My Week On Facebook (Identities Removed)
Someone I know posted this:
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A.I think marraige is a heterosexual tradition. Why should everyone automatically be entitled to it? It has a long tradition. It is a very special committment that a man and a woman make and it is the start of a family. It is one of special rights heterosexuals get to enjoy ( Read more... )
How the heck did you stay so rational in your arguments when faced with all...that? The whole procreation argument makes me twitch. "Producing" children is easy (it was for us, at least, but I know that's not always the case). But even if it was easy for everyone, they'd still have to raise them, and that is the hard part, and it really doesn't matter if you're homosexual or heterosexual or bisexual or... Geez.
I really liked this that you said, btw:
The responsibility of marriage is in committing yourself to another person, in loving and caring for and respecting them even when times are hard, even when you are furious with them. The responsibility is in choosing to spend your life supporting them, letting them support you, and working together even when it feels impossible. That is the responsibility you take on when you say "I do,"
Because, yes. Will and I wanted kids when we got married, but we didn't get married because we wanted kids, we got married because we love(d) each other and wanted to do everything we could to support each other. If kids came along, great. If not, we'd be okay childfree, too.
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I unfortunately have a lot of experience responding to people with discriminatory opinions. My father's entire side of the family is pretty much a minefield of bigotry. My dad is both homophobic and racist, my uncle has pretty much the same opinion as A does, and my other uncle and his family are very strictly Catholic (which I don't have a problem with in and of itself, but they adhere to pretty much all of the negative and discriminatory rhetoric that can come with it, so yeah, THAT I take issue with).
That uncle's family, at least, is also very charitable and seem to genuinely care about people, but they have these massive blinders on when it comes to anyone who is different from them in a way that they can't comprehend, or who they've been told by others is in someway bad or wrong.
Part of the problem is when people are told something by someone they love or trust or admire, they sometimes end up absorbing it without considering it or holding it up to any kind of scrutiny. I think everyone's guilty of this sometimes, but it doesn't really make it okay. It certainly doesn't make it okay when it effects other people in a negative way or allows you to view other people differently.
So, I don't know, I think it helps to remember you're talking to a person and realize that just because what they're saying is despicable and wrong doesn't mean they're just a bad person or less of a person. They've absorbed some of the heteronormative, discriminatory B.S. flying around out there and took it in without running it through its paces and it's become a toxic, internalized way of thinking. I probably won't be able to change his mind. Maybe I will, I don't know. But I'm not going to just sit back and let what's being said avoid the necessary scrutiny. Real people are being hurt because of these kinds of ideas. Maybe if enough people can criticize them constructively, we can prevent them from spreading even more and eventually get them shut down.
And the kids thing drives me crazy. My parents are divorced, my sister got married young and doesn't want kids at all, my cousin and her wife have a seriously adorable little girl, my friend Rob is gay (and in a pretty serious relationship) and he wants kids more than anyone I've ever known. He'll make a really good dad, too, I think. For Rob, at least, the ability to produce children is a responsibility he wishes he had. He loves kids, he wants kids of his own.
I know and love so many people who exist outside of A's definition that it drives me crazy to think that anyone could be so limiting. Heck, I might not fit into his definition. Because of the PCOS there is a very good chance I won't be able to have kids and this is NOT a weight off my shoulders. As someone who' lived for years with the knowledge that I may never be able to have kids, the argument that the ability to do so is simply some kind off terrible albatross straight people must bear rankles more than a little. I imagine for a number of homosexual couples, it would feel the same. They're not loving who they love so they don't have to worry about knocking someone up or getting knocked up themselves. I mean, there are lesbian couples who fight over who gets to be inseminated because the desire to have that experience doesn't necessarily go away with your sexual orientation.
Anyway, this got SO long. Sorry about that. Thank you for your response, I'm glad what I said was meaningful to you :D
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