system so that the birth certificate no longer confers responsibility but is instead a document which only records physical and genetic parentage, it would be impossible to do in an equitable way which accounts for single mothers (who used donors or not) and the donor conceived children of straight couples.
5. Acknowledging a woman’s same sex partner on the birth certificate does not provide a precedent for men to have any rights they don’t already have. If they are a birth mothers partner, they can already be on the birth certificate, regardless of how they identify.

Starting out with the assumption that lesbian parents want to be named on their child’s birth certificate in order to “validate their identity” rather than so that they can care for their children is the opposite of centring the child. It centers your own assumptions about motivations.

I mentioned that the children of lesbian parents are more likely to know that they are donor conceived. I never said that lesbians are universally superior to, or even significantly different from, straight women.

Seriously this falsehood needs to stop.

I'm quoting the law. Not the law as you would like it to be.

And the law is that the woman who carried and gave birth to the child is the legal mother, irrespective of whose gametes were used.

There seems to be this argument:

1. Lesbians are superior.

2. Lesbians can do no wrong.

Therefore lesbians must be given everything they want.

Most people go along with this, because you think ‘ah lesbians are women, women are nice, therefore double the woman = double the nice - have at it lesbians’.

But no one stops to think about who else should be entitled to these rights lesbians demand or what will be the consequences of certain gates being opened to everyone.

I have observed that men are very much breathing down lesbians necks waiting for them to open things up to them which they had no previous access.

This is a lie.

Mother is a noun, not a verb, in a legal sense. Stop this sleight of hand.

That’s one hypothetical etymology, but it’s such an old word that’s pretty much conjecture. It’s not clear the original root.

in any case, I am not states that the word mother excludes the biological definition or that it’s unimportant. I’m stating that mother has meant both historically.

A women who experiences a still birth or gives a child up for adoption is a mother, the act of giving birth makes her one.

A woman who raises a child is a mother, the act of mothering makes her one.

An egg donor is not a mother, she neither gives birth nor raises a child.

It is you who are changing meanings, by including the first and last instances but excluding the second. If you want to include the last, it is you who need to change the definition of the word mother.

the current legal process honours the word mother as it has been historically understood.

You are clutching at straws now.

The word ‘mater’ comes from the word ‘matrix’ = womb.
From the word ‘mater’ comes, ‘matter’ and ‘material’.

Mother can be used as a metaphor and analogy. “Mother ship”. Or a ‘Mother Superior’ nun.

The word ‘mother’, when speaking about parenthood, is inextricably linked to the biology of a person growing in the womb of a woman and being born to her and to define their ongoing relationship.

No, even in the 1500 it’s easy to find examples of the word already having the established meaning that could include the non-biological, and it was often used as an honorific for all elderly women. In addition to the standard English definition (which includes non-biological mothering) anthropological evidence is strong all over the world that mother means both “female parent” and “one who gives birth”.

It seems that “TRAs” have become such big bogey men in your mind that any comparison to that is an automatic shut down. Comparing to TRAs is a distraction and character assassination technique that derails real discussion and lacks intellectual rigour. Please keep to the actual discussion.

All legal debate will eventually get down to the nitty gritty of defining the parties. It’s why definitions are so exact and lengthy in laws. No one is changing the meaning of the word mother. I don’t think you’ll even find a historical legal definition that only includes biological mothers, even if you look long long before assisted reproduction. It has been accepted for all of human history that a woman becomes a mother by either giving birth or mothering a child. No one on this thread is implying that a man, or a group of people, or a corporation, or anything else can be a mother.

We both agree that a woman is a female parent, and I agree that a mother is relational to her children owing to the fact that they grew inside her and she gave birth to them, but you have changed the meaning of the word ‘parent’ and ‘relation’ to be divorced from biology, which is actually implicit to those long established meanings and definitions you cite.

You are doing that TRA thing “the word woman only ever meant someone who looks like a woman”. Er no, it is a very recent thing to divorce words from their biological meanings. It is politically necessary for people who wish to push through ‘progressive’ agendas, without thinking about the unintended consequences to do it though.

It’s the dictionary definition.

and not one that has changed recently, it’s been a woman in relation to her children and a female parent (in addition to other definitions) for a few hundred years now.

You are the one trying to change and narrow the long established meaning of a word.

Your refutation is unsuccessful. You’ve had to change the definition and meaning of the word ‘mother’ to support your argument.

TRAs change the meanings and definitions of words to support their arguments too.

Donors do a wonderful, selfless thing.

This is a matter of opinion. I personally believe that we have a responsibility, a duty to look after and then look out for our biological children for as long as we live. I believe it is negligent and irresponsible to have no thought or care about what happens to them. At least if a desperate mother relinquishes her child for adoption, there is some process where new adoptive parents will be rigorously screened. If you donate gametes anonymously, they could end up in a surrogate, commissioned by child abusers or any other such horror - they could end up in the hands of people you wouldn’t trust to look after your baby for two minutes.

Not equivalent at all.

A mother is a woman in relation to her children.

This can be biological or not. This certainly has been true for all human history. A woman actively raising her children, whether biological or not, is a mother. She doesn’t just “feel like” a mother.

You’ve taken the idea that men can’t become women (true) and superimposed on it the idea that women can only become mothers by giving birth.

Women are mothers, sometimes through childbirth, sometimes through child rearing. Sometimes through both. The thing that all mothers have in common is being women, not childbirth. I am saying this as someone who has given birth three times and found my pregnancies and births some of the most powerful experiences of my life. That doesn’t mean I begrudge non-birth mothers. They are, after all, fellow women.

Nope, I just used it in this thread for clarity, I don’t think it needs to be a legal term. Mother and parent work just fine.

Seriously this falsehood needs to stop.

”It's a document showing a child's legal parentage.”

It is not true. Babies are people, citizens, human beings.

A birth certificate is not like a car registration certificate to prove ownership of the thing.

A birth certificate is an identity document, a proof that a person, a unique individual, has their name, place and date of birth, along with the woman whose womb they came from, registered. This proves this is a unique individual, a citizen of a particular nation, and they cannot be confused with any other person.

Most children also have their father documented too.

This document lasts for a person’s whole life.

An adoption certificate, however, is a proof of adopted legal parenthood, which supersedes the biological birth certificate. And this is needed because legal parental responsibility automatically goes to the biological mother and father who created the child and brought them into the world. It needs proper due process to transfer this responsibility to a biologically unrelated person.

Please clarify how exactly this is an intersection of rights?

For both it is saying that ‘feelings trump biology’ [I feel like a parent and I feel like a woman, therefore I am a parent/woman and society must validate this] and ‘we want to change what is documented on birth certificates to reflect our feelings’.

“preferred terms” have no legal standing. Who should qualify as being a ‘social parent’ otherwise? Mates? Boyfriends? Girlfriends? Neighbours who regularly babysit? It’s like in cultures where everyone is ‘auntie’ or ‘uncle’.

‘Parent’ has a clear meaning = biological mother or father.
’Step parent’ = married/civil partner to biological mother or father.
‘Adoptive parent’ = non-biological relation but with legal parental responsibility.

Trying to add this vague term ‘social parent’ to the mix, is the beginnings of divorcing the word parent from its biological meaning. It might suit lesbians to do this, but who else will it open this up to, who might want to be put on a child’s birth certificate instead of their biological parent?

I agree. I also think that the male of a couple using AID should not be listed as the father either, because he is not the biological parent - he can be listed as parent, so that he has parental rights, but not as the biological father.

It's neither.

It's a document showing a child's legal parentage. In terms of lesbian couples, the mother from a legal perpsective is not the same thing as a legal parent. A legal parent and a biological parent is not the same. Likewise, a gamete donor is not a parent.

In law, as it should be, the rights of the child are paramount. This does, however, mean that donors' own anonymity is an issue, which in the past this has led to a shortage of donors as it's put some of them off.

I would not want the child of someone else's family contacting me as a donor, if by any chance my name had enabled them to trace me.

It's clear that a knowledge of the biological family's medical history - specifically any genetic or hereditary conditions - would be beneficial to the child. But medical records are, and should be, entirely confidential. There are issues here with GPDR breach, and raises questions surrounding how much power the biological tie should confer on one person over another's private information, simply because they've committed the altruistic deed of helping their parents to have a family they wouldn't otherwise have had?

Donors do a wonderful, selfless thing. A child does have a right to know their origins: they now have that. IMO donors should not be penalized for their altruism.

There is no place for this level of detail on a birth certificate. It's also a public document. Information about gamete donors is a separate matter which should be - as now - recorded elsewhere.

There's nothing wrong with the current system.

if anyone sides with the children in all this, all the arse-backwards arguments and insults get rolled out to say that it can only be based in ‘lesbophobia’.

No, this is a disingenuous ad hominem. You don’t reply to the majority of the actual arguments, and no one from the “biology only” crowd have clarified how it’s in the child’s best interest to not give the women caring for the baby from the first day of its life parental responsibility, and to give it to a random man instead. You’ll say that you don’t intend to give parental responsibility to a random man, but that’s what putting him on the certificate does right now. Then you consistently fail to outline a feasible way to overhaul the current regulations.

Sorry *intersection of rights

It’s not slight of hand to acknowledge that children born to lesbian parents are much more likely to know their conceived status, just a biological fact. Like the ones you are so fond of.

I am not familiar with the case you are talking about, and I freely admitted there will always be bad actors. However, « full on TRA » seems to « any argument about LGBT I disagree with » as even in your account, there was no advocating for trans rights.

Please clarify how exactly this is an intention of rights?

Mothers are women
Fathers are men

sometimes children do not have a social father (even if they do have a sperm donor)

Nowhere does gender identity come into this

Social parent is one of the preferred terms of adult donor conceived people to describe their non-biological parents.

you know, the people you claim to be so concerned about.

All in all, I find it both distasteful and dangerous for society, that activists are trying to divorce the idea of ‘parent’ or ‘mother’ and ‘father’ from its meaningful biological definition. Going straight for the birth certificate.

As for this new term ‘social parent’, what’s that? Who does that apply to?
We used to have: parent, adoptive parent and step parent.
All of those have a legal meaning.
Maybe we should define ‘social parent’, what exactly it means in law and so on before we start sticking unrelated people who claim to be one on a child’s birth certificate for the rest of it’s life.