In my philosophy of sex and love class we had a discussion about why people get married (specifically should homosexual marriage be legal, the consensus was yes) but of course, the conversation got off track.
As the only person engaged in the class (there were married people but the professor for one reason or another didn't want them to engage in this discussion...), she tended to pick on me to justify it.
I first answered why I wanted to get married based on two things: the first is what everyone expected: "I love him, I see a good future together, I want to have a life partner" yada yada yoo. My second reasoning was half expected, I answered because of politics, essentially. It's easier for tax purposes to be married. The main thing I argued was the fact that I found out once my fiance and I get married, that we will both get $2000 more each/year of educational loan funding from our province's program.
Marriage is encouraged. I am not saying get married because quite often people get married without knowing why. I am just saying that politically it makes sense because that is how we are trained to think.
But I know for a sure fact that a marriage license won't change our relationship too much. At one point I used to see it almost as an insurance policy, that we will not leave each other. It will be harder, since divorces are hard to go through rather than just splitting ways, but I still think that a marriage license is that last little thing there that makes you try a little harder to make it work. Notice how I said not to force it to work.
Anyways. Our professor asked the class "Who here is going to get married someday/ wants to?" Almost all of the men actually raised their hands, except 1.5 guys. Only about 1/3 of the female population of the class raised their hands.
What did I expect in a mostly gender studies major class?
Marriage is not death, but it is also not a really necessary thing to achieve in life. My fiance and I are basically married already, to a degree. We live together and share everything and love each other just as much as we would if we were married.
The second question my professor shot at me, specifically this time, was why I was going to change my last name (only about 3/40 students raised their hand saying they would change their last name). Since she knew I was engaged, she asked why. I again, argued something political. I also argued I am not connected to my dad's name. My last name right now is my dad's name. I don't feel like it's mine. Even though my mom has the same last name, I don't feel like it is mine. A lot of people probably do, but I don't. Honestly, if I could have my last name be anything, I would have my fiance and I both change our last names to something new, but I have no idea what and that is not necessarily an idea I see myself following through on. My fiance said he would hyphenate his name with mine, but I would much rather save us both the extra characteristics by just having once last name, his. It's traditional, but fuck, when am I ever traditional? Let me have this one thing!
I feel like everyone in the class thinks I am the stuffiest person ever for getting married so young, and the people who don't think I am think I am too young to be getting married.
But the thing with marriage is even though my fiance and I see each other being together for the rest of our lives, we recognized that people change and maybe someday we would fall apart. You never know what will happen. But what we do know for sure is that we want to be together and we want to try. My point is that if our relationship lasts 5 years, 2 minutes or 50 years, it will be an experience.
I hate when people see a marriage or any event as a waste of time. No, it was a memory and a learning experience. So your 15 year long marriage fell apart? But the first 12 years were amazing? Just because the last 3 sucked does not mean that the last 12 should be discredited.
That is a huge part of your life!
It's hard, I get it. If my fiance dumped me point blank right now, I would fucking hate him for it. I would be so mad, confused and upset. But I wouldn't think the last few years of our lives were useless.
Whatever.
What do you think of marriage?
I think if marriage was no longer a thing, politically, and all marriage certificates were just discredited and marriage became illegal, that that would be fine. A relationship is a relationship. Sue me for going through the motions and wanting that license.
As the only person engaged in the class (there were married people but the professor for one reason or another didn't want them to engage in this discussion...), she tended to pick on me to justify it.
I first answered why I wanted to get married based on two things: the first is what everyone expected: "I love him, I see a good future together, I want to have a life partner" yada yada yoo. My second reasoning was half expected, I answered because of politics, essentially. It's easier for tax purposes to be married. The main thing I argued was the fact that I found out once my fiance and I get married, that we will both get $2000 more each/year of educational loan funding from our province's program.
Marriage is encouraged. I am not saying get married because quite often people get married without knowing why. I am just saying that politically it makes sense because that is how we are trained to think.
But I know for a sure fact that a marriage license won't change our relationship too much. At one point I used to see it almost as an insurance policy, that we will not leave each other. It will be harder, since divorces are hard to go through rather than just splitting ways, but I still think that a marriage license is that last little thing there that makes you try a little harder to make it work. Notice how I said not to force it to work.
Anyways. Our professor asked the class "Who here is going to get married someday/ wants to?" Almost all of the men actually raised their hands, except 1.5 guys. Only about 1/3 of the female population of the class raised their hands.
What did I expect in a mostly gender studies major class?
Marriage is not death, but it is also not a really necessary thing to achieve in life. My fiance and I are basically married already, to a degree. We live together and share everything and love each other just as much as we would if we were married.
The second question my professor shot at me, specifically this time, was why I was going to change my last name (only about 3/40 students raised their hand saying they would change their last name). Since she knew I was engaged, she asked why. I again, argued something political. I also argued I am not connected to my dad's name. My last name right now is my dad's name. I don't feel like it's mine. Even though my mom has the same last name, I don't feel like it is mine. A lot of people probably do, but I don't. Honestly, if I could have my last name be anything, I would have my fiance and I both change our last names to something new, but I have no idea what and that is not necessarily an idea I see myself following through on. My fiance said he would hyphenate his name with mine, but I would much rather save us both the extra characteristics by just having once last name, his. It's traditional, but fuck, when am I ever traditional? Let me have this one thing!
I feel like everyone in the class thinks I am the stuffiest person ever for getting married so young, and the people who don't think I am think I am too young to be getting married.
But the thing with marriage is even though my fiance and I see each other being together for the rest of our lives, we recognized that people change and maybe someday we would fall apart. You never know what will happen. But what we do know for sure is that we want to be together and we want to try. My point is that if our relationship lasts 5 years, 2 minutes or 50 years, it will be an experience.
I hate when people see a marriage or any event as a waste of time. No, it was a memory and a learning experience. So your 15 year long marriage fell apart? But the first 12 years were amazing? Just because the last 3 sucked does not mean that the last 12 should be discredited.
That is a huge part of your life!
It's hard, I get it. If my fiance dumped me point blank right now, I would fucking hate him for it. I would be so mad, confused and upset. But I wouldn't think the last few years of our lives were useless.
Whatever.
What do you think of marriage?
I think if marriage was no longer a thing, politically, and all marriage certificates were just discredited and marriage became illegal, that that would be fine. A relationship is a relationship. Sue me for going through the motions and wanting that license.
