I’m ok with companionate marriage [Blogathon 9/12]

Last updated on: January 16, 2013 at 1:11 am by Leah Libresco

I’m ok with companionate marriage [Blogathon 9/12] 2013-01-16T01:11:46-05:00 Leah Libresco

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This post is number nine of twelve for the Secular Student Alliance Blogathon. I’m responding to comments in the “Go Ahead, Tell Me What’s Wrong with Homosexuality” thread all day. You can read an explanation of the Blogathon and a pitch for donations (even if you’re religious) here.

There’s been an essay making the rounds by Josh Weed, a gay Mormon man who’s been happily married to his wife for ten years and has had several children with her. I was reminded of it when thinking about how essential sexuality is to human identity in the last post. Weed opted for a companionate marriage, where the two are intimate partners, but their bond isn’t driven by sexual chemistry. As Noah Millman wrote for AmCon, it’s only relatively recently that sexual comparability and desire have been rated as necessary components of marriage.

A number of people see this kind of marriage as a waste (or worse, a ticking time bomb), but I’m not sure that I have any objection. Or that most liberals would if we just tweak the parameters a little bit. Would this be a good outcome for Weed if he were asexual? If he were a woman nearing the end of her fertility who hadn’t found someone with whom she had a sexual frisson.

Why shouldn’t two good friends want to entrust their lives to each other and pass on their love to a child just because they need to lie back and think of England when the time comes to conceive one. The relationship of two friends is obviously different from that of two lovers, but I’m not sure why it’s necessarily lesser or a poor type of parenting relationship.

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How Critical is Sexual Desire to Human Identity? [Blogathon 8/12]

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June 11, 2012 Companionate Marriage for Everyone? [Blogathon 10/12]

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