Split of plaintiff lesbian couple in Massachussetts marriage case shows that LGBT couples are just like everyone else

I was forwarded this thought-provoking commentary on the unfortunate news that Julie and Hillary Goodridge (pictured below),the lesbian couple who were the plaintiffs in the landmark Goodridge v. Department of Public Health lawsuit that led to marriage equality in Massachusetts, have announced their intentions to divorce.

The author, James Richardson, is dead-on that the Goodridge announcement proves that, when it comes to marriage and divorce, LGBT people are just like everyone else:

The social conservative community wasted no time in offering gratuitous, crass responses, heavy with doses of I-told-you-so when news broke of the Goodridges impending divorce. Anti-gay marriage crusader Kris Mineau, president of the Massachusetts Family Institute, sought to capitalize on the moment. “Obviously, they don’t hold the institution [of marriage] in very high esteem,” he told the Boston Herald. Obviously, he says. High esteem, he says…

Given the staggering heterosexual divorce rate and contemporary American’s pathetic social construct of life partnerships, gay divorce, if anything, legitimizes gay marriage as normal. Like it or not, divorce is as American as apple pie and baseball. Why? Americans cherish their freedoms, including the freedom to marry and the freedom to divorce without intrusive speculation.

With the rights of marriage come the rights of divorce – a notion that at least half of heterosexuals understand, appreciate, and fully make use of. The Goodridges were a normal couple – loving, financially and emotionally stable – and as such, they faced the same tribulations as their heterosexual counterparts. Divorce, like death, is a sad reality of life (and marriage). It is not indicative of mental or emotional instability; it’s a reminder that larger-than-life situations often devour individuals without remorse. Gay marriage opponents are keen to argue that gay divorce, particularly by such high-profile couples, suggest gays are not emotionally equipped for marriage. They overlook, of course, the fact that the national divorce rate hovers near 50%.

The institution of marriage is not one of fixed social constructs frozen in the white picket fences of yesteryear. The social conservative notion of the “traditional marriage,” the intellectually bankrupt brainchild of Anita Bryant, purposefully ignores marriage’s tumultuous history of change. From its inception, marriage was a loveless institution, focused solely on increasing financial stability and the family work-force, and a means to enforce obedience in a fiercely patriarchal society.

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The decision for the Goodridges to end their marriage was a delicate, personal one, and is certainly of no business to social conservatives looking for fodder in the “culture war.” If Mineau and co. were truly interested in salvaging the institution of marriage – purportedly teetering on the brink of destruction – they would exhibit more than feigned outrage at the unacceptably high heterosexual divorce rates, not hone in on one lesbian couple who hit a rough patch.

[Photo: Boston Globe/Bill Greene]