Should Legal Documents Be Accurate?
July 23, 2023 | Washington, D.C.
by Eagle Forum Chairman, Anne Schlafly
The “trans” phenomenon defies science. Instead of defining sex through biology, one’s sex is now determined by time and space, according to the activists. In this context, time and space are subjective emotions and not scientific terms. “I feel” has replaced “I am.” Feelings are not science.
A birth certificate, a driver’s license, and a passport are legal documents. These documents ought to be accurate. These documents should not be manipulated according to feelings. Kansas has recently passed a law that defines males and females at birth by their biology. What a radical notion of using the sex characteristics of humans as the definition of biological sex! Biology, not ideology, should define sex.
No one is “assigned a gender” at birth. Biological sex — whether a newborn has XX chromosomes or XY chromosomes — is a statement of fact, not a guess by the attending physician. States that allow people to redo their birth certificate and change their sex on a legal document are participating in a lie and trying to rewrite historical facts.
Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach said, “The legislature chose to have our laws reflect biological fact rather than a person's chosen expression of identity.” And he is enforcing the new law.
In contrast, last year the U.S. Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, announced, “U.S. passport applicants could self-select their gender and were no longer required to submit any medical documentation, even if their selected gender differed from their other citizenship or identity documents.”
So what good is a U.S. passport as a legal document if the passport holder can lie on the passport? If applicants can lie about their biological sex, then why not lie about their date of birth? Perhaps one could explain feelings to the State Department: I don't feel like a 60-year-old; I feel like a 30-year-old. The jingle for the candy commercial is playing in my head, “Sometimes I feel like a nut, sometimes I don't.”