I’ve been getting invited to more weddings lately. About a year ago, France legalized same-sex marriage. They didn’t stop there – gay and lesbian couples now have the right to adopt children, too. That’s something I’m profoundly grateful for.
Oh, not because I’m gay or want to adopt a child, but because I’m not an asshole.
Also, because I like to see my friends happy and endowed with equal rights. I like to see human beings treated as such and to see children who need homes and love being taken in by people who want to give them those things.
While I think it’s naive to believe that ‘All You Need is Love,’ I do still like to see love win.
‘Traditional marriage’ isn’t real. It’s not a thing. It’s a phrase that usually represents outdated thinking and the meaning of it gets skewed in whatever way the speaker decides to twist it.
Whenever someone tries to throw an argument at me about how traditional marriage should be preserved, I usually walk away. I assume their perception of ‘traditional’ is asinine and archaic; that they’re hiding behind the word ‘traditional’ in a feeble attempt to mask their bigotry.
Sometimes, I give them the benefit of the doubt. I see their ignorance and understand that their definition of ‘traditional marriage’ has nothing at all to do with mine.
My parents were ‘traditionally married’. By that, I of course mean that they fertilized an egg, got married too quickly and much too young, then divorced soon after. No judgement, just facts. Kids do crazy shit. They make mistakes involving weird outfits and floppy hats.
The more I grew into my adult body, the more I was okay about my parents not being together. I could barely imagine them in the same room together, much less living with both of them at the same time. I never knew them as a couple. Not that I can remember, anyway. And to tell the truth, I didn’t want to.
I never found it strange because many of my friends were like me. My closest friends were raised by single mothers. Some had step-dads, but most didn’t. Our fathers, they were all in other states with new families that we’d visit occasionally.
Some of my other friends were living with single dads, their mothers off in other states, living new lives.
This was normal.
This was… traditional.
Those people whose parents were still together, they were the weirdos.
From what I could see, traditional marriage was a waste of time and energy. It inevitably ended in divorce, leaving parents and kids broken and bitter. My idea of a typical marriage was: 1) get hitched 2) have the kids 3) get divorced 4) get married again 5) have the marriage and family you actually want.
Yeah, I know. Pretty cynical. But, fuck it. I’m being honest with you.
I decided I didn’t want to have anything to do with that shit. Marriage, kids, domesticity… nothing about it seemed very appealing. Fuck that.
While we’re being honest, I should let you know that we never planned on getting married, we just wanted to be able to live together in the same country. The easiest way was to get married. We discussed it, deciding that getting married wasn’t a big deal for a couple of people in their 30s and that if it was what we had to do to be together, it was worth it. It was a practical decision as opposed to an impulsive or romantic one.
We did away with some of that boring ‘traditional’ stuff, though. We decided dogs and cats are better than human babies. If ‘traditional’ marriage is all about procreation, count us out.
I know for people with a very different perspective on a ‘traditional marriage,’ my husband and I are a better choice for raising kids, as opposed to a same-sex couple.
Those people are fucking idiots. I’ll explain to you why that is.
Babies are gross. They smell weird. Strange, disgusting things come out of them, along with a cacophony of sounds that shatter my serenity. Sure, they have moments of hilarity, cuteness and a special wisdom that can only come from youth and innocence, but I am not a mother. I do not want to be one. I have never looked at a mother and child and felt a sense of longing, or a space within myself needing to be filled. I only feel relief that it isn’t me and reassurance that I’ve made the right decision for myself. There’s more, but that would require a big, ranty post of its own.
Then I see my friends in same-sex couples. They fight to be together, to have a family. They endure the hate. They struggle. They have literally risked their personal safety. All to have this thing that many people like me do not want. A thing that so many ‘traditionally married’ people have handled poorly.
The world doesn’t need more babies. It needs more parents. Those parents are out there, but unfortunately, there’s a lot of small-minded fools getting in their way, spreading misery around.
What’s better, a ‘traditionally’ married couple having a kid that they don’t want, or a less-traditional, loving couple raising a child that they will fight and risk themselves for?
If you disagree with me, that’s okay. If you disagree with me because of an old story book that condones rape, murder and incest, then I invite you to watch this brief, yet enlightening video:
If you disagree with me, maybe we can agree to disagree. But, if something like same-sex marriage and adoption gets you more fired up than, say… children being forced to marry and have sex with grown men, I probably don’t want to know you because the likelihood that you are human garbage is just too high.
If you think that a person marrying an inanimate object makes more sense than two people who love one another wanting to have a family, then I have to question your sense of humanity.
If you spend more energy hating on the LGBT crowd then you do on anything else, you have issues. You do.
We’ve all seen movies. We know that when evil is losing, it lashes out harder than ever in that moment just before it’s finally defeated. Thanks to the new laws here in France, I’ve been invited to more weddings lately. I’m happy about that. But, this doesn’t mean it’s time for a ‘happily ever after’. The fear is still there. The nervousness and tension. The hate and the lack of acceptance. These events have been low-key, intimate affairs because getting a seat at the lunch counter doesn’t mean that it’s always safe to throw a party in the diner.
‘All You Need is Love’ is naive because it’s too simplistic. But, love is a damn fine place to start. Love is worth more than tradition.
And I do like to see love win.
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