Is a Transman a mother or father?

[Mamello]

What do people make of this in today's Times? To me this person did not 'Father' their child - they gave birth to their baby from their ova and so are the mother.

www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/mother-of-all-legal-rows-for-trans-man-and-his-baby-5rzpw9mr7

Sorry - don't have a share token.

unless you're using some unusual definition of the term I haven't previously encountered.

Well yes, precisely, if anyone can use their own personal definitions for words then there'll be a lot of confusing conversations no?

Really? It’s narrow-minded for everyone here to think about the wider implications of a potential ruling? How is that narrow-minded? It is narrow-minded to only consider the personal feelings of TT as important.

Again, if someone is trying to set a legal precedent and talks to the media about it, then it is public information and our right to discuss it and the implications for society - the society that my children and I live in.

Making legal terms functionally meaningless is a problem. Those terms have definitions for a reason, not because feminists love to be big meanie meanies.

I want to know if you understand the reasons why we use birth certificates, why international agencies think they are so important - especially for vulnerable populations.
If you don't understand their function, then how can you accurately assess what the impact of changing it will be?

At a hearing in February, the judge questioned how fertility regulations allowed TT to receive artificial insemination, which can technically be received only by women, after he had been legally recognised as a man.

Agree with Datun, Orchid, & Applejack that this is something that needs further investigation.

VeronicaDinner

Language is important because it enables us to communicate clearly with each other. And at present 'father' means a male parent ie biologically male. Plus the decision made by the courts on this case will affect many of us who work in the medical, legal and teaching professions so you can't assume this is just an academic exercise for many of us. But regardless of that we all have a stake in how children are raised and what they told. Children are not raised in isolation from society and claiming fathers can give birth is a major shift in both language and cultural understandings of biological realities.

if genetic parenthood had to be recorded on birth certificates I think it could be very very dangerous for children and women at worst and highly intrusive on several people’s lives at best. Think about in how many situations you have to show a BC- they are used as an identity document throughout your life. Why does the genetic truth need to be revealed that many times to all those people? Is there a known benefit?

Weigh that up with the potential harms. We don’t live in a society that is ready for that and we can’t be sure that key individuals in the child’s or mother’s life or society in general won’t discriminate (or worse) against children or their mothers, because of that genetic parenthood being known.

The fact that unmarried women can omit the father from the birth certificate entirely (unless he forces his way on to it via a court order) and also the legal presumption of ‘the child of the marriage’ while rooted in a load of old patriarchy, in effect protect women and children where a publicised genetic truth could make them highly vulnerable. (Including where donation was involved).

Just because we now have easy access to genetic truth does not take away that vulnerability in lots of children’s and women’s circumstances.

This does not mean that we shouldn’t be open with kids about their genetic origins where they can be known and where it is safe to do so. There is absolutely everything right with telling kids the truth from an early age so they grow up always having known the truth (and don’t somehow discover later and then feel needlessly lied to.)

But let’s recognise that genetic information won’t be right or safe in all families to be revealed. So then let’s keep the law to a protective default on the birth certificate of not covering genetic parenthood, to maximise the safety and well-being of women and children.

What a thundering narcissist. TT can’t have identified that strongly as a man if they went and did the most female thing you can do

^ This

I presume the legal argument is that the U.K. law that requires the registration of this mother is incompatible with a higher or different law such as Human Rights?

Even if it was, I don’t think ‘father’ is the right place to put this relationship.

In fact, I think the box is ‘father/parent 2’ and means either the husband of the mother (who need not be the biological father), the male who is not married to the mother but who thinks he is the biological parent, or the lesbian partner of the mother (I don’t know whether the marital status is important there?) who wants to be the parent of the child.

I presume, but I may be wrong, that the second parent has a box to say male/female?

In which case, then the way to solve this is to add a male/female box to the mother section too.
Then it is still clear who the biological mother is, but also that that person is legally male.

A father can be recorded on a birth certificate by a mother's choosing that is not the biological father. So it's all tripe anyway. This is nothing new

I love the way this vitriol cloaked as concern is all from middle class folk (I can tell by your intellectual wording) you just, hate trans people. Why don't you meet some? Most are normal that just want to live quietly as a man/woman and don't want to be perving in thr showers at you. Why the hate!? Let him be recorded as a father. At least he's got one. Live in my area. Most kids haven't. Or mothers put their current boyfriend as the father when they're not.

Hilarious limp. I'll take your assumptions as a compliment!

I'm more bothered about people like venebles and Thompson getting new identities and living amongst us like nothings happened after torturing and murdering a 2 year old boy. Anyone else? Men living as women or women living as men who want to record themselves proudly on a birth certificate rightly or wrongly misgendering themselves isn't really on my radar. At least the child has a living parent. How many birth certs are accurate? Mothers can record anyone as the father. Doesn't mean it's biologically accurate. Drop your hate honestly.

They fuck you up, your Mum and Dad

You mean
They fuck you up, your gestational parent and your donor parent

Your name says it all @vitriol

Mothers can record anyone as the father.

What? How?

limpbizkit - Uhuh. So the kid will have no mother because it’s father decided to he male and female? The parent had the eggs not the sperm so please check your biology GCSE books.

It’s about the baby not the parent. They can say what they want but the facts still remain that they were ‘female’ enough to get pregnant, carry and give birth to a baby.
What the child chooses to call them when they are older is up to them in reality this person is their birth mother.

@vitriol I also love the way you have skirted correcting me in anything I've said?

@death grip. Yup it's true

Does anybody in this world really believe that a man can give birth to a baby?

Those "man gives birth" headlines are stupid and the general public can see through the bull shirt.

Yes, bull shirt.

Explain how you think this happens, please

A woman turns up to register a baby, names a random man and they just take her word for it?

Do you believe this is possible?

So first we're horrible, now we're middle class. Any other reasons people shouldn't be allowed to discuss the legal implications of a current court case, limpbizkit?

@lord Prof. Ive got an A* in all sciences. Thanks. And I'm working class. How about that! As I previously said... A mother can record any male she likes as a father (or female as you are so concerned about!) it's not a biological factual document

HOW CAN SHE?

Stop repeating something that’s total bollocks.

Hopefully most do record the biological father but many don't!

I shall record Prince Harry as the father of any future children. Just need to say his name apparently.