Sep 01 2007
Before God, I declare you Husmand and…
I was married one and a half times. The first lucky lady was Jennifer. We almost went through the whole ceremony but when the time came to kiss the bride, I panicked and ran away. I then jumped off the monkey bars and sprained my ankle. This was witnessed by god for it was done behind St. Patricks on the playground of my Catholic grade school.
The second time was a real marriage when I was 18. By that time I had my fill of the Church and my bride Sinthia had no love of god, so we opted for a civil ceremony. Her Baptist preacher father was quite disappointed. The wedding was, if I may take the liberty, the most unique marriage in the history of Human kind. It was performed on July 4th, in a park, with all the family and friends we could muster. The Justice of the peace came 3 hours late. He forgot about the service because he got hung up at an Irish wake. My Green Beret short fuse father was furious. He denies it, but I remember him waving his .357 Colt Python chrome plated
revolver around telling everyone he was going to blow the head off of that Mick McJP. I just turned up the punk rock music and tried to keep the guests over 80 from dieing in the killer heat. 
But luck is always on my side. The JP finally arrived, drunk, and my dad didn’t kill him. He performed and we only had one hiccup during the ceremony. My step aunt stood up and screamed “louder!” He paused and screamed back that if she couldn’t hear him she should move “closer!” Well, Sin and I kissed and then hopped on a 1976 Honda Super Sport and road away. I’ve been a statistical anomaly from the start. After I graduated from culinary school we moved to Key West and had a gay time. I kept my head under the water killing fish and Sin served fish.
I recently was at the Teamsters Gay Lesbian Bisexual and Transgender Caucus website when I read this odd line, “According to recent statistics, the American gay and lesbian population represents close to a 60 billion travel market We do love to travel! Sadly, a staggering number of hotel workers who served us so well are struggling just to make ends meet. Many of them are members of our own LGBT community…” I wonder if I would be considered a member of the LGBT community? After all, sitting on my porch on Truman ave, I could look across the street at Numbers Gay strip club. My friend talked Sin and I into going there for a drink. The naked guys didn’t bother me because I’m sure their straidar indicated I wasn’t a tipping customer. Though the videos playing on the monitors gave me the he-be-je-bes. At any rate, I was a citizen of one highest per capita gaylebitranian city-states (conk republic) on the planet and I had a difficult time making ends meet serving the LGBT travelers. When I would go snorkeling with one of my gay friends was he a visiting member of my strait community or did I have a gaypass? I don’t know. Nonsexual sexuality communities are very confusing.
Recently Mississippi was declared the fattest state in the union. A whooping 30% of the population are clinically obese. They also recently “passed a constitutional amendment defining marriage as between a man and a woman and refuse to recognize same-sex marriages from other states.” - wiki. I think there might a correlation between the two facts. New Orleans chocolate mayor knows all about the advantage of a two-edged sword. I don’t think that Mississippians are frightened of skinny homosexuals, I think their hate of homos has more to do with the Holy Book. Regardless of whether “gods” scribes got the Manly man in the skies intent correct or not, most Christians and Muslims throughout history have viewed homosexuality as a grotesque crime. It seems a perfectly acceptable position seeing as one of the commandments is to not covet you neighbors wife’s ass, not your neighbors “life partner’s” vibrator. Marriage and religion have been twisted together for many ages.
When a priest or rabbi performs a wedding they become an agent of the state. That is a clear violation of the separation of Church and State and shouldn’t even be debatable. Ironically, nations where homosexuality is punishable by death, most notably Saudi Arabia, The Islamic Republic of Iran and Sudan, marriages aren’t a religious event, they’re a civil contract. The solution to same sex marriage is simple, sanction the term marriage to religion and let it have no secular meaning. When couples go to Church to be wed they do so to have god witness the ceremony (odd for an omnipresent guy). If homosexuals are upset that religious organizations beliefs are unfair and irrational, it’s because they are. Duh. Why would homosexuals want to give their money to an organization that promotes prejudice and prescribed collectivity anyway? Who would have thought that the answer to the problem resides in Secular Heterosexuals taking a hit and giving up the publicly recognized word, marriage. However, anti organized-religion supernaturalists that want to be “married” have the Unitarian Universalist Church, they’ll happily marry anyone in the name of (insert deity of choice here).
When the first church refused to marry my ex and me, I should have given a little more thought to the whole prospect. We were not suited. God knew it. The preacher knew it. I knew it.
If California contributed data for divorce rates, I would be part of the statistics.
My opinion on gay marriage has changed from not giving much of a hoot, to sure why not? Gays should have just as much opportunity to be as miserable as the rest of us.
When I finally got married at 37 I almost had a somewhat superiority complex thinking, here I am married to this religious zealot that has actually made a legal commitment to me. I felt so much more secure than my non married friends…
Yak well that was a short lived stupid dream that became a nightmare. At any rate, most of my gay friends have been together far longer than my straight friends.
When I talk to my gay friends about being allowed to be married the overall thought, especially with lesbians, is that being married makes you more accepted in society. Like a “real couple”; like I thought it was supposed to make me when I got married.
I am quick to tell my friends that are not allowed to legally wed, that being married is not the commitment. The legality of being married is not a commitment.
The legality involves social security, health insurance and legal adoption of children. I think same sex couples should go after the “Legality”.
The Wedding bit is fluff and expensive and does not equate to commitment nor does it make other people respect you more. The only reason same sex couples want to be able to wed is because they can’t legally under the system of things now. Same sex sanctioned weddings aren’t going to make the religous right respest them any more - it just is not about that, unfortunately.
It will take a huge change in the religious system to every let same sex marriage happen: “under god”. Let’s face it, if you believe in god whatever religion you are, same sex marriage is not going to be allowed.
So same sex couples should not blame the government, but religious institutions as these religious institutions’ are who bar them from “church blessed weddings”. I doubt that the government would really have a problem with sanctioning civil unions that give same sex couples the same legal rights as not same sex couples.
Being married is not the commitment; the commitment comes through friendship, attraction and mutual respect for another person. I don’t think the government nor does the belief in god have anything to do with commitment.
Only the two people (or three or four if you are Mormon) can make a true commitment and that is not to god or government, but the commitment you make based on trust to each other.
Just 2 cents…
Your father was a Green-Beret? Interesting, I’m sure you had a very interesting childhood.
As for your post, its interesting that you view that marriage (within the confines of the church) violates the separation of church and state, I never thought of it that way. I think it comes down to how you view marriage. Is marriage a contractual arrangement or some magical thing witnessed by God and a sacrament. I tend to believe the former. Love and loyalty, two intangible ideals are probably the domain of God, and assuming he exist, violation of promises or vows within the confines of “love” and “loyalty” would get you into trouble. Most people in the western world take the attributes of love and loyalty and stick them into marriage. We expect it to be some type of “combo package” in life, while truth is further than that. Hell Rob Zombie dated his wife for 13 years, got married and remains that way. I think he is the ONLY individual in the entertainment industry to actually pull that off.
As for homosexuality and marriage, I don’t see what all the fuss is about. All valid marriage would do is afford homosexuals the same “benefits” IE tax breaks, that other married couples get and probably eventually lead to some more validify to their relationship. I’m sure after a few messy divorces, alimony payments, and division of assets the homosexual community will realize what a mistake they made. People are strange animals in that they build their cages, Nothing to be too concerend about
Any ways I need some information from you, you mentioned in a previous post on my blog about some friend you knew who had his guns confiscated by Blackwater during hurricane Katrina, I would like to ask him some more detailed questions and make a short right, assuming he’s willing to do that for a minute or two. Thanks a lot.