Putting aside the 1,000 plus civil law benefits that attach to marriage under state and federal law, there's another reason that I believe same sex couples want legal marriage rights: to officially mark their relationships. The boyfriend and I have done all the legal paperwork required in a backward state like Virginia to address making medical and financial decisions and to cover inheritance issues. Nonetheless, to the world as a whole, our relationship is still that of legal strangers and I for one want fully legal legitimacy. Part of this is because I believe most couples want their love and relationships recognized. For me, it is also because I know that the only real reason that Christianists and Mormons oppose same sex marriage is because their goal is to de-legitimize gay couples and keep us legally inferior. Indeed, they want to de-legitimize our very humanity. Oh yes, they cite the few lines from the Bible to justify their bigotry, but their total disregard for countless other Bible passages illuminates their disingenuousness. We know quite a few couples who have gone and married in gay friendly states even though their marriages are not recognized in Bible beating Virginia. View it either as a form of protest or and act of affirming your love and relationship. Either way, it's something we may well do sometime soon.*
Yesterday's New York Times ran an article on Mitchell Gold and Tim Scofield's marriage in Iowa. Like the weddings of other gay friends, this marriage struck a cord with me since I met Gold back in 2008 at the LGBT Blogger Summit and have communicated with him since from time to time. I want to congratulate Mitchell and Tim on their marriage and hope they enjoy much happiness together. Here are some Times highlights:
*
WHEN Mitchell Gold, now 59, arrived in Manhattan in 1974, he “was young, fresh out of college and closeted,” he recalled. He took a job selling pillows at Bloomingdale’s, and remembered going out with women and usually finding that “the waiter was more interesting, or her brother.”
*
In the fall of 2006, while he was in Manhattan for an auction of rare stamps, a friend invited him out for cocktails with a group that included Mr. Gold, who was dressed in a black shirt and blue jeans. (In his wardrobe, blue jeans are as ubiquitous as yellow cabs on Fifth Avenue.) Mr. Scofield was awestruck. “I was too shy to look into his eyes,” he recalled.
*
By then, Mr. Gold had broken up with Mr. Williams and expected to be single for the rest of his life. “I’d had one big love and I didn’t think I could find another,” he said.
*
But in Mr. Scofield, he sensed a possibility. He liked his “winsome” quality, and the fact that he seemed knowledgeable about everything from paper-making techniques to the latest legislation on gay marriage. “He was as adorable as can be, but he also had depth,” Mr. Gold said. “It was nice for me to just sit and listen and not have to be the one selling and talking.”
*
Some people would never date a smoker; Mr. Gold said he could never date a clumsy conversationalist. He soon discovered that Mr. Scofield can make conversation with anyone at a party, out of almost nothing, like a chef making a great meal out of leftovers.
*
On June 19, they were married at the Des Moines Art Center in a wedding that was in some ways a celebration of Iowa, one of five states that permit same-sex marriages. As 92 guests, including Mr. Williams, watched, the couple said their vows before Judge Robert B. Hanson of Iowa’s Fifth Judicial District, whose 2007 ruling helped open the door to same-sex marriages in that state.
*
From now on, they will be known as Mr. Gold and Mr. Gold, or the Golds. “I’m changing my name,” Mr. Scofield said. “My grandfather’s name was Goldberg. It’s almost like going back to my roots, in a way. I think it’s very interesting that women are becoming more liberated and keeping their names, whereas gay men are becoming more traditional and changing their names.”
*
Again, congratulations to Mitchell and Tim!!!
*
WHEN Mitchell Gold, now 59, arrived in Manhattan in 1974, he “was young, fresh out of college and closeted,” he recalled. He took a job selling pillows at Bloomingdale’s, and remembered going out with women and usually finding that “the waiter was more interesting, or her brother.”
*
In the fall of 2006, while he was in Manhattan for an auction of rare stamps, a friend invited him out for cocktails with a group that included Mr. Gold, who was dressed in a black shirt and blue jeans. (In his wardrobe, blue jeans are as ubiquitous as yellow cabs on Fifth Avenue.) Mr. Scofield was awestruck. “I was too shy to look into his eyes,” he recalled.
*
By then, Mr. Gold had broken up with Mr. Williams and expected to be single for the rest of his life. “I’d had one big love and I didn’t think I could find another,” he said.
*
But in Mr. Scofield, he sensed a possibility. He liked his “winsome” quality, and the fact that he seemed knowledgeable about everything from paper-making techniques to the latest legislation on gay marriage. “He was as adorable as can be, but he also had depth,” Mr. Gold said. “It was nice for me to just sit and listen and not have to be the one selling and talking.”
*
Some people would never date a smoker; Mr. Gold said he could never date a clumsy conversationalist. He soon discovered that Mr. Scofield can make conversation with anyone at a party, out of almost nothing, like a chef making a great meal out of leftovers.
*
On June 19, they were married at the Des Moines Art Center in a wedding that was in some ways a celebration of Iowa, one of five states that permit same-sex marriages. As 92 guests, including Mr. Williams, watched, the couple said their vows before Judge Robert B. Hanson of Iowa’s Fifth Judicial District, whose 2007 ruling helped open the door to same-sex marriages in that state.
*
From now on, they will be known as Mr. Gold and Mr. Gold, or the Golds. “I’m changing my name,” Mr. Scofield said. “My grandfather’s name was Goldberg. It’s almost like going back to my roots, in a way. I think it’s very interesting that women are becoming more liberated and keeping their names, whereas gay men are becoming more traditional and changing their names.”
*
Again, congratulations to Mitchell and Tim!!!
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