Are you abducting these children madam?

[Victoriapestis01]

Well, holiday season is here again, so I’m bracing myself for questioning from airport staff about why my children (or at least, those of them I’m taking on holiday with me) have a different surname from me.

I do appreciate that airports need to take child abduction very seriously. Also that in our society most mothers do have the same surname as their children. But I also feel very irritated by the assumption that I would change my birth surname to a male partner’s surname, or keep my ex partner’s surname. Do others feel the same? Is this a feminist issue, or just an inevitable aspect of life?

One time, I was kept in a room at the airport until the staff had contacted my then FIL who fortunately was picking me up at the airport! He had to vouch for me.......I was a woman on the loose with children and no man.... ...clearly a menace.

The feminist issue is why you gave your children a different surname to yours.

Was it to mark them as "belonging" to their father?

As someone who has worked with trafficked children it’s reassuring that border staff are asking these questions. And no it’s not a feminist issue, step Dad’s often have the same issue and don’t have the benefit of a birth certificate to confirm their relationship.

A feminist issue more worthy of your time is the trafficking of women and girls across borders for the purpose of exploitation.

I'd say my feminist radar is pretty well tuned. This is a symptom of a feminist issue (how we name children, whether women change their name on marriage and what that signifies, even the way we perceive marriage to be different to a civil partnership or common-law relationship) but it in itself isn't the issue. I too agree that trafficking is far more important than inconvenience.

We've only ever been questioned at the desk, but my DS is autistic and not good at judging social situations, so very likely to say something like 'I've never seen her before in my life' which means it's always a bit squeaky bum. I've a copy of his birth cert on my phone and have never needed to use it yet.

I have never been asked when travelling and I don’t use my married name at all, but DS has my husbands surname.

I wonder whether I'm asked now because one of my children is a young teen girl (re trafficking) as I say when I was wrangling 3 small children (baby and 2 toddlers) by myself I was never questioned - started when the eldest was11/12

This has been normal for years now. You just need a letter stating that you have both parents permission to travel with the child. This applies regardless of your sex.

My stepson and partner have different names and have never been asked.
Who cares if they ask questions? Security is important and so is keeping kids safe.

I think it is entirely reasonable and sensible to question adults travelling with children who don't share their surname regardless of sex. It is the safety of the children that matters.

As for surnames being a feminist issue, I guess they probably are in the sense that the convention for using fathers' surnames rather than mothers' stems from a time when children, not to mention women, were regarded as men's property. There's no reason to stick with it today though many couples do for whatever reason.

My own kids have my surname but I'm aware this makes me the exception and I have never particularly 'identified' as feminist.

I live in Italy and my children's (Italian) passports have my name and my husband's name in them as we both gave permission for them to have passports and travel with either of us. Also here women don't change their name on marriage so this is an easy solution to quickly understanding whether kids have the right to travel with the parent who is accompanying them. We should introduce it in the UK!

I do not understand why, having had to carry the baby for nine months and do all the hard work of pregnancy and breastfeeding, women give their children someone else’s surname. Something like up to ten percent of children have a different father to what’s on their birth certificate. Giving children their father’s name is daft IMO and is only to settle father’s ego. When they carry them, they can name them...

But I also feel very irritated by the assumption that I would change my birth surname to a male partner’s surname

Yet you gave your children your partner's surname?

I got stopped and questioned when we took DD's friend on holiday, but only when we were bringing her back. A 16 year old basically who could say "this is my friend's mum" when we came back through passport control in England. I had a letter, they said if I hadn't they works have taken us off and made enquiries, which would seem to be a complete waste of resources. I can understand it if it had been a younger child who couldn't speak or seemed hesitant.

My DD has my name, though I have wondered what would have happened if she had her dad's as I am the only person with parental responsibility as he has never been bothered. Bearing in mind I have done pretty much everything and paid for nearly everything, the idea that a fairly useless father could stop us going on holiday is pretty crap. She did travel with him once but they weren't stopped. I guess he could have been kidnapping her, but since he found it "really hard work" I suspect he would have brought her back quite quickly! On the other hand I do want the abduction of kids to be stopped, but I do feel they could have exercised better judgement with my DD's friend.

I think measures to prevent the trafficking of children are important and I am glad that they have been introduced

I do not think that the issue should be muddled in with the entirely separate issue of name choices

This happens to me. My children have a different surname, a different nationality, I’m a bit on the young side for children and they look very very different to me (mixed race). I would be deeply concerned if airport staff didn’t make an enquiry. I don’t think I have the right to sail through airport security with children who seem more likely than not to not be mine just because I have a vagina.

EverardDigby what do you think under 18’s who are being trafficked are told to say? Lots of uncles, aunts, mum’s friends out there.

@Telos my husband’s name is half the length of mine. I tried to take it myself but there were issues with paper work so gave up eventually.

I had three/four flights where me and DD travelled with different surnames (I didn't update my passport after marriage until it needed renewing) and was never questioned about it once 🤷

EverardDigby that's a bit mad, I flew to Malaysia by myself to visit a school friend when I was 16... On the way back the Kuala Lumpur to Amsterdam flight was very delayed and the last Amsterdam to Manchester flight had left so I slept in Amsterdam airport on standby waiting for the next available seat on a flight...

I guess if she'd queued behind you as a solo traveller it'd have looked less suspicious and been clearer she was travelling if her own free will!

It’s far more likely to affect women because whilst women very often don’t take their husband’s surname on marriage, nearly always the children of the marriage will have their father’s surname.

So I think man can take their whataboutery and shove it up their jumper.

Not sure this is a feminist issue. DS(14) was taken to one side and questioned a couple of years ago. DH and I were travelling with him and we all have the same surnames and nationality.

CassianAndor the surname is a red herring. It's nothing to do with having different surnames, it's just when only one parent travels with the kids.

I wasn't questioned when I had a different surname and a different nationality on my passport to the surname and nationality my kids had on theirs, only times I was questioned was after we all had the same surname and nationality on our passports.

I agree that it's important for checks to be made to try to prevent abductions and trafficking.

On the other issue raised by previous posters, it is absolutely a feminist issue that children are often given their father's name rather than their mother's.

There are countries that don’t allow for a mother to cross borders alone with the kids but allow fathers to do it.

If you find the airport check annoying... I have had to carry evidence that I have custody of my son after divorce to go though multiple road checks, even when DS shares part of my surname.

It's a matter of choice, though.

I expected to feel that my son should have my name, but when it came to it, having carried him for 9 months and given birth to him, he felt so indissolubly flesh of my flesh that giving him his father's name seemed like the most trivial thing in comparison with what I had.

Plus I'm not that fond of my (Dad's) name anyway. He has my name as a second middle.

I can see a few others have now said what i came to say - that the feminist issue is actually that most children are automatically given their father’s surname.