The Master’s Tools Will Never Dismantle The Master’s House.

The mention of a marriage equality rally here prompted me to raise the issue of the logic of gay marriage rights activism. I’d really like to bounce the ideas around on this subject but I’m not sure that site is the place to do it in, too heteronormative for one thing, and when people are invested in heteronormativity they tend to want to preserve its ideals, one of those ideals being marriage*.

I wonder if this is the reason why progressive-minded straight people are so keen to jump on board the marriage equality bandwagon; because they’ve signed up for the institution of marriage and are therefore obliged to delude themselves that it’s some kind of romantic utopia, for all eternity. Maybe it pains them to think of teh poor dykes and gender-fluid women as having to miss out on the rapture of stifling suburban bliss and the treasured opportunity to sacrifice ones unique identity in order to morph into one bland being whose main interest, consistent with the principle of homeostasis, is in maintaining the unit they’ve ‘chosen’ to live in, filling their houses up with shit from Ikea and living vicariously through their kid’s sport. Bridget Jones was 99.9% full of shite, but she had one thing right; smug married couples are indeed excruciating.

Maybe, and this is the impression I get from a lot of nice straight liberal dudes who pontificate on this subject, it stems from some desire to rationalise LGBTQ people for themselves, convince themselves that they are really Just Like Them after all, in order to be able to tolerate them. See, if we paint everyone invisible with the same heteronormative brush then we needn’t trouble ourselves to accept diversity; we can just ignore it.

What people fail to grasp here is that marriage is one of the foundation stones of patriarchy, its primary unit in fact. As Twisty explains in this classic post, marriage blows chunks. To this I would add that it is also a petrie dish, sprouting such bacteria as child abuse/neglect, family violence and marital rape, from behind its iron curtain of non-accountability. Its also how the state wrings the absolute maximum amount of unpaid labour and cannon fodder out of us and this is why the state grants special privileges to smug married couples, special legal and financial rights which elevate them to a privileged status way above everybody else’s. They have to do that in order to get people to live that way. This is why wedding culture is forced down our throats via media and pop cultural narratives. People who live their lives in relative misery need some kind of social rewards; this is why we ooh and aah over engagement announcements and bestow lavish gifts on the well-behaved couples living up to heteronormative cultural norms and maintaining that status quo. It’s why we fawn over brides and give them flowers, white organza and pretty stones. Something has to lure them down that aisle toward a lifetime of sexual and domestic servitude. The socialisation into hetnormative domestic arrangements pretty much begins at birth.

The state imposes this norm on us, this is why the state gets to define what our personal relationships should look like and how we should experience them and in fact who of us get to experience them. Seeing as queer partnerships are not a true reflection of societal gender power relations, the state gives them the thumbs down as far as their demands for equal legal and economic privileges, as they do anybody who refuses to live out their short life gasping for air in the stagnant scum-encrusted pond of het marriage. That’s right, it isn’t just non-het people who miss out here, it’s a whole bunch of people.

The Beyond Marriage movement has this to say:

“Marriage is not the only worthy form of family or relationship, and it should not be legally and economically privileged above all others. A majority of people – whatever their sexual and gender identities – do not live in traditional nuclear families. They stand to gain from alternative forms of household recognition beyond one-size-fits-all marriage. For example:

· Single parent households

· Senior citizens living together and serving as each other’s caregivers (think Golden Girls)

· Blended and extended families

· Children being raised in multiple households or by unmarried parents

· Adult children living with and caring for their parents

· Senior citizens who are the primary caregivers to their grandchildren or other relatives

· Close friends or siblings living in non-conjugal relationships and serving as each other’s primary support and caregivers

· Households in which there is more than one conjugal partner

· Care-giving relationships that provide support to those living with extended illness such as HIV/AIDS.”

Extending marriage rights or couple privilege is to promote marriage itself thereby preserving it as an institution and as I’ve already pointed out marriage is the primary unit of patriarchy, the eradication of which is the primary goal of radical feminism, therefore marriage equality discourse is by definition, anti-feminist.

People have argued that re-defining marriage to include same sex couples is progressive because currently marriage is defined by the state as a partnership between a man and a woman. I call bullshit. Progession entails forward movement and this is simply a step sideways. I’m not arguing that the state is not discriminating against LGBTQ people here. Clearly there is discrimination and naturally I am opposed to that, but marriage is also defined by the state as being necessarily monogamous and sexual, excluding people within the poly community as well as people who identify as asexual. Whether the nice straight married folks like to think about it or not there are a lot of people who will not be crammed into the narrow confines of their precious little institution.
I am one of them and I would thank them to keep their heteronormative ideology off my damned personal relationships thankyou very much.

I already resent the extent to which the state gets to intrude on my life and I firmly reject any suggestion that they should be allowed to define my intimate relationships by their patriarchal terms and stick their nasty little labels on them. Same goes for all the nice straight folks who are so determined to fight for my ‘right’ to be Just Like Them and be stuck shackled to one person for the rest of my life. Please, don’t bother. I don’t need cultural recognition of my relationships. This area of my life is not public property and were it not for the social, legal and economic rewards bestowed on people who toe the party line, nobody would stand to gain from making that area of their life public property, either.

The institution of marriage is irreversibly fucked up; those in power created it and will always have the power to define it and use it to oppress; the wedding ring is like Sauron’s ring, people. It was forged for foul purposes and there is no reclaiming it or redefining it’s use; it has to be destroyed in order for us all to be free.

*tigtog, the owner of the blog I linked to in the first paragraph, is actually het-partnered to a person who performs marriage ceremonies, so therefore has a personal stake in the blatant promotion of marriage on that site.