On Marriage: I welcome discussion

[ailbhe]

I'm pulling this one out for further discussion. I'm particularly interested in the views of people who thought marriage was meaningless, or that it's just unfair because of hetersexual privilege, childrearing privs, etc. I mean, obviously it *is* unfair, but I'm interested in other people's views.

Are you happy that you married Rob?

Depends on what you mean by married. I'm happy we are committed life partners. I'm delighted we're co-parents. I'm thrilled we plan holidays and DIY and grocery shopping and menus together. I'm pleased some of our friends and family came to celebrate our relationship and offer support for our commitment. I'm ambivalent about the legal and social status the legal ceremony gave our relationship. It was originally because of child guardianship laws - only a man (not necessarily the father) married to a woman at the time of birth got automatic next of kin type rights. That law changed I think while I was pregnant, so I felt dreadful. Then civil partnerships showed up and I felt a bit better. It's complicated.

Comments

[sidheag.livejournal.com]

I, and DH, feel that our commitment to one another (and its exact terms) are none of the business of the state, or of anyone else we don't choose to discuss it with. So we didn't get married. Then (nearly 20 years after we became a couple) when we planned Colin, we wanted to make sure that DH and I were equally regarded by the law as the future baby's parents, etc. We still resisted getting married briefly - we contemplated doing what we could by private legal documents, and we briefly investigated using Scotland's marriage "by habit and repute" law. In the end, it was clear that getting married was vastly easier and cheaper and more effective than the alternatives, so we did that. In a register office, with only the statutory two witnesses, who were an unmarried couple of friends. In the end it was OK; in particular, I hadn't realised that if you get married in a register office you don't have to say anything in public about the matters we regarded as private, such as the nature of the commitment: we just had to say we wanted to be regarded as married.

For a long time we didn't tell anyone (including family for some months) but we don't bother about that any more. I do still wish we hadn't "had to".

[ailbhe]

That guardianship law was a real pain. I hate it. Hate hate hate.