Law

For some children, their first word is ‘Mamas’

According to unpublished data from the Institut de la statistique du Québec, 88 children born in Quebec since 2003 have two mothers, that is, the woman who gave birth to the child and her spouse. Furthermore, this parental relationship appears on the child’s birth certificate.

According to lawyer Alain Roy, double maternity raises some very important questions, not only in terms of the law, but also social, anthropological and psychological issues. “ Quebec is the only place in the world where this phenomenon exists,” Mr. Roy explains.

While the national debate on same-sex marriage rages on in Canada, lesbian and gay parents have made their way into Quebec law. In principle, male gay parents could also exist, but since the use of surrogate mothers is illegal, ‘bi-paternity’ can only occur through adoption. And since there are so few children to adopt in Quebec, male gay couples are facing a serious hurdle. Internationally, most countries fervently oppose adoption of their orphans by same-sex couples.

Although the law prohibits such phenomena as surrogacy and human cloning, the ethical discussion on same-sex parents has not kept pace with the evolution of science and law. Clearly—whether it’s medically-assisted procreation or ‘friendly-assisted’ procreation in the case of homosexuals—parenthood is in the process of being redefined. “It’s not about the rights of the child, it’s about the right to a child,” states the lawyer.

Have we gone too far? Yes, according to Alain Roy. The law has created a new concept of filiation, one that is “stripped of any anthropological, sociological or biological roots”. There has never been a debate about homosexual parenting, yet it is legally recognized.

In a study recently published in the journal Enfances, familles, générations (Conseil de développement de la recherche sur la famille du Québec, Fall 2004), Prof. Roy of Université de Montréal’s Faculty of Law criticized the absence of any debate on such a fundamental issue. “Over the course of a few weeks (in June 2002), Quebec’s lawmakers shook the foundations of a millennium-old institution,” writes Prof. Roy.

Alain Roy points out that he does not doubt that homosexual couples can be very good parents. “Many empirical studies have shown that a child who grows up with loving homosexual parental figures develops adequately.” But there is quite a stretch between legally enshrining the commitment of same-sex spouses to a child and being recognized as a ‘co-mother’ or ‘co-father’ on a child’s birth certificate. The civil status of a human being carries particular significance in terms of the development of his or her identity, he contends. “The birth certificate is a testament to a child’s social existence and roots in a society. It’s a person’s constitutional document,” explains Alain Roy. “Putting down the names of two men as the fathers or two women as the mothers constitutes a veritable revolution in genealogy.”