I had a rather interesting conversation tonight about marriage, since it's quite likely that it will soon be legalised for same sex couples here in the UK - the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) bill is currently resident in the House of Lords, after a committee, report, and third reading it will return to the House of Commons where it will be addressed for the final time before it becomes law.
A question arose in our conversation of who we would prefer to ask the question and I had to think for a moment. In a heterosexual couple, it's traditional for the male to propose, with the exception of leap year proposals where a female would propose to the male. That was tradition something which many have said has little influence today - however I would argue that of all the women I have known every one of them wanted to be asked rather than asking. Rather interesting when Civil Partnerships came along I had never considered the question of who would ask - namely because I would not of had a Civil Partnership, I want to get Married.
Who would be the one "expected" to propose then? Well in any gay couple regardless of gender there won't be a 'man' and a 'woman' - any preconceived notions of gay men or lesbians conforming to this binary pairing should be put out of your head, our relationships don't work like that, no matter what you may have been led to believe.
There is perhaps a question of Psychology, that perhaps whichever partner is the most socially dominant would be the one to ask, but even this I find hard to use as a rule of thumb because as I have said in other posts on this blog, our social and sexual standing is often reversed - those who are dominant socially are often submissive sexually. You could perhaps say that sexual dominance should determine who asks, but even that is hard to do as sex and love aren't the same thing.
Then perhaps there should be a third standing, an aggregate position that combines your social and sexual role and produces your overall standing in the relationship as a whole? The problem with this is that there are a lot of factors beyond social and sexual roles in a relationship that would determine your overall position. There is also the question of whether you should be in one position or the other at all - the argument that a balanced relationship would see both partners as equal and therefore neither as being dominant or submissive, in other words, equal.
The problem with that is we don't get an answer to our question, who should be the one to ask? I would argue that your inclination to ask would be based both on a selfish consideration of your own desire, and a selfless consideration of whether your partner is ready - marriage is a big step.
Personally I think I would rather be asked than be the one to ask. Having said that anyone who knew me that intimately would tell you that it would be hard to tell when I was ready and it would also be a bad idea to ask too soon [yea, I know, I have issue but so does everyone whether they admit it or not] the result is that I would most likely end up being the one who would ask, not out of personal desire but out of necessity.
There is the romantic element which is the most compelling, whilst most of the above takes the stance of debating being the one to ask, there is a romanticism to be found in the idea of being asked. Most straight guys will never have dreamed or fantasised about being asked, many straight girls will have though. For a gay person though there is no predisposition of that nature, either or both could have grown up dreaming of being asked. That puts you in the position where one would have to give up that dream to be with the one they love.
Love can move mountains, and there is no limit to what we will sacrifice for someone we truly love, and so we end up back at square one. Who should be the one to ask? Or rather, who will be the one to ask?
