The Definition of Marriage

In his book "The Future of Marriage," David Blankenhorn devotes an entire chapter (pp. 91 to 125) to the definition of marriage. He traces the history of marriage, the biology of marriage, different forms of marriage in different cultures, and focuses on fatherhood as the core meaning, or definition. Even so, I don't have the sense that he's entirely satisfied with his definition. It's terribly ironic, because there is a simple definition that has been written down for millennia, which really sums it up. That definition is found at the very beginning of the Bible, Genesis 2:24: "Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh."

I always read this as meaning that they become one in sexual intercourse. But that's not what it means. You can have sex and not be married. It happens all the time. For that matter, you can be married in the physical, social, legal sense of the word, and not be married in the spiritual relationship that it is.

The key point, the crucial word, in this simple definition is "one." "They shall be one."

Marriage is a spiritual relationship, not a physical one – though it does have a physical component, which is embodied in the sexual relationship, but which is probably not necessary to consummate in order for the marriage to occur. In fact, marriage is probably the spiritual meaning or embodiment of sex, but that spiritual relationship is not contingent on ceremonies or legal documents or property exchange, or even a vow. It is an aspect of family, but family is more inclusive. Children are an aspect of it, but they are not necessary to it. Some "marriage defenders" put "responsible procreation" only within the boundaries of marriage, and in the spiritual aspect of it, I think they are right.

The problem is that Blankenhorn and other "marriage defenders" have limited the definition of marriage to the physical, social, and legal sense of the word. They have mistaken the finger pointing at the moon for the moon itself.

Notice the simple phrases that make up that one sentence definition. "A man [shall] leave his father and mother." A child, growing up, separates from his nuclear family, from the unity to which his mother and father belong. "…and shall cleave unto his wife." I emphasize "and" because it's not enough to separate from mom and dad. The adult child must also form a new relationship, which has a sexual connection or aspect – what Blankenhorn calls "pair bonding." "… and they shall be one flesh." Again the emphasis on "and," simply because there is no way to separate the two aspects. The "one flesh" is spiritual unity. By pair bonding in this way, those two people literally become one unit. That unit is marriage. It's like an molecule of water – atoms of hydrogen and oxygen bond to create a new element. And, like water, that element can be re-divided into its individual parts; but when that re-division happens, the element no longer exists. (That is divorce. And that spiritual divorce can happen with or without dissolving the physical-social-legal aspect of marriage.)

That spiritual unity, whole unto itself, is basic to humanity. It is part of our spiritual biology. Growing within it is the spiritual and emotional birthright of children, and that birthright should never be intentionally taken away.

In this, the "marriage defenders" are absolutely correct.

But what "marriage defenders" don't understand, is that the physical form of marriage is only the physical manifestation of a spiritual entity. The social institution of marriage, in whatever form it is manifested in the different cultures of the world – patriarchal, matrilineal, whatever – is how society honors, acknowledges, and recognizes this spiritual entity and unity. The form doesn't matter. And while the social institution of marriage is important in honoring and sanctifying the spiritual entity of marriage, in supporting the child and the child-rearing unit, it is not vital to it. Marriage will continue whether it is recognized by society or not, because it is at heart the joining of two individuals into one unit – and it is inherent to our species.

What they further don't understand is that gender is not a defining aspect of it. That sexual-spiritual unity exists among gay and lesbian relationships, and in my experience as a witness, is very common to those same-sex relationships. In other words, like it or not, gays and lesbians do marry, in the basic, spiritual-physical aspect that is the genuine entity of marriage – literally, the marriage of the Bible. The Bible puts it in terms of man and woman for good reason; by far the most common marriage relationship is between a man and a woman, and that is the form of the marriage relationship that produces children entirely within itself, and until the recent advent of IVF gestation and surrogate motherhood, the only way children were brought into being inside a married, family-childrearing unit.

So the first question we must ask in the marriage debate is whether we are going to define marriage as a purely physical relationship, or as the spiritual relationship it is. The health of the social institution of marriage is directly proportional to society's value and recognition of the spiritual entity of marriage.

The second question in the marriage debate is whether we as a society are going to find a way to honor those relationships between same-sex partners with a social institution, or whether we will continue to throw gay and lesbian families – gay and lesbian marriages, and their children – under the bus.

Then lets talk about how, within that framework, we are going to ensure that every child possible is raised with the birthrights of both family-childrearing unit and biological heritage intact.

Pokemon

Lately my kids have gotten interested (I refuse to use the word "obsessed") with Pokemon cards. They bought some, then traded with a neighbor for more, and in only a week or two have accumulated a pack of about a hundred cards, which they play with frequently. They're so enthusiastic they managed to talk me into a game, and taught me how to play. They even checked a Pokemon comic book out from the library.

I wish I could be more enthusiastic, but the game left me cold. At first glance, it seems too ambiguous. (Funny for me, the queen of ambiguity!) Or maybe just arbitrary. Or I have trouble discerning the pattern of it, which I find disturbing. But I think most of all it's the level of implied violence.

This came into much clearer focus when I read the comic to them. The premise was that a strong criminal was stealing Pokemon from a group of peaceful kids, led by an old man, who kept their Pokemon from battle. The peaceful Pokemon thus could not evolve, and the peaceful peopole were helpless victims of violence. A kid who got his Pokemon into frequent battles comes along, and through a series of adventures nearly gets killed, and his Pokemon nearly gets killed with him. But this level of violence stimulates the kid's Pokemon to "evolve" to a bigger, badder, more violent … creature. The Pokemon saves the kid's life, and together they go back and kill the strongman and his Pokemon.

It is this concept that violence is necessary for improvement, and that the most violent, brutal creature is the most evolved creature, that I find so disturbing. From my own Christian background, raised to emulate the peaceful example of Jesus, to my deep admiration for Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, and Julia Butterfly Hill, to my current nonreligious spiritual efforts and imperfect study of Nonviolent Communication, this is antithetical to every value I hold dear, and to my own concept and philosophy of what is useful and healthy in life. When I see the concept of violence embodied in Pokemon, I fear that the generation of children we are raising will be unduly influenced toward the habits, philosophies, and mindsets that that have caused so much grief and pain in our world.

It is a test of faith, I suppose. I'm not willing to tell my kids they can't have them. The need for choice is too strong, and I would rather risk the influence of this insidious philosophy than provide an example of violent force by taking it away from them. I find instead, that I must trust – not only them, but the parenting that Kristin and I provide, and the Universal Love that inspires every human heart. I must trust that, given the example and comparison of these competing philosophies – that the most violent is the most evolved vs. that the most nonviolent is the most evolved – my children will choose the path that I hold dear. And if they don't, at least I have given them the freedom to make that choice.

I think they will make the choice I would prefer, ultimately. They're aware that Pokemon is a game, and that even the comic book is just fantasy, albeit a fantasy that I find profoundly disturbing and abhorrent. In the atmosphere of this family, and the unconditional love that nature and their parents provide, they are thriving.

But I'm not going to read that comic book again.

More on Marriage…

But not here. I've moved that discussion over to Culture Pax. This is my personal blog, and I'm going to try to keep it more on a personal basis for awhile, though of course, being the political person I am, I'll certainly post my opinions here. Just don't ask me for news. I've got no more news than Fox (Faux) News does. My opinions do align, however, far more with reality than theirs.

Joy

I am so happy today! What a magnificent event - to see Barak Obama take over residence in the White House. It's so refreshing to have an articulate president. And somehow he actually makes you believe, when he speaks!



There is hope. Our long national nightmare is over, and, for the first time in years, I feel proud to be an American.

Inauguration Day!

Goodbye, George! Don't let the door smack you on the butt on the way out!

Good morning, HOPE!

May this day open a new era in our American story. And may Barack Obama be blessed with the wisdom to guide our nation out of the dark morass of disgrace, dissolution, depravity, and depression that the former occupant of the White House guided us into.

Gender Identity

This is based on a comment from Chairm, in my discussion with Jose at Opine:

Gender is a lot more than a social assumption. This is the same mistake many feminists make in their effort to break free of the restrictive gender roles of our patriarchal culture – they mistake gender roles for gender (or vice versa). Gender is our subjective, "sexual Self-Map, how we feel ourselves to be: male or female." (Bushong) "Like pain, it is unambiguously felt but one is unable to prove or display it to others. One's subjective gender is just as real and immalleable as one's physical gender but unfortunately not recognized in our culture."

So while it is true that I am not a genetic woman, and cannot share the complete experience of what that means (as far as the physical, embodied experience of living in a female body, and also as far as socialization from birth), it is at least as true to say I am a woman as it is to say I am a man. Probably more so, because gender identity certainly appears to be more immalleable than physical bodies.

In the same way, can you say whether an intersexed person is a man or a woman? Their bodies are ambiguous; so my gender is ambiguous. I'm neither man nor woman, but transwoman – some of both. I choose to live as a woman because it's a lot more comfortable. And that's not a bad thing, even though our culture works hard to make it so. It just is. It's beautiful in its own right. Between day and night is the beauty of twilight.

Gender is not plastic, but gender roles are. Gender roles are defined and delineated by culture and society, and they change over time and from place to place, culture to culture. When I speak of living in the role of a woman, I'm speaking of sharing that gender role with other women in our culture.

Given our culture and the discrepancy between sex and gender (or physical gender and gender identity), one of the biggest challenges faced by transpeople is integrating mind and body. Certainly that's been one of the hardest things I've tried to do, but, thankfully, I have had some success with it. I've still got plenty of room to grow there, but it is, I think, an important – maybe the most important – aspect of the peace that fills my life. I believe that there is a Universal Being (usually called God) which creates us all – Life, Love, Mind. Which means that I have a purpose in being a female person in a male body. That purpose is to love, but it must also be more – perhaps to demonstrate the integration of male and female aspects in the fullness of humanity, I don't know. Or maybe it's just a cozmic joke. :-)

Culture Pax

I have a new project in the works. It's a second blog, called Culture Pax. I intend to move my political diatribes over there, including my discussion on marriage equality.

The blog is not completely set up yet, and I'm not sure exactly when it will happen, but I hope very soon. My intent is that it will be a forum where people in this country can discuss controversial subjects in a way that is safe for both sides, even when emotions grow heated. My hope is that people on different sides of issues such as same-sex marriage, abortion, climate change, and just about anything else will receive empathy and learn to advocate for their side in a way that both ensures their needs will be honored, and that honors the needs of others who disagree.

With that in mind, I'm hoping to develop a team of people who are skilled in Nonviolent Communication (or some similar system or non-system of communication) and in giving empathy, who will share in the creation and support of this blog. I'm looking for team members, and guest contributors, and have three others who are willing to start.

All right, I'm going to stick my neck out. Here's the link to Culture Pax. Don't expect too much to begin with. I'm just starting, and this site is truly under construction!

Blessings to all-

OFNR

If y'all are bored with my conversation with Jose, please let me know, and I'll stop re-posting stuff over here. Meanwhile, while he's thinking about my last post (and perhaps trolling the internet for information to refute the study I cited), I brought up NVC:

"As an aside, while you catch up with your deadlines or whatever you’re doing, I decided to go back to something you said in the comment dated 1/10/09:"

Let me say Seda that when I first read your comments you sounded like a man trying to sound feminine. The comments sounded affected. All that schmaltz didn't sound real to me. It was as if you thought women were immersed in fuzzy-feely expressions and therefore you had to express yourself that way. You were forever reveling in your feelings and even now you are immersed in your sadness which is probably more related to feigning offense because I do not accept your illusion of what you are. Like so many men who imagine themselves women it sounded like a caricature of femininity.

"I found your comment rather ironic, as my frequent references to feelings (especially when I first began to comment on your blog, was my attempt to use Nonviolent Communication (NVC) to connect with y’all. NVC was developed by Marshall Rosenberg, a cisgendered man who’s been married for probably 50 years at least, as a means to connect with people to resolve conflicts by relating to feelings and needs, rather than speaking in judgments and evaluations. Believe it or not, it works – at least, most of the time. :-) In the jargon, there’s something called OFNR – “observation, feeling, need, request.” The idea is to make a clear, concrete observation, then relate it to a feeling (emotion) you have or you guess the other has. Needs, in this case, are universal. You then connect the feeling to the need unmet that stimulated the feeling. At the end, you make a clear, doable request that the person can act on immediately. Example: “When you scream at me, I feel scared, because I have needs for safety and respect that aren’t met. Would you be willing to step out of the room until you calm down?” The website for the Center for Nonviolent Communication is www.cnvc.org; for more specific info on OFNR, try http://www.cnvc.org/en/what-nvc/nvc-model/2-parts-and-4-components-nvc.

"If you look back at my early comments, you’ll probably notice I wasn’t too hung up on the exact form of OFNR. The real idea is to connect – which, mostly, I didn’t do with y’all as much as I would like, though I think I did connect a little bit a few times. You probably will notice, though, quite a few feelings being linked to needs. What I find ironic about this, is that you immediately thought my use of OFNR sounded “like a man trying to sound feminine.” It “sounded like a caricature of femininity.” Yet I was making absolutely no effort to speak in any gendered way at all – I was using a discrete system of communication developed by a cisgendered man!"

(Actually, the example I used wasn't that great, since 'scream' could easily be considered an evaluation.)

Be that as it may Seda, you thereby affirm that my observation of it being contrived and affected is correct. I mentioned that this was simply a subjective conjecture. You may still subconsciously approach this as being a suave "feminine" form of expression but we need not labor the point.

"Jose, The point of NVC is to communicate with another person in a way that conveys respect and honors their humanity. I would really enjoy it if anyone from Opine tried to communicate that way with me - no matter how "contrived" it might sound.

"And no, I don't use NVC, and especially OFNR (which, as you point out, often sounds contrived), to sound "feminine," I use it because I don't know a better method of connecting in a way that conveys the respect and love I want to convey, while also honoring and respecting myself."

Also, BTW, if anyone familiar with it wants to critique my description and use of NVC here, please do!