I’ve often remarked, about male friends of mine with whom I share deep emotional bonds, that I would happily “gay-marry” them.  Some people take this statement for what it is: an act that, in a way that sex and reproduction only manage to celebrate, amounts to the magic of two individuals becoming one, that I and this or that friend are “like this,” just on that level.  In comparison, I’m extremely sparing with such words for any of my female friends, precisely because I respect them too much, to assume that much knowledge of our possible emotional compatibility (note for the nitpicky: this is not to imply that difference in physical sex or gender identity implies obstacles to emotional connection, but rather that the passion and mystery of romance in any form comes from the diverse inner conflicts which sex can bring to a relationship).

That said, I’m not being flip about the beauty and sanctity of a thing like gay marriage, just because I have no substantial romantic feelings for these men. I’m describing an ideal state where cohabitation is effortless, harmonious and generative, where people’s needs are compatible because they’re essentially the same,  (again, not to imply that the experience of all homosexuals is somehow a narcissistic cop-out like my own affection for my familiars, highlighting rather that these friends of mine and I have no “growing into each other” left to do).  That said, I have no experience of the very real struggles of those involved in romantic relationships which could only flourish naturally under the institution of gay marriage, legally prohibited in a shocking majority of 32 states.

There may be some who share my understanding first stated above, of the beauty and mystery preserved in the hallowed institution of Traditional Marriage, who feel altogether threatened by this kind of talk. By way of a clarification of terms, I think we can bring these opponents of gay marriage into the fold and achieve some mutual understanding. There appears to be a serious misunderstanding among some valiant defenders of Traditional Marriage, about what exactly happens when any two people who are not, strictly speaking, one man and one woman, engage in the apotheosis of mutual boundary dissolution which is so reliably facilitated by sacred cohabitation. That is to say, the experience of ritual union is completely the same. The perceived depravity of a sex act which is not reproductive is not a legitimate fear on the part of this particular brand of conservatives. It holds up to be no more than a straw man when we recognize the motivation behind this fear could not possibly be disgust. Dominion over nature implies all variety of “unnatural” modifications, however slight, to the “natural order” of which human sexual reproduction makes a comparatively small part. Not only then, do reproductive choices on the part of humans fall effectively outside of the umbrella of the evaluation of “nature” and its “order” distinct from society (a distinction fondly maintained by this same line of thinking), but when we see the natural occurrence of homosexuality throughout the animal kingdom, the entire pretense to an essential, natural-moral disgust which runs any deeper than a fear which must be socially ingrained, falls apart completely.

The problem, as I see it, lies elsewhere, and has its origins in a fundamental misunderstanding. There is the spiritual union which occurs between two individuals, and the biological. The sex act is a physical image, of an essential merging which takes place outside of space and time. By the same token, the production of another human organism, a miracle of nature as it may be, is still a miracle of nature, the most elaborate allegory in the entire created universe for what is produced, on a spiritual plane, when two individuals come together. Moreover, neither physical image, when mechanically reproduced, is a guarantee of these special effects. When these effects do occur, they can result in (appear to the slow-witted, to stem from) prolonged physical contact and mutual stimulation; forms of ritual union, however, exist as a social sanctuary for individuals who are compelled, through a constant recapitulation of these genuine spiritual connections, to pursue their physical expressions to their logical conclusion.

The institution of Traditional Marriage, writ large, is defined by the loudest and therefore unsurpassed participants in the conversation today, as the union between one man and one woman. Radical proponents of this definition, however, have come under the impression that the mechanical reproduction of past instances which served as evidence of spiritual unity are not only necessary, but sufficient to bring about that unity. They see the institution of Traditional Marriage as the sole bastion and refuge of the secret to human happiness and inner freedom available to more than one person at once, in danger of contamination and being lost to history. There is a way in which they are mistaken, and a sense in which they are entirely correct. My reasoning follows:

• Spiritual unification of at least two individuals is not only possible and desirable, but a moral imperative
• Myriad forms of ritual practice have served to facilitate this throughout human history.
• Fear threatens to tear people up on the inside; social institutions arise to ensure that it does so mostly on the outside; all to often, they tend to separate people from one another in the misguided fear of forcing an individual to face fear themselves (to recognize as only a threat, and nothing more without an individual’s participation in it).
• The institution of Traditional Marriage has evolved around a complex historical network of socially ingrained fears in a valiant attempt to project them back into society, out of the fear that they may ultimately make unity  impossible (again conceiving individuals as non-agents on a double level, first assuming their inherent total susceptibility to fear, while also summarily attributing their spiritual unity to heterosexual reproductive union in faux-causal succession).
• The institution of gay marriage, which some argue to be an offshoot of Christian monastic orders, (and unthinkably efficient when held to the standard of other esoteric orders, having survived and perhaps thrived, prior to our modern knowledge of its existence, perhaps in excess of a millennium in total secrecy, at least to the historical record) co-evolved with the institution of marriage as a fundamentally heterogeneous set of practices of spiritual unification in direct response to what certain individuals perceived to be unhealthy fixation on heterosexual reproduction becoming increasingly inhospitable to their existence as a category comprising one-tenth of the human population.

So we see, that the institution of marriage does not function in any exclusive way to facilitate the spiritual fulfillment of more than one person at a time. It exists precisely in distinction from other forms of union to allay the fears of individuals, who perceive those other forms of union as a threat.

Now this is all very complex stuff, so any radical camps in the debate, whether they want to destroy this last lifeline for the above-mentioned small populations of neurotics, or are just such neurotics, should be forgiven for any misunderstandings that have come about in our collective attempt to hash all this out. That said, I also think I may just be able to proffer up a few words that will clarify this whole matter once and for all.

The institution of Traditional Marriage exists first to preserve the happiness of a few very frightened individuals by strictly defining the terms by which, second, it helps certain individuals (certainly the ones with heavily preconceived notions about how such a thing is possible) become one. The institution of gay marriage exists as a completely separate institution to accommodate individuals excluded from the institution of Traditional Marriage. Much in the same fashion as Narcotics Anonymous was founded upon Alcoholics Anonymous’ core principles and 12 Steps due to the social unacceptability of heroin use compared to that of alcohol, gay marriage exists as completely distinct from marriage (depending on one’s acceptance of the exclusive truth claims of AA or marriage enthusiasts, this analogy holds varying amounts of water); though serving a similar purpose, and modeled upon Marriage, it serves a group of individuals whose identities do not revolve around the rejection of lifestyles unlike their own, and thus should be afforded equal dignity under the law and in public opinion.

As a point of clarification, this post originated as an attempt to explain to some raised eyebrows my repeated use of the verb “Gay-marry” (as opposed to just marry) to describe what I could totally do to Gabe. There’s no intolerance on my part in insisting that the distinction from Traditional Marriage be preserved; it is firmly my belief that, for the sake of clarity, any ritual union seeking, under ethically legitimate pretense, legal privilege, which does not befall one man and one woman, be heretofore referred to correctly as gay marriage. It is a separate institution of equal stature with equal dignity and equal promise to enrich the lives of a group of individuals who, as long as the institution of Traditional Marriage continues to retain political clout like a swollen joint, will be tragically perceived in however limited, conditional, or even empathetic public aspect, as separate from society.