Trans man denied Gender Recognition Certificate over attempt to conceive

[IwantToRetire]

A trans man has been denied legal recognition of his gender by the Gender Recognition Panel (GRP) after it ruled that his attempt to conceive a child meant he was not “living as a man”. The decision has sparked outrage among human rights advocates and legal experts, who argue it breaches both domestic and international human rights law.

Article continues at https://www.scenemag.co.uk/trans-man-denied-gender-recognition-certificate-over-attempt-to-conceive/

It's like the trans movement keeps stepping on rakes these days, and they keep popping up to hit them in the face.
First the SC ruling, now this: when the EA says 'woman' it means 'woman'; when you are granted a GRC on the basis that you've declared formally that you are henceforth going to 'live as a man', that does not mean 'having a baby'.
Reality hurts, when you've been fed fantasies as fact for so long.

It means something that could successfully be hand-waved away back in 2004, but the question still remains, when you ask in 2025. Politicians still hate being asked it.

There was a time when I'd have felt sorry for them, with the rug being pulled from under all the certainties they'd come to rely on...

But my current attitude is: slap it up them.

Totes. To make the whole gender enterprise work, we have to believe that men can have babies too. We have to accept the bastardization of language around birth and motherhood. Fuck that shit. Women, however they identify, pay the unique tax of bearing children. Any language or bits of paper that obfuscates that is damaging to women as a class. They don't get to fucking have that.

Me too. I do feel this is discrimination against transmen, it only impacts them. Trans women can do what they like. Again.

...Requiring that a minority not have children reeks of eugenics...
Positioning to justify surrogacy.

Did the panel say that the trans man could only get a certificate if sterilised?

This is a big jump from what we have been told, which is that the trans man wanted to get pregnant, so was deemed not to be living as a man.

Of course they think living as a man is thinking of yourself as a man. They think that you don't actually have to do anything other than have the feeling.

Anyone can be what they want. As Chase Strangio, the ACLU lawyer and trans man, says, a penis is not a male body part, it's just an unusual body part for a woman

Surely this means we can get rid of all the bollocks in maternity wards and antenatal clinics and just call a woman a woman without reference to 'people' now then?

Thank you both for sharing that. It's good to know I'm not alone. And I agree, why would anyone want to go through that horrendous weirdness if they were wanting to 'be' a man?

Excellent point!

Upthread I talked about misrepresentation of the law by some groups who appointed themsevles as the unltimate arbitrators.

Now I am beginning to think that logical thinking and facts are just no longer skills that everyone has or aspires to have..

The GRA doesn't give a definition of what living as a woman/man means, despite the fact that having lived in the acquired gender for at least two years and intending to continue to live in the acquired gender are two of the criteria for getting a GRC.

IANAL but surely this judgement is useful in defining at least one aspect of living as a man. Case law?

I know that defining 'living as a man' and 'living as a woman' is tricky, but if you got a nice clean sheet of paper, carefully drew a line down the middle with a ruler, and wrote 'LIVING AS A MAN' on one side and 'LIVING AS A WOMAN' on the other, I don't think you'd have much trouble deciding which side to put 'having a baby' on!🙄

Just curious, for those that have had a gender recognition certificate as a trans man then they go on to give birth to a baby, are they also entitled to maternity leave ?

If the Gender Recognition Panel is going to adopt a view that having a baby is inconsistent with "living as a man", I'm cool with that.

Next they should decide that wanking in changing rooms is inconsistent with "living as a woman".

If you can't get a GRC because you are failing to live like a man, you possibly don't even fall under the protection of 'undergoing the process of reassignment' after they've denied you a GRC.

You might be perceived as going through transition - and thus have some claim indirectly to discrimination.

But it makes it a whole pile more difficult to bring a claim.

It's interesting and I suspect there are multiple ramifications.

Yes because they haven't changed sex and sex is a different category to gender reassignment.

It is a sex based right.

If you can't get a GRC because you are failing to live like a man, you possibly don't even fall under the protection of 'undergoing the process of reassignment' after they've denied you a GRC.

This absolutely.

Another consequence of this law being written when many didn't realise it was a trojan horse. Not a gesture towards a few thousand people.

Good. I’m so glad some people aren’t pandering to this nonsense. It’s high time these people were told “no”.

Well, this was part of the For Women Scotland case at the Supreme Court. If 'woman' didnt involve biological sex then a trans man wouldn't be covered. Trans activists basically said they were relying on employers not to be so churlish. But they were prepared to throw pregnant trans men under a bus for the bigger prize. They lost of course.

But now it seems that some of the submissions to the ERHC about their draft code are concerned that breast feeding trans women are not being protected. This is true because they are biological men and the maternity benefits are for biological women. But they aren't happy.

I'd be fascinating to get a definition of what living like a woman is, without references to sexist gender stereotypes.

I suspect its about why they aren't having surgery or taking medication. Although surgery and drugs arent required for a GRC, the reason not to 'fully transition' is indicative of commitment.

If she wants to give birth, would gender dysphoria (or whatever it is now) be an accurate diagnosis, and how can she live as a man while pregnant? Has she considered how she would feel about being seen as a women while pregnant?

It really demonstrates how the people asking for GRC has changed. It used to be mainly older men, now there are many younger women. They will naturally have a different attitude to why they want a GRC and what it means for them.

I’m not getting why everyone’s applauding this.

If it worked both ways then fine but this strikes me as very much ‘women aren’t allowed to identify out of their sex’ (which we all know yes). But I am not going to applaud when men are allowed to rape women and be designated ‘women’.

Are the adults back in the room? High time!

Nobody has said that.

Everyone is making the point that if you are claiming gender dysphoiria but then claim the right to something that is only open to someone of your biolgoical sex then clearly you aren't transitioning.

Anymore than a man who claims to be a woman and then uses his male appendage to rape a woman, ie they have retained their sex.

What would make you think anyone has said anything like you have implied.

The answer is becoming increasingly elusive, because whatever you think it might be, or include, there are always some people who identify as trans but don't do it, so they obviously consider it an optional extra.
Examples might include:
Having gender surgery and/or other body and facial modification
Taking feminising/masculinising medication
Wearing typically opposite-sex clothing
Getting rid of your beard
Expecting to use opposite-sex facilities
Insisting other people use opposite-sex pronouns for you
Bothering to get a GRC
Refraining from behaving like a stereotypical member of your birth sex
And now- refraining from living the reproductive life of your birth sex

So if all these things are optional and unnecessary for beginning to live "as a man" or "as a woman", what exactly is necessary? What is left? What do you have to do/not do? Clearly the GRC awarders have some sort of standard that must be met (or they wouldn't have said no to this person), but what definition are the people who rejected their decision using?

Ironically, when woman and man are defined as having a body organised round the production (successful or otherwise) of large or small gametes respectively, the problem disappears, because all the sorts of things listed above are truly optional. You don't have to look or behave or dress in any particular way, or have a particular kind of character or interests in order to be a member of your sex; you don't have to bear or beget children or even be capable of doing so; you don't even have to actively "identify" as a man or a woman, whatever that means.