Seahorse BBC2 now

[Hirsutefirs]

I wonder what the viewing figures are, for stuff like this: www.jeaniefinlay.com/seahorsefilm

I’m not going to watch it, for a start.

As an autistic person I don't feel a connection to my body. Unless I'm concentrating I don't really feel it at all. I think it's fairly common for autistic people. It feels like my suitcase that carries me around.So I think the idea of people being trans ties in with how disconnected I feel, that people don't have to be one thing or another because their body says so. I'm not disconnected from reality, I ought to point out!

@NotBadConsidering. I wasn’t aware of the court case, or that this is a Guardian journalist. You are right there. It does change perspective . For my entire life Ive stuck up for diversity and those who society looks down upon- difficult habit to break!
I posted immediately after watching, and after thinking about it for a while, what bothers me more is the unquestioning approach of the film. It centres around this one person’s experience, and any implications re health of the baby or of Freddie are simply ignored. The mother’s assertion that to become unfertile is “simply untrue” for trans men requires qualification. The effect of artificial hormones on the baby is ignored. The question for the child of the birth certificate- having their mother down as “father” - or having their “father” down as mother....l

The birth certificate belongs neither to the mother not the father but to the child.

The child has a right to have their birth detailed accurately.

So if you are under 16 and you need a passport currently as I understand it, only the mother can apply. As Freddie is a single parent and a father, what does this mean?

That he'll send the form back with mother crossed out, like on the birth plan booklet.

littlesweet it's not "anti-trans" to point out that it doesn't matter what someone identifies with whilst giving birth, health professionals have a legal duty to treat that individual according to the sex they actually are in order to avoid charges of criminal negligence.

Personally, I identified as a slab of meat on a chopping board whilst giving birth. I'm very glad the medical staff weren't forced to address me as such.

What really annoys me about this film is that the BBC have shown such a one sided piece at a time when the courts have to decide over this issue. Whatever happens to impartiality? No wonder Freddy wanted to protect their privacy. They didn't want to know that the poor little trans man in the film was actually part and parcel of lobby that always has money to fight court cases and always try and portray them selves as victims, just as Lily Madigan did when they took their court to school. Jess Bradley soon had access to well paid QCs, every time things turn legal for any transpersonal the money is there and this time it has paid for a whole film.

It's nothing but propaganda for a lobby that wants to erase the biological meanings of man and woman andrelace it with self identity. The BBC have used licence payers money to back that campaign. Its an absolute disgrace.

I'm going to spell out the ramifications of this person's legal challenge, for those who think it's about people living their lives etc etc etc
If a woman can become a man, legally, and then have a child, in law that child was birthed by its father. If this person then wins the fight to be listed as the child's father, we have a child with no legal mother. (Assuming donor sperm)
The existence of a child with no mother gives weight to the argument that no child needs a mother.
Furthermore, if men can birth children, anything relating to pregnancy is no longer related to natal sex.
So pregnancy is able to be discriminated against legally, as it is not longer sexist to do so (and not covered by the Equality Act) if men can be pregnant too. Simply put, you could sack a pregnant woman, claim it isn't discrimination because men can get pregnant too. Or scrap antenatal services, or scrap rules keeping men away from abortion clinics, or out of maternity units at night.
Once you unlink the legal understanding that pregnancy and childbirth are linked to being female (which is obviously still the case but now legal sex and natal sex can be different) then you can easily undo much of what has been fought for for pregnant women and new mothers.

@MildThing
Great post from yesterday. I’ve just read it.
I watched part of the programme yesterday- about half an hour.
Freddie seemed like a lovely person who is just trying to get on with his life, apart from the fact they’ve had a documentary made about him of course. He had a lot on his plate and experienced a lot of transphobia.
He’s a human being and yes, I will call him he, even though I know he’s female. I’ll call him he because I respect him as a fellow human being.
Some of the comments on here are awful, just awful. Unkind, mean, sneery. Just like the comments he was reading from the internet on the programme.

Oh the irony

just an ordinary bloke who has a film crew following him around and a case in the courts and he doesn't want people to join the dots.

The existence of a child with no mother gives weight to the argument that no child needs a mother.
I forgot the point here which was that in surrogacy terms, we could be looking at neither the birth mother nor the egg donor being listed as parents, if this case establishes that a mother is not legally necessary.

Just an ordinary person going about their life who:

• writes for the guardian
• had fertility treatment 11 days after obtaining a GRC (in which they signed a legal affidavit stating they would live in their acquired gender for the rest of their life
• had a film deal in place even before they had conceived
• is pursuing a very expensive legal case through the high court to deny their child has a mother
• is now alleging that testosterone does not damage fertility and it's mere anti-trans rhetoric (

apple.news/AizJvOhCTS_aSJF5vgqZ-qg)

"And we create another legal fiction. One that would effect the human rights of every child born in this situation. I believe a child has a fundamental right to know their biological parentage. My father was haunted by not knowing his. I hope parenthood makes Freddie understand their feelings aren't the most important thing here."

Not a legal fiction, perhaps but a language fiction.

Freddy, in gender terms, is a man. Man is his gender construct, he lives as a man, presents within a masculine gendered construct. Grows a beard, does his best not to look 'soft' and scrawny', wears clothes aimed at the masculine stereotype.

Biologically Freddy is female, and does indeed have the large gamete. The child will know that Freddy is a biological mother, but is living the gender construct of father. If Freddy tries to say that gestating a child and giving birth is a male biological function then that is the fiction - but still a fiction of language. The child will have no more or less access to knowledge of bio parenting than any other child born of donor eggs or sperm.

As words we use father and mother equally to mean the social function and the biological function.

I also didn't take Freddy's relationship with his own body to mean disdain for other women's bodies. Or other women. He was honest that it was uncomfortable for him to have to return to some more feminine-assigned clothing etc, because of his Trans status. Not because he was hostile to women.

Why do we need to pick apart the details of his relationship with CJ. Freddy said it was complex, and 'queer'. CJ seemed lovely. People can have all sorts of relationships. I'm glad they stayed friends.

I see time and time again that GC women are not transphobic against Trans people just because they are Trans. So what is the problem with an individual Trans person living their life as such, and making the individual choices that make their lives possible and happy.

LittleSweet Thank you for explaining how your relationship with your body is. I found that a valuable insight.

FlyingOink, that was an interesting point about discrimination against pregnant women in relation to the Equality Act. I think that a father who gives birth would still be protected as they are trans gender.

Thank you MildThing.

In order for Freddy NOT to be a mother, which Freddy factually is, (since mother simply means female who conceived and gave birth to her baby), Freddy has to change the meaning of mother.
FOR ALL OF US.
That meaning, and word, which describes billions of us perfectly and accurately, and also Freddy too, would be contorted to something along the lines of 'parent who identifies with femininity', so that Freddy can say "yep, that's not me, that's THEM"
Which means

1. Billions of us who ARE mothers suddenly find our unwanted definition is 'parent who identifies with femininity'
2. There is NO RECOGNITION of the state of being female, conceiving and giving birth.

It is more important to recognise and retain the truthful meaning of mother for the sake of the billions of us who are, were and will be, than it is to change the definition for those billions to humour a dysphoric female who cannot bear the fact that she is as female as any female that ever lived.

You cannot redefine the reality of billions to cater for the preposterously unreasonable demand of those who wish to create a false distinction between their false self-image and reality.

LittleSweet - if women (or men) have discomfort around the roles that society places on them, we need to change society, not encourage people to change their bodies to fit.

Poor Freddie's baby wasn't able to breastfeed because Freddie had amputated their breasts.

Brava, Barracker.

Let's talk about seahorses, for the benefit of Alice Roberts and others:

A female seahorse has ovaries and produces eggs. A male seahorse has testes and produces sperm. A male seahorse has a pouch with an external opening into which a female deposits her eggs.

A male seahorse can as such be described as a 'pregnant' father, with the provisio that fish do not actually get pregnant.

Bravo Barracker.

Creating legal fictions will impact all of us. I'm not inclined to be especially 'nice' or 'kind' to someone who clearly gives no fuck about the wider ramifications of their court case for women who are mothers. That is not just getting on and living your life quietly.

So I think the idea of people being trans ties in with how disconnected I feel

I think we all can feel alienated and disconnected from our bodies ( including our sexed bodies) at certain times and periods in our lives. Inner feelings are temporal things; subject to change as we age, move through life, and meet new experiences. There is nothing unique in this that applies only to people who identify as trans.

Identifying as 'trans' is largely a modern phenomena; that has arisen out of a very specific post modernist theory - and that is Queer Theory. It is largely a fad; a trend - albeit one which has profoundly negative consequences for the children and young people sucked into its orbit.

Thank you barracker.

So what is the problem with an individual Trans person living their life as such, and making the individual choices that make their lives possible and happy.

No problem at all, as long as their choices don't negatively impact on others, and as long as I am not required to share their beliefs.

Sadly the MRAs who identify as trans and trans allies want to force males into female spaces, want to compel speech etc.