Civil Partnership. As defined by Google it is a ‘legally recognized union of a same-sex couple, with rights similar to those of marriage.’
Although it seems this will not be true for much longer.
As of today, London couple Rebecca Steinfeld (35) and Charles Keidan (40) saw their appeal for heterosexual couples to enter into civil partnerships overruled by the Court. Being far from defeated, however, the two have claimed that there is still “everything to fight for”, and are determined to take their case to the Supreme Court, the most powerful and influential court in Britain, shortly. What’s more, this declaration has been hugely supported, and looks as though it will be handled with great success, with the case being lost by “the narrowest of margins”, as according to the BBC legal affairs correspondent, Clive Coleman, and Steinfeld herself affirming the fact that “all three (of the Judges) emphasised that the Government cannot maintain the status quo (of civil partnerships) for much longer”.
The couple began their fight to receive a civil partnership in 2014, three years ago, when their attempt was rejected by a registrar. Since then they have persisted with their cause, raking up over 70,000 signatures on their ‘Change.org’ petition. Steinfeld and Keidan’s desire for such a union was formed due to their opinion that a traditional marriage was not a process which they believed suited them as a couple, however, the birth of their now three-year-old daughter, acted as a catalyst to create a relationship that was legally recognised by the state.
The outvote of the case, however, has sparked much controversy in the country, making breaking news this afternoon, with several protestations that the outcome was discriminatory, Steinfeld noting in her speech that they “were being treated differently because of (their) sexual orientation”, alongside claims of human rights violations, with campaigner Peter Tatchell calling the ruling “a defeat for love and equality”.
There are so many issues with this entire scenario that make bisexual blood boil, starting with the accusations of inequality and human rights violations. It seems so innately ignorant to me that this could be even considered as fact. For want of a better term, in my opinion, it was a reach. It was a reach for oppression, for a straight couple to seem as if they have if so much worse than the LGBT+ community, as if we are somehow oppressing them. In fact, Mr Tatchell himself has been quoted as saying:
“It cannot be right that lesbian and gay couples have two options, civil partnership and civil marriage; whereas opposite-sex partners have only one option, marriage”.
It is almost as if we are not allowed anything. For a start, same-sex marriage was only legalized in 2014, a full decade after the creation of civil partnerships in the UK, pitiful in comparison to straight marriage, a practice that has been around since Adam and Eve, and talking snakes. Going even further back, being gay was illegal in this country up until just 50 years ago: criminalized existence is something that straight people have never had to deal with.
Even just looking at the formation of civil partnership, you can see inequality. Civil partnerships weren’t created in order to oppress straight people, but because gay people weren’t deserving enough of marriage. Sure, there was a fight for marriage reform, and yes it was an improvement, but when all is said and done, in the eyes of the government, we weren’t seen to have a right to marriage. We weren’t seen as right for marriage. We were sinners, d*kes, against religion, f*ggots, pedophiles: all things which were seen as unfit. We were given lesser titles and lesser legal rights. Indeed the grant for civil partnership was given, but it in no way made us equal. And now it seems straight people want everything. The one thing we were given, the one lesser thing we were given, and they want it too. When they are denied it, they say they are being violated. But it was not called a violation when history had murdered us, institutionalized us, and persecuted us: it was called law.
It seems altogether ungrateful to me. I understand that one’s perception of discrimination can be clouded if they hold a certain amount of privilege, but this seems altogether excessive. These people are so blind to all the things they already have. For them, marriage has been an unquestioned, fully accepted given of life: for us, it has not. From a personal perspective, I am not particularly bothered by marriage, however, I am certain if I was in a long-term relationship with a woman, I would marry her. Why? Because it is a political statement. This is something that these people just can’t seem to grasp. If our marriage is still seen as a rebellion, we are not equal. This is still a huge obstacle, and yet civil partnerships are seen as unfair to ‘heterosexual rights’.
Newsflash: everything is a ‘heterosexual right’. They are seen as mandatory in our society. LGBT+ rights are not. End of story.
Now don’t get me wrong, I do think there is some room for marriage reform. There is much legislation in this country that allows the restriction of certain things out of marriage. For example, if you are in a long term relationship but do not plan on getting married, there are laws which can restrict your access to benefits, inheritance, and different tax rules to name but a few. These things can be very unfair, especially since more and more, marriage is being seen as the ‘old fashioned’ solution.
The thing I disagree with, however, is the conversion of civil partnership. It is such a sensitive subject because this was designed as something specifically for the gay community. Now it feels as though they are trying to invade our territory. In all honesty, I am in favor of such a reform, but under a different system. I would even support the complete scrapping of civil partnerships since they were still founded on the principle that same-sex love was subservient. But the past is so littered with the complacency of straight people over the degradation of the gay community, that this is a battle we cannot afford to lose. For us, marriage was a necessity, for them civil partnerships is not. For so many years, as a people we have been to “shut up and deal with it”.
Now it’s their turn.
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