"Transgender man, 34, loses legal battle to be named as the father on his child's birth certificate as Supreme Court refuses to hear his case"

[Malahaha]

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8953783/Transgender-man-34-loses-legal-battle-named-father-childs-birth-certificate.html

Don't know if this was already posted but it's a glimmer of hope that soe judges have their heads screwed on tightly.

Yep, despite that part being very clearly laid out (as opposed to 'acquired gender') testing Freddy and the pro bono lawyers still see this as a gap/discrimination in the law. (Freddy says that originally it was more the idea of pointing this out as a sort of oversight and it was thought it would be recognised and maybe dealt with?!)

By BC's recording mother and father and not 'parent 1' and 'parent 2' is apparently for 'c*s' people and not queer-family friendly and also BC's are not about recording genetic relationships either.

The denial of biology is strong in this one.

I have nothing more to say on the video, only that a fundraiser is mentioned at the end so like Joylon's I'll be watching to see how deep the supporter's pockets are, just to make a comparison as we've been funding JR's etc for years now...maybe some of those big pharma profits could be redirected for the plight of trans parents in Europe.

@RealityNotEssentialism

Freddy says the law didn't consider GRC holders as parents and that a trans woman might want to have a BC retrospectively changed to show them as the mother of their child, with no mention of the actual mother.

That’s completely ridiculous because a child can only have one mother. If you allowed the child’s father to be registered as the mother, you’d have to erase reference to the actual mother. Freddy is living on another planet with this shit.

And nobody is saying that trans people can’t be parents. Of course they can. It’s just that they can’t be referred to as something they are not just because they want to.

they can’t be referred to as something they are not just because they want to.

Bit hard for Freddy to understand this given that Freddy has clearly got very used to being referred to as Freddy wants to.

I think it's hard for people have been used to having their own way completely to understand and accept it when they are told "No".

I think it's hard for people have been used to having their own way completely to understand and accept it when they are told "No"

True. I am hoping that the European Court of Human Rights also says no. I think the fact that the Supreme Court wouldn’t even hear it is a bad sign for Freddy. They suggested there was no arguable point of law for them to hear. The cases that go to the ECHR have nearly always involved a judgment from the highest court in the country.

Ah well, I guess it’s not Freddy’s money being wasted here. At an estimate, I reckon the legal fees are over 100 grand by now and that’s without the ECHR appeal.

Freddy says the law didn't consider GRC holders as parents and that a trans woman might want to have a BC retrospectively changed to show them as the mother of their child, with no mention of the actual mother

OK (not watched the video).. well yes anyone might ‘want’ something that the law doesn’t allow them to have.. but to say that they can’t have it because the law ‘didn’t consider’ their situation is not true.

GRA has considered parenthood, and in the exact instance that Freddy outlines there. GRA section 12, which is called ’parenthood’ says: ‘The fact that a person’s gender has become the acquired gender under this Act does not affect the status of the person as the father or mother of a child.’
www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2004/7/section/12

The explanatory notes continue that:
Section 12: Parenthood
43. This provides that though a person is regarded as being of the acquired gender, the person will retain their original status as either father or mother of a child. The continuity of parental rights and responsibilities is thus ensured.
www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2004/7/notes/division/4/12

So the GRA did specifically consider the instance Freddy mentions... and it ruled it out. Meaning that children’s existing birth certificates are not changed, if their parent obtains a GRC allowing the parent to legally ‘change’ their documented sex.

It would be interesting to know that group of people views on whether they wish the law would allow that their own BCs could be changed in line with their parent’s acquisition of a GRC.. or not. I’ve not seen anyone in that position call for this so if anyone has examples that would be interesting.

GRA is unworkably poorly and naively drafted. For example because it is permanent and irrevocable irrespective of the GRC holder’s own consent which can of course change over time, as detransitioned people have noted.

And crucially for example because it does not specify what should happen if parents get the GRC before the birth of their child. Hence Freddy’s legal case to test that situation.

GRA was seemingly drafted only with later-in-life transitioners in mind. It appears not to consider the needs of natal female transitioners. For example when it assumes that people holding a GRC would until their death behave consistently with the stereotypes of their acquired legal gender.

The example of pregnancy exposes this exclusively male-centred world view in a shocking way, in that GRA’s legal drafting doesn’t even consider the possibility of pregnancy etc after GRC. Pregnancy can of course can be unintended or forced, as well as being intended and planned, as everyone with female reproductive capacity grows up all too aware.

It’s discriminatory and sexist for the law to apply male biological norms to female biological people, where biology creates different needs or abilities.

The male agenda here has neglected women and in that sense Freddy’s case shines a long overdue light on the unworkable problems with the GRA itself. As opposed to the GRA showing up any problem on the existing laws around children’s birth certification.

Xpost on s12

That is interesting OHJ on the acknowledgment of the ‘oversight’. I’d say it’s lawmakers applying a systematic male default to women, so a bit more than an ‘oversight’.. to have ignored the needs of female biology within the UK’s main legislation specifically considering biological sex and legal gender.. but I guess it wouldn’t serve Freddy’s legal arguments which rely on the GRA as a solid starting place, to look too far into that aspect.

BC's recording mother and father and not 'parent 1' and 'parent 2' is apparently for 'cs' people and not queer-family friendly and also BC's are not about recording genetic relationships either.*

But ‘second parent’ is quite rightly already allowed on UK BCs. And I guess it could come as bit of a surprise to some of the lesbians or transmen who are already the second parent on their kids’ birth certificates, alongside their female civil partner or wife, to learn that they are all apparently now ‘cis’ or ‘not queer’..

www.gov.uk/parental-rights-responsibilities/who-has-parental-responsibility

Great analysis, thanks ohholy and chattylion.

It would be interesting to know that group of people views on whether they wish the law would allow that their own BCs could be changed in line with their parent’s acquisition of a GRC.. or not. I’ve not seen anyone in that position call for this so if anyone has examples that would be interesting.

It would be interesting.

They need to invite opinions from people who are actually in the situation that freddy's baby will be.

Why can freddy not see that the inconsistency is not in the law.
Its in signing a declaration to live as a man and then getting preganant and giving birth.
He refers to a mother in the video, the woman partner of a trans man, then has to correct himself, you can see it dawning on him that hes using the word mother as intended and a way that every single person on this earth understands.
Its not complicated.

It would be interesting to know that group of people views on whether they wish the law would allow that their own BCs could be changed in line with their parent’s acquisition of a GRC.. or not.

You mean, if my father transitioned now then could he change MY birth certificate to say he is my mother?

And do so without my consent?

Aesop no, GRA says you can’t change a BC of an existing child because their parent has gained a GRC. So your dad couldn’t do that without your consent (and not with your consent either!). Not legally permitted currently. And consent or best interests is an interesting argument around BCs since by definition children don’t have a say in that.

It’s the people who gain their GRC before a child’s birth that GRA doesn’t specify about. I can see why Freddy is testing the GRA as a law because it is full of holes, but in this aspect, arguably the principle is already set by Parliament within the GRA in favour of not changing anyone’s else BC in light of someone else’s GRC.

This is why the GRA should never have permitted a birth certificate to be amended retrospectively. A birth certificate is a record of an event and the details are correct at the time. If you later get a GRC that doesn’t change the fact that your sex was correctly observed when you were born. It shouldn’t be possible to alter that record, just as I can’t get my birth certificate changed to reflect a later change of name.

He can be the legal father without having to change the baby’s birth certificate surely? Isn’t Stephen whittle the legal father of his children?

I think this is just another example of why the GRA is a bad law and should be repealed. Legal fiction, completely ignored conflicts with sex as a protected characteristic, no annual limit of GRC...more holes that Swiss cheese! Can anyone think of any other law that has been shown up to be a badly thought out law?

The child also has rights under the Convention for the Rights of the Child. Freddy did say that no one is denying who gave birth to the son but I can't see how that is true as Freddy is denying Freddy's status as mother.

@Typesofcatalogue

He can be the legal father without having to change the baby’s birth certificate surely? Isn’t Stephen whittle the legal father of his children?

That's interesting.

Other than a birth certificate, on what record is a 'legal father' noted?

If Stephen Whittle turned up with anything on that list stating sex - male, he probably is on the birth certificates as the father. Lesbian couples would have second parent.

Technically, with a GRC, legal documents stating sex-male, what Stephen Whittle did was acquire the same ability to have non-facts on his children’s birth certificates as single mothers and heterosexual couples who have children from any combination of donated gametes.

If you give birth - you are the legal mother. Birth certificate does not say this is the person whose egg gave you half your DNA. And if heterosexual marriage or civil partnership, the bloke is the legal father. Or if not the bloke who turns up or provides a document saying he is the father - is the legal father. Nothing to do with whose sperm joined with egg.

On Whittle, from this uncommongroundmedia.com/from-shaft-to-wpath-stephen-whittles-influence-on-trans-politics/

“This is a husband and father who went as far as the European Court of Human Rights so that his long-term partner could be impregnated through artificial insemination and his name could be on their children’s birth certificate.” That’s a deliberate lie, isn’t it? I suppose it’s no more of a lie than the lie on the birth certificate of a child whose mother knows that her husband isn’t her baby’s father, because the baby is a product of donor sperm. This is the problem with law. Experts can make the law tell us lies, and then they can bully and gaslight us by saying the lie must be the truth, because the law says so.

Then it all goes a bit quiet, presumably because Whittle has ticked off the top items on the to-do list. Whittle is legally a man, with a birth certificate with an M on it; married to a woman although not in a same-sex marriage; and the birth certificates of the children that Rutherford gave birth to and Whittle adopted bear Whittle’s name.

From Wiki
The Whittles' efforts to gain recognition of Stephen as their children's legal father led to X, Y and Z v. The United Kingdom before the European Court of Human Rights in 1996.

Sorry I missed the end quote, that was entirely from the article, though I agree.

I get especially cross about lies told to children about their origins or heritage. The children will not know their biological roots of half of their family and it's entirely feasible that one day they could meet half-siblings and never know.

I do hope the children know how they came into being and they are able to find their biological father if they do choose.

Ah 1996? Pre GRA then.

Also
When the Gender Recognition Act 2004 came into force in April 2005, Whittle obtained a new, male birth certificate. He then married Sarah (née Rutherford) later that year.[15] They had been cohabiting since 1979.[9] They have four children by artificial insemination, the first of whom was born on 13 October 1992.[9][15] In April 2006, they jointly adopted the children, making Whittle their legal father.

In that video, Freddy mentioned the mother having to adopt her own child(ren), I cant recollect the full circumstances though.
If you only have to take things from that list upthread though, I can’t see how you can’t be legally named father except Freddy’s case is different as Freddy gave birth to the child and is therefore the mother