Tag: i would like some rights please

i read your tags on one of the marriage equality posts, and if it’s not too rude, i was wondering why you can’t get married?

In brief, because I’m the third member of a triad. 

My girlfriends were legally married – and conceived the Kid – before I entered the scene.  In practice, I am a full partner in the adult relationship(s) and equal parent to the kid, whom all of us refer to as my son (as well as each of theirs).  In legality, I am a freeloading housemate whose only legal relationship to the family is that they get to claim me on their taxes because they supply more than 50% of my support (since I am not currently employed), and a medical consent paper that gives me the right to make decisions for “their” child.

I am on state health insurance (nearly-free, but bare-bones) because they are not allowed to add me to either of their plans.  If we were to break up, I would be ENTIRELY dependent on their goodwill to be able to continue to see my child.  If they were to die, I would be dependent on their parents’ goodwill to get custody of him. (There’s some possibility that I’d get it anyway if it came to a fight, since I’ve lived with him nearly his whole life and could call all kinds of witnesses to the fact that he considers me a mother, but it’s not anything like guaranteed.)   All legal rights I have as a member of the family – to hospital visits, executorship of wills, life insurance payouts, custody of my own damn kid – are the ones they have remembered explicitly to give me, and frankly we don’t have the money at the moment to hire a lawyer to tell us what we might have forgotten.  (Not to mention that I can’t put my savings toward our family debt, because it’s my only guaranteed safety net in the event of an emergency.)

So, yeah.  Intellectually, I’m over the moon about the SCOTUS decision – and even on a personal level, it’s really reassuring to know that there won’t be any kind of legal question about my partners’ marriage once the Girl changes her gender designation legally.  But it’s kind of painful to see (over and over and over) that post about the list of rights guaranteed by marriage that are now available to “everyone” and know I don’t get them yet.  And, like I said, I don’t expect to live to see it.

(ETA, since someone asked:  this is totally rebloggable if you want.)

lettersfromtitan:

Please remember that this fight has been a long one, dating back well over two decades and arguably far longer.

Please remember that one of the impetuses for this fight was the AIDS crisis, which remains not truly over. The still vastly imperfect way health insurance has functioned in this country has been another.

Please recognize that this is one piece in a complex puzzle – when we can die for our country, and when our love can be legally recognized as equal, it gets much harder for rationales for other forms of discrimination (e.g., employment, housing) to hold up.

Please consider that this is not just a victory for LGBTQ Americans, but for all of us, recognizing our worth regardless of the potentials of desire.

Please acknowledge that LGBTQ rights are a global battle, and that people local to each fight know the best ways to fight that fight. Let’s support them however it is most helpful to them to do so.

Please do not consider marriage as a way of erasing the very queerness of LGBTQ culture. Instead, consider the ways we can help queer all marriage, the ways we can help equalize it, by helping to break down gender stereotypes and expectations.

So many people did not get to this finish line today. There are other finish lines that so many more will not see.

Be mindful. Be urgent. And above all, today, be joyful anyway.