TRANSGENDERED PEOPLE AND MARRIAGE: Matt Taylor and Elizabeth Marquardt

Matt Taylor writes: As we debate various aspects of marriage and parenting for same-sex couples, there is a group of people that we should not forget: those who do not easily fit our conventional definitions of gender. This includes the transgendered, people with an inner sense of gender identity different from their genetic sex, and the intersexed, people with physical characteristics different than their genetic sex or whose genetic makeup is not clearly male or female.

For a transgendered person, one important concern is the legal status of their marriage and parental rights during the change of gender. If we restrict legal marriage to male-female couples, it could have the unfortunate effect of nullifying a marriage when one partner goes through a gender change, even if the couple remains committed to one another and wants to stay married. Likewise, transgendered parents could be separated from their children if parental gender is a critical criterion for child custody.

The consequences of strengthening traditional gender roles in family law may be even more dire for intersexed people. It seems grossly unfair to insist that someone born with both male and female physical characteristics choose one gender or the other before they can be legally married, even more so if the law requires that their anatomies be surgically "corrected" to conform to one or the other gender norm. Likewise, the intersexed should not be denied access to reproductive technologies, which in many cases offer the only possibility of having children.

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posted by Eve at 12:57 AM | link

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