I had two disparate thoughts and decided to drop them here together.
fear and loathing in of nirvana
When my father died (and when Richard Hitchens died, as well) I was reminded of the expression, "there are no atheists in foxholes." I have since thought a great deal about this concept.
What a strange idea.
Basically, believers are convinced that fear, particularly the fear of death, will drive the most rational skeptic right into jesus' or buddha's or vishnu's or allah's arms. Yay, the non-believer is really just a believer in atheist's clothing! Vindication: we're all the same!
So. The ultimate test of believing is fear? That fear is the magnet and the glue that keeps you close to god(s)? Can you imagine applying this to anything else? Like, in order to "believe" in gravity, you must be dangled over a chasm, not use your intellect to understand it. Aha! You see, you believe! Or worse, the true test of love is the fear of an empty life without it. Cue generations of abused women. If your religion is true, why would fear be the reason you cling to it?
Would you want your lover to cling to you because they are afraid of the unknown life without you? Is that love?
Fear of the unknown is a manipulative force for obedience. It is religion's and nationalism's blatant cudgel. First, they must tap into your fear, your deep, existential fear. Next, that fear must be whipped up to a frenzy of terror. Then, the man-made solution to this chaos and abyss is laid out–your path to safety is here: obey this holy book and the leaders of its doctrine and be convinced of a life free of fear now and in the hereafter.
It is fucking ingenious. Really. To control billions of people with trepidation and get their labor, their money and their obedience for free.
If you pull back the curtain, however, and see the men pulling the strings of the world, it's hard to go back to blind faith. At least it has been for me. Any movement (religious, political, psychological, nationalist, etc.) that demands me to put my reason on hold, adhere to a set of ideals, obey the hawker of those ideas and tremble in terror of what the world would look like outside the movement has no appeal to me.
Fuck your dogma and concocted doctrine. I'll take my chances with the unknown.
six years ago today
Today is the anniversary of the Supreme Court ruling on marriage equality. On this day, it was decided that denying same-sex couples the right to marry was unconstitutional.
Most queers knew that the decision was coming. This queer didn't believe that it would be made in our favor. Oh, things had improved, yes, but letting us marry? Didn't think it would happen. I was about to go into a team meeting. My team. And I was leading the meeting. An email came through, saying that the court had ruled on Obergefell v. Hodges. We were free to marry! I spent almost 2 years fighting for custody of my children 29 years earlier and survived. I am pretty tough to shake. But I couldn't stop my eyes from filling with tears and my heart from pounding. How had we gotten from that nightmare to the place where I could legally marry my partner? I went into my meeting overwhelmed by the idea.
Notice I didn't say "grateful." Although that feeling kept trying to come to the surface. I didn't want to be grateful for being treated like everyone else. Anymore than I wanted a Black person to feel grateful that they were no longer slaves. These are not equal issues–not by a long shot but the idea of being grateful to a country and culture for treating its citizens like human beings is similarly nauseating. I only felt grateful to all the queer people who had fought for this and felt very conscious that marriage equality was not LGBTQIA equality. This was just a piece of the solution.
But still, it was something to celebrate.
That day I started planning our 30th anniversary/legal wedding day for the following October.
I was previously not a fan of marriage. My first foray into (straight) marriage left me with a bad taste in my mouth and a revulsion of ever being anyone's "wife" again. I felt dissolved into another human being and secondary. Truly secondary. I balked at the invisible restraints. I hated losing my name. A problematic patriarchal inheritance to be sure but replacing that with yet another man's name rankled.
Eventually, I left that union and reclaimed my freedom and my name. I would never change my name again for anyone.
When I fell in love with the Saint, I was comforted in many ways that marriage was not on the table.
Then, the legal limbo of our relationship began to pop up all over the place. Home ownership. Her parental rights with my children. Fear of relatives who might easily and legally override our commitment to each other. Then, the worst: she got breast cancer and my rights in the hospital were suddenly, clearly not equal. I could not do for her what I might have done for my husband. I could not be guaranteed access. I could not legally step in on her behalf. We had to depend on the kindness of strangers in that setting. And they were kind and respectful but that was just our luck. I hated having our relationship hang in that balance.
So, the protections of legal marriage convinced me. And, yes, the ability to stand up in front of my family and friends and declare openly that we were together also held a power and romanticism that I will not deny.
We legally married five years ago this fall. I still consider us to have been married for 35 years--just because the nation had its collective head up its ass doesn't nullify the 30 years of living, working, paying taxes, raising children, etc. together. Our relationship already was and is an amazing thing to celebrate. And now, we have legal standing that makes it that much harder for anyone else to break.
Happy Marriage Equality Day, America.
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