Legal recognition of trans parents: welcome back to the 80s

Mom keeps track of the birth certificate, even if the person giving birth is a dad. As a result, those affected are often forcibly outed.

Queer people should decide for themselves if, when and how they come out Photo: Stefanie Päffgen/plainpicture

The judgment of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) is sobering: it states that a trans father is listed as the mother in his child’s birth certificate and a trans mother is listed as the father. For ten years, a trans father, who wants to remain anonymous because of hate speech online as in real life, had been waiting for the verdict and is now understandably very disappointed.

That minorities still have to fight for their rights themselves is an injustice. Bitter when the efforts then also come to nothing. The verdict is degrading for the father. In addition, the legal situation also creates countless practical obstacles in his everyday life. So when the single father applies for a daycare voucher, the question of the mother of the child immediately arises. He is also listed as a mother in the birth certificate and has to come out involuntarily.

This is the more harmless form of forced outing. If he changes employers and has to present his child’s birth certificate for the pay slip, he is out of the job before the work really begins. Queer people should decide for themselves if, when and how they come out. In times when the rights of queer people are being restricted more and more around the world, the verdict is a fatal signal.

However, the effort was not in vain: the ECtHR leaves it to German case law to decide to what extent it is readjusted. The federal government has long since declared its flag regarding the law of descent: it wants to reform the law of descent. A draft law on this should be available by the end of the year at the earliest. In order to prevent forced outings by means of birth certificates until then, there should be an interim solution in the Self-Determination Act.

The federal government should hurry. Because the trans father and many other trans, inter and non-binary parents have waited long enough. When he first complained, his child was just a baby. It is now ten years old.