\Judge grants parentage rights to sperm donor/denies parentage to non-bio mom on birth cert

[Anonymous]

This is a little bit of outrage click-bait, as others have pointed out.

Yes, it's unnerving that the non-biological parent needs to file for second parent adoption, but it is also well known and understood.

Further, the "sperm donor" and the biological mother are currently living together and raising the child together, and were able to successfully seek a protective order against Williams for abusive behavior.

So, there's just a lot of stuff going on here that is beyond the issues with presumptive parenthood.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The demographic reality of LBGTQ families with kids is that they are more likely to live in low cost of living red states, more likely to be low income, and have a lower median family income than US families with kids as a whole. I know many LGBTQ migrant families, but I know even more who are looking for cheap/liberal/good schools-and that is a unicorn (I know I only have two where I live). So if you are a queer family with kids living on 50k in Alabama, what are the good options. And, LGBTQ families are more likely to have foster kids-I have a good friend who wanted to move out of TX with her family but she had a longterm foster child who she would have been forced to leave behind.

Here's the research that backs up what I wrote above: https://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/publications/lgbt-parenting-us/

I think the other challenge is that when you're not made of money, the cost of a lawyer to sort out a sperm donor contract or a lawyer to organize a second parent adoption is so much. It's daunting especially with all the other baby expenses and no one wants to think it's necessary when you have a newborn.

Yeah, the moms may have not had or wanted to spend money on a 2nd parent adoption after the baby was born. Ours cost 2k and that was in a state where it was pretty straightforward and no home study was required.

To the pp: the two women were married when the baby was born, were both on the birth cert, and raised the child together for several years. The donor identified himself (on his blog) as a "know (gay) sperm donor."

They had $2k. They were saavy about the law and deliberately chose not to file it. The law exists for a reason! If you chose not to do the available paperwork demonstrating you are the parent, then the court may reasonably assume that you did not intend to be the parent. I think implicit in the judges decision is that the decision not to adopt indicated that Williams actually was not intending to be the parent b

Did they? I'm not super familiar with the case and I definitely found the implied allegations of abuse concerning so I would totally understand if the judge had e.g. chosen to terminate parental rights for that reason and/or validate the sperm donor/bio father's parental status based on his involvement with the child (potentially making all three of them legal parents for example). But to just say "actually no the baby your wife bore while you guys were married and who you raised for two years is not your kid because you didn't adopt them" seems a bit much. If Williams was a man with male factor infertility, would the ruling have been the same?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:From the terrifying files: https://mombian.com/2023/02/15/oklahoma-grants-parentage-to-sperm-donor-over-nonbiological-mom/

She should have taken the time to adopt her child. That is the only legal way to have and connection.

No. They were married when the baby was born and she was listed on the birth certificate. This is because they were a gay couple. If she’d been a man and it was a hetero marriage, it wouldn’t have been the same issue.

[Anonymous]

I don’t see this as having much in the way of precedential value. It’s not binding on anyone but the litigants. It does seem to be driven by circumstances though the facts do lead to tough legal issues and we don’t know what the totality of evidence showed. One benefit it does give us is that we now have a picture of how laws might be interpreted and we can make decisions about what sorts of protections we choose to put in place for ourselves.

[Anonymous]

Always use an established and reputable agency for any IVF/surrogacy/adoption/sperm or egg donation, ALWAYS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Always use an established and reputable agency for any IVF/surrogacy/adoption/sperm or egg donation, ALWAYS.

As someone who did go this route -- you do realize this is prohibitively expensive for a lot of people, right?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The demographic reality of LBGTQ families with kids is that they are more likely to live in low cost of living red states, more likely to be low income, and have a lower median family income than US families with kids as a whole. I know many LGBTQ migrant families, but I know even more who are looking for cheap/liberal/good schools-and that is a unicorn (I know I only have two where I live). So if you are a queer family with kids living on 50k in Alabama, what are the good options. And, LGBTQ families are more likely to have foster kids-I have a good friend who wanted to move out of TX with her family but she had a longterm foster child who she would have been forced to leave behind.

Here's the research that backs up what I wrote above: https://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/publications/lgbt-parenting-us/

Actually the demographics are virtually identical to being gay in the 1960s and 1970s. If you lived in an unsafe place you need to move. Except that there are more safer places and this affects not just you. There are plenty of LCOL places in legally safe places. Oklahoma isn’t one of them and everybody knows that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Always use an established and reputable agency for any IVF/surrogacy/adoption/sperm or egg donation, ALWAYS.

As someone who did go this route -- you do realize this is prohibitively expensive for a lot of people, right?

Having kids is expensive. Either this is an item you can budget for or as an lgbt family you cannot safely have kids. A descent sperm donor agreement with counsel for both or toes can be had for $3-4K.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:From the terrifying files: https://mombian.com/2023/02/15/oklahoma-grants-parentage-to-sperm-donor-over-nonbiological-mom/

She should have taken the time to adopt her child. That is the only legal way to have and connection.

No. They were married when the baby was born and she was listed on the birth certificate. This is because they were a gay couple. If she’d been a man and it was a hetero marriage, it wouldn’t have been the same issue.

A father listed on the birth certificate is presumed to be the father, but it's not necessarily the case. If the sperm donor came around to a hetero couple and stated he didn't terminate his parental rights, there could still be a court showdown.

[Anonymous]

He was also the donor for at least 12 other children. I wonder how he would feel about paying child support for all of them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:From the terrifying files: https://mombian.com/2023/02/15/oklahoma-grants-parentage-to-sperm-donor-over-nonbiological-mom/

She should have taken the time to adopt her child. That is the only legal way to have and connection.

No. They were married when the baby was born and she was listed on the birth certificate. This is because they were a gay couple. If she’d been a man and it was a hetero marriage, it wouldn’t have been the same issue.

A father listed on the birth certificate is presumed to be the father, but it's not necessarily the case. If the sperm donor came around to a hetero couple and stated he didn't terminate his parental rights, there could still be a court showdown.

It doesn’t matter. In many states it can be proven that the husband isn’t the father, but because the baby was born into the marriage and he assumed a parental role, he’ll be on the hook for child support upon divorce, even if the mom hooks up with the actual baby daddy.

But the point is, marriage equality was supposed to give gay couples the same rights, meaning a baby born into a marriage wouldn’t necessarily have to be adopted by the other mom because she’s on the birth certificate, and they’re supposed to be equal to hetero couples. The judge specifically said the law he referenced was before gay marriage was legal, it didn’t take gay marriage into account, so this marriage doesn’t have the same protections as a hetero marriage because they’re both women. And people on this thread are like, “yeah, gay parents don’t have the same rights because they’re gay, they need different rules and hoops to jump through if they want to be real parents with the same rights.”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The demographic reality of LBGTQ families with kids is that they are more likely to live in low cost of living red states, more likely to be low income, and have a lower median family income than US families with kids as a whole. I know many LGBTQ migrant families, but I know even more who are looking for cheap/liberal/good schools-and that is a unicorn (I know I only have two where I live). So if you are a queer family with kids living on 50k in Alabama, what are the good options. And, LGBTQ families are more likely to have foster kids-I have a good friend who wanted to move out of TX with her family but she had a longterm foster child who she would have been forced to leave behind.

Here's the research that backs up what I wrote above: https://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/publications/lgbt-parenting-us/

This is true. LGBTQ friendly areas tend to be HCOL.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:From the terrifying files: https://mombian.com/2023/02/15/oklahoma-grants-parentage-to-sperm-donor-over-nonbiological-mom/

She should have taken the time to adopt her child. That is the only legal way to have and connection.

No. They were married when the baby was born and she was listed on the birth certificate. This is because they were a gay couple. If she’d been a man and it was a hetero marriage, it wouldn’t have been the same issue.

A father listed on the birth certificate is presumed to be the father, but it's not necessarily the case. If the sperm donor came around to a hetero couple and stated he didn't terminate his parental rights, there could still be a court showdown.

It doesn’t matter. In many states it can be proven that the husband isn’t the father, but because the baby was born into the marriage and he assumed a parental role, he’ll be on the hook for child support upon divorce, even if the mom hooks up with the actual baby daddy.

But the point is, marriage equality was supposed to give gay couples the same rights, meaning a baby born into a marriage wouldn’t necessarily have to be adopted by the other mom because she’s on the birth certificate, and they’re supposed to be equal to hetero couples. The judge specifically said the law he referenced was before gay marriage was legal, it didn’t take gay marriage into account, so this marriage doesn’t have the same protections as a hetero marriage because they’re both women. And people on this thread are like, “yeah, gay parents don’t have the same rights because they’re gay, they need different rules and hoops to jump through if they want to be real parents with the same rights.”

OK.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Always use an established and reputable agency for any IVF/surrogacy/adoption/sperm or egg donation, ALWAYS.

Though in this case it seems like it worked out a lot better for the actual biological mother to have not gone that route, because it kept her kid away from her abusive partner..

[Anonymous]

“there is no presumption that the wife of the mother is automatically the presumed parent of a child born during the marriage”.

What complete and utter bullshit. So if a straight couple uses a sperm donor, the man should have to adopt the child? That’s ridiculous, and deeply unfair.