Polyamory Observations #11

I just cannot get my mind off the subject of marriage these days, and specifically, the subject of marriage equality.

Some of that, probably much of that, is the continued consternation, around here, about the involvement of Rick Warren in the Obama inauguration. That unfortunate impending horror is so terribly offensive to those who campaigned to defeat California's odious proposition 8, and who see the question of marriage equality for those who are GLBT as a simple matter of civil rights. I'd count myself there.

There's just one problem with all of that, and that is that I know that some significant part of the GLBT community won't stand up for MY right to the same marriage equality they want so desperately for themselves. I know that as the right wing hate mongers start pointing to the "slippery slope" that leads to (HORRORS!) polygamy and polyamory, there are plenty of gay, bi, and lesbian folks that are more than happy to go over to the dark side and declare that "they never want to see multiple partner marriage equality. That is nowhere on their radar or agenda."

Here's the link to Tristan Taromino's keynote on the subject at the October Poly Pride event: Poly Pride Keynote



My present distress over this whole subject is, in some large degree, related to an interesting bit of fantasizing that I let myself fall into as the campaign season rambled along. I let myself imagine a society, a world, where people everywhere simply understand that "marriage" is about people who love one another choosing to create suitable family structures for themselves. I let myself believe that we might come to a reasonable understanding that there have been many successful and working "marriage" / "family" structures throughout human history, and the fact that we view man/woman pairings as the "norm" is really only a simple bit of cultural myopia. I let myself imagine that we might soon come into a more enlightened time where all the narrowness, hatred, intolerance, and sheer dishonesty that gets spewed by the right-wing fringe would begin to be quieted as more sensible heads began to guide public policy and thought.



Call me PollyAnna.



I am coming to terms, in the last little bit, with the reality that, whatever comes to pass in the fight for "marriage equality," it is never going to reach me. The longing to be able to publicly BE really a "spouse" is strong in me, but it is a longing that will have to forever go unanswered. There is no distinction made between all of us inside our own walls, between legally spouse and not-legally spouse, but the world surely marks the difference -- and acts upon the distinction. I can't ask my employer for leave time to deal with illness of my "non-spouses." I can't manage my finances in concert with my spice without all sorts of silly and annoying contrivances -- because we aren't married. I can't show up at social events with my partners. I can't even talk about the people who are part of my days without generating serious risks to my ongoing livilihood. I have to dance the dance in a thousand little ways everyday, and there is no way around it all. It is what it is.



I understand that not all poly people want marriage. I understand that there are many people out there who are linking up in a thousand different ways that have nothing at all to do with traditional marriage.



It's just me. I want the right to choose marriage. And I can't have it. Ever.



swan