Rethinking Parenthood to Achieve Reproductive Equality

Abstract

Whether you open a law manual or ask a general audience, these days it is easy to get a straightforward answer to the question of how one becomes a father or a mother. It is possible to become a father by actually “fathering” a child; but even if you are not the biological father, you can recognize paternity at birth (in the event that you are not married to the mother). Thanks to the presumption of paternity, you can also become a father without having “sired” the child. A father is a rather dispensable figure. It is less important that he actually be the father than that he commit to the child. The paternal role is not stable. In a cruel turning of the tables, a man who has assumed the paternal role for a child he has perhaps not even fathered can be rather easily deprived of his status after thirty years. Fathers do not have to be real and this explains the instability of their position.