Alright – forgive the obligatory disgusted of Tunbridge Wells tone, but remember how everyone scoffed at the idea that following ‘same-sex marriage’, the next step would be to follow in the footsteps of Spain and replace the terms of ‘mother’ and ‘father’ with Progenitor A and Progenitor B?

It would appear that, Elton John and David Furnish have decided to lead the way by declaring that David Furnish is the ‘mother’ on the birth certificate of their new baby son, Elijah as well as their elder son Zachary.

That’s right – David Furnish is officially recognised as a mother, despite the fact that he isn’t, he never can be given that he possesses entirely the wrong set of equipment. So not content with redefining marriage, we now need to redefine motherhood and fatherhood into one homogenous mass known as parenthood. Or is it that David Furnish recognises the importance of a mother, just as the LGBT lobby recognise the importance of marriage and has decided to reclaim it for himself? After all, why should motherhood be restricted to women on account of their sexual organs and reproductive ability? Isn’t that rather sexist? This is why we see the overlap between queer theory and feminism, because by declaring that gender is a separate entity to sex and performative in nature, it paves the way for boys to be girls, men to be mothers, girls to be fathers and vice-versa and everybody gets an excuse to indulge their own notions of self-identity.

And whilst I recognise that gender dysphoria can be a serious and debilitating condition requiring treatment of some sort or another, transsexualism or its younger sister transvestitism, is all very well and good, so long as it does not impact on other people, although on a very local level it will mean that when visiting my friends or taking the children to the beach at nearby Rottingdean, I’d better be sure not to drink too much tea as personally I am extremely uncomfortable using gender neutral lavatories in common with, I suspect, most women.

Causing a minor personal inconvenience or embarrassment is in a wholly different league however, to a sacred doctrine whose effects impact on vulnerable children. Men cannot be mothers, women cannot be fathers and to declare otherwise, no matter how legally binding one wishes to make this by declaring it on official documents, does children a massive disservice by seeking to deny them the links to their biological parents.

I am not ashamed to admit that the reason for my distaste and opposition to this, is like many forms of alleged ‘phobia’ , due to feeling threatened. It is threatening when on account of their sexual preferences other people seek to deny that my biology, the fact that I carried my 4 children in my womb myself, that I birthed them, that I breastfed them, that I held them, soothed them, sang to them and tended to them in a way that only a mother can, that they responded to me, from the moment they were born as being comfort and love- I only needed to pick up the newborns when they were crying for them to be instantaneously soothed; all of these things are irrelevant and none of these make me a mother. That, if necessary the state could determine that two men would be every bit as good for them as their mother and their father. It worries me on behalf of every single woman everywhere, that the unique and innate qualities that make women mothers, are now deemed irrelevant, motherhood is just now another form of childcare. Mothers are simply biological vessels and nothing more – something that’s bought into by a frightening amount of women, and was highlighted by Hilary Mantel’s critique of the Duchess of Cambridge. The image she projected was not one that Kate’s extended family have imposed onto her, but one that she has imposed upon Kate, and one can’t help but note that Hilary Mantel has herself suffered from unfortunate infertility problems, which might perhaps explain her disdain towards child-bearing women.

Biology must not be written off in order to satisfy the whims of sexual identity for a minority. To do so is the first step in a dangerous process of dehumanisation. By degrading motherhood, feminism has managed to wipe thousands of years of evolutionary history off the map, a woman’s unique ability to give birth does not render her in any way special, deserving of extra protection or elevate her in any way, it rather weakens her and her womb is something of an encumbrance that makes her not as good as men.

And, if any more proof were required as to how this new child of Elton John and David Furnish has been commodified, their comments are extremely telling, due to a ‘wonderful nanny, fantastic paediatrician, all the great support’, they had found Elijah far more easy to cope with.’

‘Now we have that wonderful infrastructure in place so we can just sit back more and enjoy the little person themselves without the worry – or as much worry.’

Most of us don’t have the luxury of nannies and paediatricians or even great support, particularly if we are not living near our families. Our children are not little pets to be cooed over, admired and enjoyed, no matter how enjoyable or rewarding raising them can be, children are little human beings requiring infinite love, patience, time, energy and self-sacrifice and in those early baby days, enjoyment is not top of the list. You do what you can to get through the back-to-back breast feeding, nappy changing, endless walking up and down stairs to get them to sleep, waving toys and rattles at them, blowing bubbles to cheer them out of their grumpiness, whilst trying to fit everything else in around that. Eventually you’ll be rewarded with a smile of recognition or a soft purring that would indicate they are sleeping contentedly, you’ll feel your baby’s soft cheek against your flesh, gripping on for dear life and comfort whilst they sleep, and that is a reward in and of itself. A baby is not something to sit back and enjoy whilst everyone else gets on and does the hard graft.

Most people don’t need to buy a fantastic infrastructure and that’s because they already have it – a loving mother and father.