Gay divorce
May. 29th, 2004 08:08 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jere7myA gay friend of mine broke up with his long-term boyfriend a while ago. (He does not read LJ, as far as I know, but if he does: hi, and I hope this doesn't upset you.) They'd been living together for a long time, merged their CD collections, built a life together. When writing about it, he several times referred to the breakup as a "divorce," though they'd never been married.
This jarred. Even though I refer to gay couples in long-term relationships as "married" (if they seem to be), I would never think of that ending as a divorce. To me, marriage is a personal agreement, which may or may not be sanctioned by the state or the church, but divorce is fundamentally legal. It can't be disentangled from the state sanction, because it's the breaking of that sanction, and the legal unpleasantness that comes with it, that makes divorce so difficult. It's the expense of lawyers and the acrimony of court settlement, the picayune unraveling of bureaucratic detail. It's the difference between slapping a masher at a bar and filing against your boss for sexual harassment.
K pointed out, and I agree, that for gay and otherwise unmarried couples there really isn't a word that denotes the breaking of a long-term commitment; our friend, she said, was probably looking for a word that conveys that empty, shattered-life feeling, which "breakup" doesn't. I don't think that divorce is the right replacement, though, unless the marriage is a legal one. Married couples often break up long before the divorce -- they separate, divide their households, sometimes years before the divorce is actually final. Sometimes one partner runs out on the other, fleeing to Iowa, never to be heard from again. That separation is analagous to what happens at the end of a long-term unmarried commitment; the divorce is another thing, running in parallel, which can be awful in its own right.
I've been through two divorces (as an offspring, not a spouse), which probably explains why this twigged me. Even if the marriage is horrible -- even if you're delighted to be leaving this person, looking forward to a life alone, as my mom was after her second marriage -- the legal aspects of the divorce can still suck you down into a bleak morass of depression for months. That's not true if, as far as the state is concerned, you can just walk away.
What do y'all think?
This jarred. Even though I refer to gay couples in long-term relationships as "married" (if they seem to be), I would never think of that ending as a divorce. To me, marriage is a personal agreement, which may or may not be sanctioned by the state or the church, but divorce is fundamentally legal. It can't be disentangled from the state sanction, because it's the breaking of that sanction, and the legal unpleasantness that comes with it, that makes divorce so difficult. It's the expense of lawyers and the acrimony of court settlement, the picayune unraveling of bureaucratic detail. It's the difference between slapping a masher at a bar and filing against your boss for sexual harassment.
K pointed out, and I agree, that for gay and otherwise unmarried couples there really isn't a word that denotes the breaking of a long-term commitment; our friend, she said, was probably looking for a word that conveys that empty, shattered-life feeling, which "breakup" doesn't. I don't think that divorce is the right replacement, though, unless the marriage is a legal one. Married couples often break up long before the divorce -- they separate, divide their households, sometimes years before the divorce is actually final. Sometimes one partner runs out on the other, fleeing to Iowa, never to be heard from again. That separation is analagous to what happens at the end of a long-term unmarried commitment; the divorce is another thing, running in parallel, which can be awful in its own right.
I've been through two divorces (as an offspring, not a spouse), which probably explains why this twigged me. Even if the marriage is horrible -- even if you're delighted to be leaving this person, looking forward to a life alone, as my mom was after her second marriage -- the legal aspects of the divorce can still suck you down into a bleak morass of depression for months. That's not true if, as far as the state is concerned, you can just walk away.
What do y'all think?
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no subject
Date: 2004-05-30 01:59 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-05-30 02:45 am (UTC)It's true that for a (legally) married couple, I would say "they're divorcing" until the judge put his stamp on it, though, while for a non-legally-married couple I would just say "they're divorced" as soon as the breakup occurred. But still, I think the word fits that kind of situation better than anything else our language offers -- just as, during the sharing-CD-collection period, "marriage" fits the relationship much better than "civil union" ever could.
I feel there are holes to be poked in that argument, but I'm a little too tired to defend them pre-emptively now. Feel free to disagree, though, and I'll try to explain myself a bit better in response to whatever you say.
no subject
Date: 2004-05-30 03:17 am (UTC)The other thing is, there are plenty of cultures and countries where marriage isn't sanctioned by the state, and neither is divorce, and yet it still happens, and even more that have had divorce longer than they've had states which recognized it. Our culture really didn't have divorce until fairly recently, which might make it seem like only a state-regulated thing because it has been as long as it's existed, but for some it's been around for thousands of years.
no subject
Date: 2004-05-30 04:03 am (UTC)Um...I think that makes my point for me. Their marriage was nonexistant for 15 years before they got divorced, right? My point is not "divorce is always bad"; my point is "divorce is distinct from the end of a marriage, and has its own characteristics."
The other thing is, there are plenty of cultures and countries where marriage isn't sanctioned by the state, and neither is divorce, and yet it still happens, and even more that have had divorce longer than they've had states which recognized it.
Do they call it "divorce"? (Presumably they don't speak English....) Obviously long-term relationships end in many cultures, with or without marriage; I'm drawing a distinction between the end of a marriage and a divorce. One can happen before the other.
Incidentally, my dictionary lists only legal definitions of divorce.
no subject
Date: 2004-05-30 11:18 am (UTC)Well, sort of. I didn't explain very well -- they pretty much considered themselves divorced the whole time (I didn't learn that they weren't, legally, until it actually happened).
Do they call it "divorce"? (Presumably they don't speak English....) Obviously long-term relationships end in many cultures, with or without marriage; I'm drawing a distinction between the end of a marriage and a divorce. One can happen before the other.
They call it something which is always translated as divorce in English. It is possible that this is a bad translation, but it seems to be a fairly common one, which suggests that the translators, at least, are using divorce to mean something which is not purely legal.
Incidentally, my dictionary lists only legal definitions of divorce.
The OED says: 1. Legal dissolution of marriage by a court or other competent body, or according to forms recognized in the country, nation, or tribe.
Formerly and still often (e.g. historically or anthropologically) used in the widest sense; hence, including the formal putting away of, or separation from, a spouse by a heathen or barbarian; the pronouncing a marriage to have been invalid from the beginning owing to fraud, or to legal, canonical, or physical incapacity of the parties, as in the "divorce" of Henry VIII from Catherine (now called in English Law decree of nullity), and the "divorce a mensa et thoro" (from bed and board), long the only "divorce" recognized by English law, but now, since 1857, called "judicial separation". But, in strict legal use, now applied in English-speaking countries only to the dissolution by decree of court of what was in itself a legal marriage, upon grounds sanctioned by the law, and upon evidence accepted by the court.
So it looks to me like it's kind of both ways -- it's often used strictly legally these days, but it can still be used, especially when talking about other cultures, to mean something which is not legal. To me, it then seems reasonable to extend that meaning to parts of our own culture, but maybe that just doesn't work for you.
no subject
Date: 2004-05-30 11:26 am (UTC)'Divorce', as it turns out, is a medieval word (OED has a fourteenth c. cite, and derives it from medieval Latin divortiare, dissolution of a marriage.
Legal dissolution of marriage by a court or other competent body, or according to forms recognized in the country, nation, or tribe. Formerly and still often (e.g. historically or anthropologically) used in the widest sense; hence, including the formal putting away of, or separation from, a spouse by a heathen or barbarian; the pronouncing a marriage to have been invalid from the beginning owing to fraud, or to legal, canonical, or physical incapacity of the parties, as in the `divorce' of Henry VIII from Catherine (now called in English Law decree of nullity), and the `divorce a mensa et thoro' (from bed and board), long the only `divorce' recognized by English law, but now, since 1857, called `judicial separation'. But, in strict legal use, now applied in English-speaking countries only to the dissolution by decree of court of what was in itself a legal marriage, upon grounds sanctioned by the law, and upon evidence accepted by the court.
As for your question, I agree that part of the definition of marriage is that you can't just walk away from it. In part, that's why I think that legal same-sex marriage - legally recognized and therefore requiring divorce to legally end - is likely to have a major cultural impact. As an example, think of this fellow's life (I'll assume we're thinking of the same guy, but it doesn't matter) if he and his lover had been allowed to legally marry. The question - marry or not - would have come up again and again in their relationship, the reasons why marrying was inadvisable would have put their behaviour patterns into sharp relief, and they might well have addressed those patterns in a very different way (whether they actually married or not). The absence of that option, with all of its legal as well as moral and social ramifications, cut them off even from deciding not to take it.
Anyway, just my thoughts.
,
-Vardibidian (http://www.kith.org/vardibidian/journal/).
no subject
Date: 2004-05-30 01:36 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-06-01 04:02 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-06-03 09:14 pm (UTC)I think it's a complicated question, and the term "divorce" means a lot of different things to different people. (And to answer someone's question, yep, there are plenty of amicable divorces.)
I've always been a little hesitant to use the term "married" to refer to a couple who aren't legally married, even if they would be legally married if the law allowed it. Similarly, "divorce" does sound a little odd to me if the people in question aren't legally married.
On the other hand, I do end up using the term "married" in some such contexts, both because there isn't a better term available that has the right connotations, and because my friends in question use the term themselves.
The only married-but-not-legally-married same-sex couple I know who've ended their non-legal marriage had a hard time deciding what to call it -- "divorce" had much more appropriate connotations than "breakup" or "separation," but they agreed that it sounded a little odd given the lack of legal marriage.
I think I would generally say (regardless of the genders involved) that such an ending is "like a divorce" (much as I sometimes refer to the end of a close friendship as "like a breakup"). But in the absence of any other term with strong enough connotations, I wouldn't be too put off by calling it a divorce.
no subject
Date: 2004-06-09 05:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-06-09 05:56 pm (UTC)I don't think we can say that the legal/beauracratic aspects of a separation have any more or less power to shove one into depression than the absence of one's dear heart (however healthy or un- that relationship may have been). The depression can exist, regardless of the state's take on a situation.
Am I misunderstanding your point?
no subject
Date: 2004-06-10 05:53 am (UTC)I think so. I mean, obviously breakups can make people depressed; I don't think I said otherwise. I was saying that the legal aspects are not dismissable: they can be incredibly hard, even if the actual breakup is joyous. There are no legal issues in gay "divorce". Ergo, if the legal aspects of divorce are significant, as I think they are, then there's a significant difference between a divorce and the breakup of a long-term relationship. Q.E.D.
Anyway, my point was not that divorce can be depressing because of the legal issues; my point was that divorce is the legal issues. An unmarried couple that breaks up, however long they'd been together, can re-constitute their relationship simply by moving back in together; a couple that gets divorced would need to do this extra legal thing to return their relationship to its original state. There's a finality to divorce that is not present in a breakup; it can't be undone through will alone.
Re: ah!
Date: 2004-06-14 12:12 pm (UTC)