Lack of News

[leora]

Random commenters on the internet are transphobic. This revelation should shock and surprise nobody. Some other random commenters on the internet were not. But anyhow, being annoyed by the bigotry, I did the futile thing of responding. In the process, I wanted to re-dig up a link I'd read before. It took some doing, so I thought I'd share it, and

Comments

[elenbarathi]

That word 'transphobic' always throws me for a loop at first sight - my brain wants to interpret it as fear of transit, transition, transportation, transformation, etc. rather than 'fear of trans-gendered people'.

I say, let religious people get married in their churches, synagogues, mosques, circles; let everybody else have whatever kind of wedding suits them best; "drinks all around!" But let the secular law take no notice of this until the happy (couple)(triad)(other) has filed their notarized domestic contract with the county courthouse.

The law has no business in our bedrooms. If two or more adults wish to share domestic assets and responsibilities, what's it matter what sex, gender or orientation they are, or whether or not they have sex together? That whole thing is an unConstitutional violation of both the separation of church and state, and our right to privacy in our own homes. So let people make whatever kind of contract they wish with each other, according to their individual requirements, and call it 'marriage' or not, just as they please.

[leora]

Oh yeah, I can see how your mind would go to transit. And I agree with you. Historically, marriage was originally the right of the people. You could marry yourself and your partner together by joining hands. I think it was a mistake to give marriage away to any organization, although people who are religious certainly have the right to make their personal marriage be held according to their beliefs and rituals. But I'd like neither the state nor the church to have marriage, but to give it back to the people. And for religions to keep having whatever authority individuals choose to give them, and for the state to enforce contracts, which is a big part of its job. And if I make a contract with someone that we are sharing our assets or have power of attorney for each other or so forth, then the state can enforce that.

[elenbarathi]

Exactly - give marriage back to the people; let everyone define for themselves what it means, and the whole problem is solved.

The current standard marriage isn't even a 'contract' in any reasonable sense. Two people make lofty but vague and unenforceable vows to each other, "to love, honor and cherish, forsaking all others, till death do us part", with the whole unspoken cultural tradition of 'marital rights' thrown in - the assumption that the woman is granting permanent exclusive rights to the sexual use of her body in exchange for protection and support for herself and her children.

There's no way to enforce sexual exclusivity, and women these days are accustomed to having to protect and support ourselves and our children on our own, so that's a bad deal. But obviously, people still want to live together and look after one another, and this is a good thing, both for the individuals and for our society, so why not make it as easy as possible?

If the churches want to continue with their one man/one woman vows of lifelong love, honor and sexual fidelity, that's fine, and more power to them if they can persuade their adherents to actually keep such vows. But a vow is not a contract, and the State is there to deal with contracts, not vows.