An Adventure in Queer Semantics

I woke up this morning to an epiphany.

Okay, so it was more of a pondering than an epiphany. A 'ponderiphany', if you will. In fact, there's a chance I may be confusing 'epiphany' with 'hangover', but that's not the point. This morning I woke up with a THOUGHT IN MY HEAD. And alcohol in my system. 

(Yes I went out last night. Yes I downed a pint of beer in a vain attempt  to prove to the resident drag queen that I wasn't a straight girl. Yes I may still be drunk. Enough!)

The thought that I woke up with in my head alongside alcohol in my system was this:

I use the term 'gay marriage' to further illustrate the silliness of these people. I am constantly threatening to marry my non-straight male friend; this would constitute a VERY gay marriage, but one which nobody would forcibly disallow. At the same time, not everybody who is in a committed same-sex relationship identifies as gay. Same-sex marriage is a more accurate term, (although still not as encompassing as it could be).

Anyway, I'm deviating. I would be terrible on 'Just a Minute'. Did I mention I have alcohol in my system?

My favourite argument against legalising same-sex marriage is that it would mean 'Redefining Marriage'***. The logical fallacies of this "argument" have been pointed out many times, with the focus mainly on different historical (and ethically dubious) 'definitions' of marriage. My observation is a little more pedantic than that.

The issue with the 'redefining marriage' argument is that it very silly. I would go as far to say that this argument is almost as silly as the silly people who say such silly nonsense.

My issue with the argument is this - how on EARTH can the minor alteration of a definition be horrifying? And when did THAT overtake terrorism, poverty and environmental crises as the scariest eventuality for life on our planet?

I wonder if these same people become as outraged when other words are reinterpreted.

As is inevitable when dealing with something as silly as this, sooner or later we reach the 'slippery slope' argument. If we allow marriage to be redefined, where do we draw the line about changing the meanings of other words? What if all we know about the English language ceases to be true? WHAT IF WE SPEND THE REST OF ETERNITY AS UNWILLING PARTICIPANTS IN 'THE OPPOSITES GAME'?!

In response, I have this to say: if the spontaneous redefinition of words is the worst we have to worry about as a society, then I'd say we're doing alright. It's a minor risk to take when it comes to achieving equal human rights. And it's not as if we're suddenly going to start sponging all the paper lamps, seven spangle, flump?

Tuna Varnish,

BT x

***'Redefining Marriage' - copyright of Right-Wing Bigots Corp.