Freddy McConnell appeal today (Transman who wants to be registered as their child's father) *Title edited by MNHQ*

[MrsSnippyPants]

Haven't seen anything about this and it just popped up on Sky News. Hearing continues tomorrow

Newspaper report here
www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/uk-world-news/transgender-man-who-gave-birth-21629478

I've just been reading this fawning article from last year in the Guardian:

"McConnell admits the whole thing is counterintuitive – that he, too, cannot think of a person less likely to put his private life on screen. But, he says, he also felt a responsibility to tell his story."

Like much of the narrative around this story, it has only a tentative connection with actual facts.

But, he says, he also felt a responsibility to tell his story."

The language is of wanting to be a 'pioneer'

Yep.

Main image: Freddy McConnell with his son, Jack (not his real name). Photograph: Manuel Vázquez/The Guardian

Son? How can they be sure?

I think this case should really underline the complete nonsense of changing factual documents (birth certificates) post hoc to register subjective identity changes. What is and was the point of a birth certificate - its a factual record of the birth of a child, established who the child is, where when and who gave birth and as such acts as a record which can establish rights and citizenship. In cases of adoption the original birth certificate (with original names, parents details) is not amended or changed but stands on the record with an adoption registration detailing the new legal status and any name changes of the child.

Why are we changing these basic records of facts for subjective feelings in any context? What does it do apart from set a precedent that official records can be falsified retrospectively?

It's been pointed out before but this will lead to the removal of the right to sue for sex discrimination e.g. at work. If men can get pregnant too then women aren't being discriminated against if they lose work for being female/ of childbearing ability (actual or assumed)

Freddy doesn't get the right to dictate his version of the truth for his child. It's just not fair or right, or legal.

Its also a Safeguarding concern.

Hi - quick question as I haven't seen the Seahorse film - but what sex is the baby?

In all the articles I've read they only call it 'the child'.

But surely it has a sex? Surely Freddy had to accept the evidence of its genitals? They didn't let him leave the hospital with a sexless baby?

What if the child decides later on that they really want to call Freddie 'mum'?

The way of the world these days shows us that some mums weren't the mum at the time of conception. I have read pieces where the 'mum' has asked the children to refer to them as the mum (must be confusing to the one who gave birth).

So who gets to decide? I think the next generation will - as is the way of generational flipping - get to decide.

The more I learn about Freddie and this case, the more disturbing it becomes.

People really need to pay attention to who is funding, supporting & invested in Freddy McConnell's case to remove the identification of a child's mother on its birth certificate.

& also to consider the wider implications for children & mothers should the appeal be successful.

but what sex is the baby?

The Guardian photo says “son”. By convention this means male offspring. The world is so bonkers however, and the facts of the birth certificate are seemingly open to feelings and identity that this could mean anything. It could mean the child is a boy, as per convention, but maybe they’ve looked into the baby’s soul and decided their female child identifies as a boy? The fact that I’m only slightly joking at this being a possibility is telling to the level of madness of it all. Remember this is the child’s birth certificate they’re looking to alter and exchange facts for feelings. So if they win the court case and can replace “mother”, why stop there? Why not adjust the baby’s sex? Time of birth? Date of birth? Place of birth?

I don't understand how you can "live like a man" while being pregnant. How do you give birth in a masculine way? How do you breastfeed in a masculine way?

No matter how hurt their feelings are there are two things more important. Firstly that facts are recorded on official records. Secondly, that the child is not denied their true history. The needs of the child override his wants.

Freddy needs the publicity for other projects.

I agree with OvaHere. Society will not benefit from dismantling what it means to be a mother.

However I think their appeal will be successful, sadly..

It seems the core focus is to get maternity services, family & friends, media & the public to call you a pregnant man.
Hence the ultimate demand to not be named mother on your babies birth certificate.

All other demands were acceeded.

And if the child needs to give family medical history (as does happen). That could be confusing if the parents 'feelings' are put above reality.

So discussing early menopause or breast cancer in female relatives for example if you are a girl - I have no medical knowledge here but I am sure there are some woman only medical things that could affect a man? 'I actually have no mother'.

Society will not benefit from dismantling what it means to be a mother.

It will put children & their mothers at risk.

And if the child needs to give family medical history (as does happen). That could be confusing if the parents 'feelings' are put above reality.

Genetic histories for some diseases are sex specific.

Main image: Freddy McConnell with his son, Jack (not his real name). Photograph: Manuel Vázquez/The Guardian

Son? How can they be sure?hmm

That's the thing that makes it all so nuts isn't it? Valiantly fighting against sex while immediately sexing your child.

That's the one. My family history seems to be bizarrely weird and non-hereditory - but I know that breast cancer seems to have a hereditary element.

Mitochondrial diseases are inherited from your mother.

That's the thing that makes it all so nuts isn't it? Valiantly fighting against sex while immediately sexing your child.

I expect the next demand will be to remove sex from birth certificates. That way they don't need a GRC later on when they switch.

R0wantrees

People really need to pay attention to who is funding, supporting & invested in Freddy McConnell's case to remove the identification of a child's mother on its birth certificate.

& also to consider the wider implications for children & mothers should the appeal be successful.

THIS

The chronology of this is all eye opening. A documentary crew was engaged to follow Freddy BEFORE the GRC and BEFORE the fertility treatment and obviously before the legal challenge to have the word mother redefined from 'person who gave birth' into 'parent who plays some sort of gendered role'?

Is that correct?

It's almost as if someone hatched a plan to find a woman who would be amenable to legally becoming a man and subsequently having a baby, as a 'legal man', purely to challenge the existing parenthood clause (clause 12) in the GRA 2004 that insists that any change of gender status will NOT change parental status because it adversely affects the competing rights of offspring regarding the status of their parentage.

Who has funded this exercise, from beginning to end, I wonder?

It's a classic example of the tension created by the act itself. If you create a legal lie through a law like the GRA, any clauses or exemptions are massive beacons drawing attention to the original lie. There can be no homeostasis. The lie either has to be extrapolated forwards (peerage, sports, refuges, parenthood, prisons, biological recognition - all of these exemptions have to be destroyed because they expose the nature of the lie), or repealed backwards; we shouldn't try to enforce upon society a legal fiction that someone who is male is legally female. Because the lie is constantly exposed by other people's realities.

Double down harder on the lie, or undo the whole thing.
But there can't be homeostasis.
There never will be as long as the GRA allows legal falsification of sex.
We're either going to take the lie further and enforce it harder, or we're going to repeal the entire principle and start again.