For some reason I'm not able to put a title up for this blog entry. Oh well, let's see if that stops me! (I should mention that yesterday it did actually stop me. I kept trying to fix it but when I wasn't able to I just got pissed off and didn't feel like blogging at all...)
I spent the weekend with a friend who was visiting from overseas, and we went to a wedding, a big celebration of heterosexual loving. I had a wonderful time and the whole party was beautiful and fabulous. But there's still that naggin annoying feeling that "this is something I am not entitled to, according to a whole lot of people".
In Sweden I still can't get married. I can register a partnership, which has been the case for nearly 10 years now. That essentially means I can have the big ceremony, my wife and I would have all the same rights as a heterosexual couple... but marriage, the big M-A-R-R-I-A-G-E: That's still reserved for the union between one man and one woman.
And it's not really something I think about on a regular basis. For one, I'm not in a relationship so I'm nowhere near thinking about actually tying the knot with someone. Furthermore I was never one of those women who dreamt about a big white wedding ever since I was a little girl. Nope, never really was one of those girls. And to this day, while I do think that weddings are beautiful and am actually really moved by the ceremony and the big party of love that typically follows, I'm pretty sure that I don't want to get married. I'd love to have a big party and all of that, but the paper work and the title of wife and wife really holds no particular value for me. I suppose you could say I love weddings but am not a fan of marriage.
Still, when I'm at a wedding I get pissed in the midst of all the happiness, because even if I don't want it for myself I want to have the option. Right now, I don't even have the choice of rejecting the institution of marriage because "it" rejected me first. And we all know how it sucks to be rejected.
So I'm raising my glass to gay marriage: "May we all have the right to define our institutions as we see fit. May no one be denied the right to choose how we wish our unions to be recognized. May we all have the choice to say 'I don't need no stinkin marriage' and not be pre-empitively excluded from that holy circle that we may or may not want to be a part of."
2 comments:
Being in California - hear you! Only we don't get all the same rights, just the responsibilities. Our Federal government keeps the full rights card in their deck.
Yeah... I guess for a whole lot of folks having something like "registered partnership" is a big step forward. But I'm still PO'd about the whole "separate but equal" thing they've got going here... Yeah, 'cause that's always worked out so well?!
It's crazy how quiet the federal goverment is about gay marriage though (well, when they aren't blatantly against it). The democratic candidates for '08 all seem to be going for the "it's a state matter" bullshit huh?
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