I once heard LGBT activist
Dr. Judith Halberstam say during a
lecture how demands for marriage equality are 'a betrayal of the early gay rights movement'. When pressed for a clarification for that comment which had made many audience members nod in disbelief, Dr. Halberstam said that 'marriage as an institution was always defined by its exclusions' and therefore efforts to assimilate into this institution is somehow at odds with what at heart is a movement of inclusion.
While these views were self-admittedly outside the mainstream of LGBT advocacy, they serve as a reminder of a key aspect of marriage, that it has an
institutional besides the
contractual character that is more often emphasized. A marriage is in a sense an establishment, as the phrase 'institution of the family' constantly reminds. A choice of if, when and whom to marry has traditionally been viewed less as an act of 'free expression' and more as an exercise of the
historically more regulated right of 'free association', again out of an implicit recognition of its institutional character.
Therefore an unmistakably 'establishment act' like marriage isn't an intuitively radical act to start with. If marriage is the triumph of hope over experience, a solemnized marriage is also the triumph of an act of abiding citizenship over the radical's discomfort with treating anything as
fait accompli. One's own marriage isn't typically where one is keen on
relaxing all assumptions about relationships.
Even when someone intent upon making a statement through their marriage, this caveat from David Brooks stated
here in another context becomes applicable:
Quote:If you go to Wall Street mostly to make money for charity, you may turn yourself into a machine for the redistribution of wealth...Taking a job just to make money, on the other hand, is probably going to be corrosive, even if you use the money for charity rather than sports cars.
Likewise, making an ideological statement as a consideration of one's marriage to the extent of sometimes being at odds with the deeply personal commitment that underlies marriage, can also be corrosive. To treat marriage as a personal sacrifice for the public good, rather than as a personal choice of willing commitment, has its downsides. Ideological considerations may matter surprisingly little in the cordial conduct of a marriage, which is more subject to such imponderables as the 'compatibility' of
personalities and
preferences. Stated in more next-door terms, "What matters most is mutual love and respect and such jargon as exogamy and endogamy shouldn't come in the way!"
Is any of this an argument against 'exogamy'? Not by any means! It is only a good-natured warning about the flipsides of viewing marriage as a political act. How then, may crossovers be encouraged in an area where adventure is rare? A start maybe made during conversations at a time when marriage is the last thing on one's mind and when revolutionary-seeming possibilities seem more possible to entertain, so that these considerations present themselves unbidden when one is in the thick of things indeed considering marriage. Endogamy or exogamy isn't something to discuss on the eve of a wedding ('arranged' or otherwise) or
when a person is deeply in love, and this means that the discourse is urgent and overdue for beginning now. Of course, as mentioned
here, the following caveats apply:
Quote:Often any intervention we may attempt is circumscribed by notions of 'personal space' and 'civil liberties'. If justifications of unorthodox choices in matters such whom to marry and how to raise one's children, can be provided invoking by civil liberties, then the same liberties can be invoked to justify orthodox choices as well!
Edit 19/08/2013 : Added
video link to Prof. Halberstam's lecture (which became available this weekend)