I have spoken with some radically religious people who insist “a man can’t have a husband” or “a girl (sic) can’t have a wife.” However, I’ve been calling my sister’s partner “her wife” for decades, and around such people I now say “her legally wedded wife.”
OTHO, when a man on my cashier line told the obviously Orthodox Jewish woman behind him “I’m sorry. My husband had to go out to the car to get our card” she did not look horrified or go into spasms over it. Her only words were “That’s all right.” It made me feel good and I told her so.
So, how do you feel about having a man say “my husband” or a woman say “my wife”?
While it is a perfectly reasonable locution, I find it just slightly jarring to hear, probably because of its novelty. I assume that, as the phrase becomes more common, I will lose the slight double-take I do when I hear it.
I can understand if people find it… unusual. Heck, I’m a gay woman with a legal wife myself, and it’s taken ME some time to get used to wrapping my tongue around it and to get over of the impulse to call her my ‘partner’… But I do think it’s something people will rapidly get used to.
+1 coupled with a momentary flash of confusion and shame. This is not something that should be noteworthy. For right now though, it is. My brain pauses for a beat while internally I think “wait…what?”. I’m glad that I’m hearing it openly and sorry for my instinctive reaction.
Yeah really, I expect it will sound “unusual” for a little while longer like any change in language usage, but it will soon enough become routine. Not something I’ll make myself anxious about.
I don’t have a problem with gay people or them getting married but hearing it said does cause a little stutter in my brain or something, it kind of makes me roll my eyes on the inside for just a second because it sounds incorrect or silly to my ears to hear or read, I think it’s just because it sounds wrong to my ears or some reason and I have to reprocess what I just heard, it’s probably just growing up when that was not a common thing to hear.
Hard to remember because it never really affected me directly but it was probably jarring at first. Now it feels normal and causes less confusion. If someone says boyfriend/girlfriend I understand the level of relationship. If someone says husband/wife I understand. If someone uses partner then i have questions.
Agreed. I have struggled with saying “my husband” to people I don’t know, it’s like someone said in the “gay pride” thread, it feels like coming out all over again. As it happens, I was already 20 when Stonewall happened, so I had already thoroughly internalized all the shame and stigma. That stuff has deep roots and is hard to dig out.
That’s why I don’t mind so much if people have an initial reaction, or if they assume when they know I’m married that I have a wife instead of a husband. No-one has ever said anything unpleasant to my face about it, and that’s enough for me for now.
I was with a lesbian couple at their swap meet booth a few years back, and when April introduced Janice as her wife to a woman browsing the wares the woman responded “You can’t really be married, you know”.
April responded, “I am so sorry if I offended you. I meant to say this is Janice, my fuckmate”.
Yes, there is a quarter-second or so of mental re-adjustment. Not exactly outrage, just “Oh, that’s what he means”. I don’t react that way when they say “partner” - not sure why.
About time. For a while I was supposed to call my wife my partner because to call her my wife would be lording it over people who were not allowed to marry. I didn’t want to offend anyone but I’m too old for that shit and can’t learn anything new.
Yeah, pretty much this. While I may not (yet?) be entirely comfortable with it, that’s on me.
I get the impression that at least some such people think of “husband” and “wife” as separate but complementary roles, like mortar and pestle, or nut and bolt; and that part of their opposition to same-sex marriage comes from their inability to make sense of a coupling with two of one thing and none of the other, like two nuts with no bolt, or two mortars with no pestle.
Yes, I am so using that line the next time a rah-rah says “Your sister can’t have a wife.” And I’m giving the line to her because I know her [del]wife[/del] fuckmate will want to use it.
I always found the terms quaint and peculiar when used by heterosexual couples, so I was already resisting a minor flinch before gay and lesbian folks began using them. If anything, I think their use of it may be defusing the terms for me somewhat.
Yes, pretty much exactly that. After aeons of husband/wife having a very strict definition and usage plus the rarity of actually hearing it used in a new context, it is bound to take a period for it to become the new normal.
But of course I’m fine with it, what the heck else are you supposed to call your legally-approved husband or wife?
