Having a child with complete strangers … This is the principle of a Belgian television program, the first episode of which was broadcast last Monday. A program that causes scandal. As the presenter, Dina Tersago (a Flemish version of Karine Lemarchand), who on previous shows has helped farmers find love … and homeowners renovate their homes. Today she wants to bring together people who have a desire for a child but cannot have one (for medical or social reasons, or because they do not have a partner).
The goal is for them to take action, but without all the hoopla! Love at first sight, romance, love, all that … it gets in the way. Let’s be pragmatic, we focus on the main project: raising a child together. This new form of non-traditional family has a name: “chosen co-parenting” or “programmed co-parenting”.
Bewust co-ouderschap – het is één van de nieuwe gezinsvormen. Eentje waar nu zelfs een tv-zoektocht over gaat. #ikwileenkind vanavond op VTM. Lees er hier meer over.https: //t.co/xiTWSI1kqc pic.twitter.com/ukfCQLk3lN
– patriciaderyck (@patriciaderyck) October 18, 2021
Those who decide to share parental responsibility can be two, or three or four. For example, a gay couple and a lesbian couple, a single person and a homosexual couple.
Monday, October 18, the show began with the testimony of a 40-year-old pharmacist who had a boy with two married men she did not know. “We often go out as a family and go on vacation together. But we don’t have a relationship“, says the forty-something. However”on paper, our son has only two parents: a mom and a dad“.”This means that we had to define another path. We have the impression that our situation has not been recognized.“
This first episode is intended to attract candidates for the rest of the program, simply called Ik wil een kind (I want a child).
VTM, the Flemish channel which broadcasts the program, wants to break a taboo, “shake up mentalities“,”provoke debate“on a social fact to which our laws are unable to respond. Because in Belgium – as elsewhere in Europe – there cannot be more than two parents for a child. The law does not provide for any other possibility, no status for example for the homosexual husband of a co-parent.
“We ain’t gonna deliver a baby on a platter“, says Diane Tersugo. Because to make a child with three or four is to face rather sturdy administrative and legal obstacles. The program thus proposes to the participants to be followed by a psychologist and a lawyer. For the producer Lander Kennis, it is about providing information: “Anyone who wants to start today must learn everything for themselves. There is no framework for that “, he explains to 7sur7.
Even those who are very supportive of talking more about co-parenting feel that reality TV may not be the best method.
“Shameful practice“, even said Senator Bert Anciaux, “motivated by the race to hear”.
Having a baby at 2, 3 or 4, without a romantic relationship, and as part of a reality TV show … This is the very controversial program of the Flemish channel VTM (and I tell you about it on @the first one 😉 https://t.co/NHsokXwjpQ
– Joyce Azar (@AzarJy) October 13, 2021
It’s true that when it comes to announcing in a few years to a little Mathias or a little Chloe that they were conceived thanks to a TV show … it won’t be easy. Caroline Vrijens, Commissioner for Children’s Rights, recalls that a child is not simply “an object to which we have a right, but a subject which itself has rights “. The concept is not planned on our screens in France. For the moment.