Old people in love!

[layla]

Dawwwwwww ... I have completely forgotten where I ran across this link, but it made my heart go all melty -- two retired ladies, age 83 and 79, tie the knot at last in a nursing home in B.C.

(*Should* it be news? Not really, no, but it's awfully sweet anyway. Behold the scourge that our bold U.S. politicians have decided to protect us from ... old people in love! And while you're at it, just look at the way civilization has completely crumbled in Massachusetts -- oh wait, NO IT HASN'T.)

Comments

[naye]

Awww! That's adorable! ♥ Good for them.

And that second link was interesting reading. Huh. I mean - I'm not surprised that non-hetero marriages do work out, but that they work out so well? Of course, when you have to fight for something that other people can do without even thinking twice about it, you're bound to be pretty motivated.

Thanks for the links!

[laylalawlor.livejournal.com]

Well, it's the divorce rate in Massachusetts in general, not specifically same-sex marriage. But still. It's scary to me how many people in this country seem to honestly believe that granting people the right to marry whom they choose would somehow "destroy" marriage. Despite all statistics to the contrary!

[parisntripfan.livejournal.com]

My thoughts on the subject run along the lines that there is nothing that homosexuals could do to destroy marriage that heterosexuals haven't already done.

[laylalawlor.livejournal.com]

Er, I think I know what you mean, but that comment could be taken any number of ways ...

The thing is, I don't believe marriage is in some kind of decline anyway. Yes, people are waiting and getting married later, and the divorce rate is high. But you know how long the average marriage lasted in the 1800s? Twelve years. Life expectancy was so short. Several of my forebearers, a few generations back, had three and four marriages because they outlived a number of spouses.

The idea that civilization is crumbling because we no longer have this massive societal pressure on teenagers to get married and have babies is ridiculous to me. Who are probably the most powerful promoters of "traditional" marriage in America today? That Mormon splinter sect in Texas that just had their compound raided and their kids taken away. That's the face of what marriage used to be: girls groomed to be good mommies (and nothing else), boys whose main function in life would be to tend their chattel (wives and kids). Words cannot express how much I prefer the modern notion of marriage as a partnership between two equal people (of any gender).