Married alive

I declare a lack of interest in the Dublin argy-bargy over gay marriage.
I have never understood why people want to get married. I do understand why some choose marriage. Tax reasons, inheritance etc. – conveniences which should be available equally to gay people, straight people, in-between people and outsiders. I sympathise with folk who weaken in face of parental pressure. Or who just want a party.
But what makes so many actually crave the married state?
Most of my own gay associates believe that pushing the demand for gay marriage confirms the nuclear family as the only wholly acceptable model for good living together.
Does the presumption of sexual exclusivity associated with marriage meet the needs and proclivities of gay advocates of marriage? What’s wrong with polyamory? Or with solo living and/or celibacy? Why should people who live together in a sexual relationship have privileges over those who prefer to live otherwise?
In one perspective, legalising gay marriage would represent a forward shift in society’s thinking. But in another perspective, it would be a slide back towards traditional morality.
The main commercial beneficiaries of same-sex marriage in Massachusetts have been traditional florists, caterers, fashion-houses, photographers, limousine companies and gift-list emporia. As the fashion for glitzy no-expense-spared marriage celebration fades in the straight community (in Massachusetts, anyway) gays have seemingly stepped forward to save the day for ancillary industries dependent on people pledging to love, honour, etc. until death or divorce do them part.
There’s another thing. Gay marriage today means gay divorce tomorrow. Gimlet-eyed lawyers of all sexual orientations are even now gathered in the wings clutching pre-nups and alimony precedents.
All who fancy being married should be given every facility. But should they also be given rights denied the rest of us? Why shouldn’t every citizen be allowed to assign inheritance rights, make joint tax returns, etc. with whomever they choose?
Legalising gay marriage would end one discrimination but leave the fundamental inequality – the dependence of certain civil rights on State-recognised relationships – intact.
Gay marriage for all who want it, yes. But in the context of equal rights for the rest of us too.
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Lance Armstrong has been asked to lead a contingent of “critical mass bikers and anti-war couriers” on a troops-out demonstration in Washington D.C. on September 24th.
It may come as a surprise that the cancer-surviving cyclist has views on Iraq. His triumph in taking his seventh-in-a-row Tour de France made all the main news bulletins on July 24th. But none I heard mentioned the war.
Asked his opinion as he came down from the podium on the Champs Elysee Armstrong replied: “The biggest downside to the war in Iraq is what you could do with that money. What does the war in Iraq cost a week? A billion? Maybe a billion a day? The budget for the National Cancer Institute is four billion. That has to change.”
It ought to have made his views even more newsworthy that Armstrong has long been seen as a personal ally of fellow Texan Dubya Bush.
His statement last month represented a hardening of attitude. Following his 2003 victory in the aftermath of the invasion, Armstrong had taken the anti-war side – but softly. “I know George Bush well, and I support him. But going ahead with this war…would be dangerous without the backing of the United Nations and Europe.”
Last year, he made much the same pitch. “George Bush is a friend of mine and just as I say it to you, I’d say to him, ‘Mr. President, I’m not sure this war was such a good idea’.”
What’s prompted his tougher line now?
Maybe he has political ambitions in retirement and can see what way the wind is blowing.
Maybe a genuine liberalism – in the US sense – has come to the fore. In another recent interview, Armstrong described himself as “against mixing up State and Church, not keen on guns (and) pro a woman’s right to choose.”
It could be it’s the influence of his partner Sheryl Crow, a leader of Musicians Win Without War and singer of the brilliant anti-war anthem, ‘Soak Up The Sun’.
And it could also be that he’s just had it up to here with seeing all the effort he’s put into fund-raising for cancer research and care being set at naught by the war. Says Dave Zirin on Counterpunch.com: “There is no more money for cancer research because of the war. It’s that simple. It’s also not just cancer. In my hometown of Washington, DC, this $800 billion price tag (on the war) means high rates of infant mortality, shuttered public hospitals, and schools in a constant and eternal state of crisis. This is a battle for priorities.”
Lance has earned the love, and a long life. We’ll all live longer and stronger with him if he wheels into Pennsylvania Avenue on September 24th, pedalling for peace.
We’ll be peddling peace at Shannon the same weekend. Once more, see you there.
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One reason many of us have recently been dismayed at the unadventurous role of rock stars in relation to war and world hunger is that, in the rowdy days of its youth, rock operated to agitate contentment. It split age and interest groups, was dynamic, dialectic, daunting, dangerous. The reason the devil has all the best tunes is that God’s a reactionary bore. Now the big-brand acts sing songs of praise to the power.
But not all, not always, not everywhere.
There’s bands like Civilian, made from genuine teenagers who don’t know any worse. You got to be taught to prostrate.
There’s rock super-heroines like non-pareil Ani.
And simmering subversives like poetical Marc Carroll.
And the utterly fascinating Ms. Dynamite who, asked last month about immigration to Britain, replied: “This whole country is built on what was stolen from the rest of the world.”
And there’s the American Federation of Musicians, which has just resolved:
“WHEREAS, there is general agreement in the United States and throughout the world that Iraq did not have weapons of mass destruction that posed an imminent threat to this country or to Iraq’s neighbors, and that the government of Iraq had few, if any, discernible ties to those who perpetrated the 9/11 attacks; and
“WHEREAS the war and military occupation of Iraq have cost the lives of over 1500 US troops, the wounding and disabling of thousands more, and deaths by some estimates of over 150,000 Iraqi civilians, casualties among soldiers of other nations, and the devastation of much of that country; and
“WHEREAS the Bush administration, through its wholly-controlled Coalition Provisional Authority, has left in place the anti-labor laws of the Hussein regime, thereby inflicting great harm on our brother and sister trade unionists in Iraq; and
“WHEREAS musicians and other artists have historically been among the strongest defenders of peace, justice and equality...
“THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the 96th International Convention of the American Federation of Musicians calls on President Bush and Congress to bring our troops home from Iraq as expeditiously as possible…”
Seconded.