I hate the way American society conceptualizes romantic relationships. The notion of “love” is typically framed as a progress narrative – whereby “marriage” is the highest form and product. Intimate connections are reduced to linear equations. Whenever people speak of love, I imagine a bunch of CEOs in a boardroom pointing at a graph with a sharp incline. For Americans, love always needs a goal. It cannot just be. This partially explains why 50% of marriages end in divorce: once couples tie the knot, ending the relationship is the only destination.
From the typical American perspective, married couples are the most qualified to speak about “real love” – while unmarried couples lack the credentials to do so. Married couples are seen as more experienced, matured, and developed; while unmarried couples are seen as less experienced, immature, and undeveloped. This entire frame of mind mirrors a racist discourse. Since black folks are less likely to be married, the general view of “love”, to the extent that it is conflated with marriage, is anti-black.
Many people fail to understand what marriage is. First and foremost, marriage is a political and economic institution that maintains law and order. The purpose of marriage is to regulate sexuality, taxation, and surveillance. Marriage is, was, and always will be a control mechanism for a racist, sexist, and classist State. We ought not subscribe to the fairy tale that marriage is about love and rainbows. It is obvious that couples who love each other often can and do get married; but marriage is not synonymous with, nor reducible to love. Anyone who conflates the two understands neither. It is possible to be in a loving, committed relationship outside the institution of marriage; the same way one can be in a loveless marriage.
That stated, I hate when people tell me, implicitly or explicitly, that my relationship is somehow diminished because we are not married. I do not need my love life to be recognized by the State. I need the State to be burned. During slavery, black folks could not get married – because recognizing marriage was a slippery slope toward recognizing humanity. Black couples had their own way of celebrating love: jumping the broom. When the government recognizes my right to exist as a human being free from violence with a right to housing, a job, education, and healthcare … maybe, just maybe, I will ask it to recognize my relationship. But until then, the State can go fuck itself. Refusing to recognize my relationship as valid because I have not signed a document at City Hall says that ‘real love’ can only exist after one receives the ‘blessing’ from their oppressor. Folks are not necessarily concerned with our individual relationship to one another; they are concerned with our relationship to the State (and God). It is not about love between people; it is about the love of oppression.
I hate all of it, from top to bottom. I despise the whole ‘Say Yes to the Dress’ phenomenon. Post-feminism at its peak: women lack equal pay, and reproductive rights are under assault … but every woman/girl is taught they have the ‘freedom’ of picking out an over-priced and over-hyped dress as they are ‘given away’ by their father to another man.
The tradition of engagement rings is intellectually and spiritually vacuous. People need to be a little more critical of the trends they follow – instead of blindly repeating actions with no sense of history. The origin of giving women diamond rings began 80+ years ago when the De Beers Corporation – a diamond company exploiting Africa for resources – had an advertising campaign linking diamonds to everlasting love. They began by suggesting that one month’s salary be spent on an engagement ring. We are now at a point where folks are judged by the size and shine of their bling; and people are dictating how much money one should spend at the jewelers. Keep in mind: any recipient who has the audacity to put a minimum price-tag on a ring doesn’t deserve one. More importantly, we need to get away from the practice of using diamonds as symbols of love. Diamonds cannot be a symbol of everlasting connection when they are produced through hateful exploitation and bloodshed of Africans.
Anti-blackness makes the narrative and performance of “love” in America possible.
April 26, 2017 at 7:36 pm
Reblogged this on shelbycourtland and commented:
I approve of this message! And how!
A most excellent piece Darryl!
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April 26, 2017 at 7:38 pm
Thank you for sharing my friend!
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April 26, 2017 at 7:39 pm
Anytime!
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April 26, 2017 at 7:36 pm
Darryl, you are indeed, a breath of fresh air! I thank you for writing and posting this!
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April 26, 2017 at 7:38 pm
Hey Shelby! Thank YOU for reading this! I am glad you liked it!
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April 26, 2017 at 7:39 pm
The honor and privilege was ALL mine! You hit the nail squarely on its head!
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April 26, 2017 at 8:25 pm
I love this. I also have a question (which you can choose not to answer of course). I agree that marriage is a political and economic institution. That being said, would you never get married?
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April 26, 2017 at 8:41 pm
Hello Rae!
Great question, you can ask me anything. I am planning to get married soon … reluctantly. The State incentivizes marriage in the form of discounts, expedited processes with insurance companies, etc. This is a real problem – because I do not think a person should have to get married to gain access to healthcare (i.e. it is a complex argument to make. I, of course, am not homophobic. But I opposed gay marriage, in the limited sense, on the grounds that it was anti black and really only benefited white folks who were trying to get insurance and had money to afford it. This means the law essentially left out poor, single black women. The REAL solution is to have a universal healthcare system, you know what I mean? That way people dont need to be employed or married or a citizen of a country to get medicine, they get it because they EXIST). But I still have to play the game due to limitations, unfortunately. We all do. As critical as I am of capitalism, I still have to work and consume to stay alive. Life is full of seeming contradictions. My girlfriend is sympathetic to my philosophy as outlined above butttttt she is waiting on that ring, so I gotta make that happen soon lol.
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April 27, 2017 at 8:47 am
You are right about all of that of course but I wish you the best of luck with your future engagement!
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April 27, 2017 at 8:48 am
Thank you 😀
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April 26, 2017 at 10:23 pm
Life is full of contradictions. My mom and her third husband told the Social Security people that they were NOT married so that they could get two checks instead of just one as a married couple. They could not have existed on just one check. I understand your dislike of “the game” so I will just say to you, that my friend Johnny never married his girlfriend because he wanted them to get two disability checks. When he died not only was she not allowed to keep anything they owned in his apartment, his family would not let her ride in the front funeral car. Even the guards at the funeral procession would not let her ride in front at the head of the cars. She was devastated. If Joyce had had a paper from the State recognizing the relationship this could not have happened. Johnny’s death was unexpected. So Joyce lost everything. Your girlfriend sounds like a nice girlfriend to have.
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April 26, 2017 at 10:43 pm
Hello Ms. Elva!
Excellent points! It is amazing how we allow the bureaucracy (i.e. paperwork, what is authentic, recognized, and what isnt) to control our relationships. I sympathize with your friend Johnny; especially because those disability checks do not necessarily allow a person to “eat high on the hog”. As you know, it is expensive to live. Sometimes, we are forced into a position where getting married is not in a person’s immediate interest because it will hinder their cash flow. Marriage also has the problem of being so difficult and expensive to end – so that is another reason people avoid it. I hope Joyce landed on her feet. And thank you, my girlfriend is great!
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April 27, 2017 at 12:45 am
Great piece Darryl! I have never been big on the institution of marriage — it has always been racist, sexist, and set up to server the State rather than the individual. (I am also sure someone is now profiting from the high divorce rates. Lawyers and government maybe.) I did not know about the whole diamond history — amazing!
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April 27, 2017 at 6:46 am
Heyyy Christine! Thank you! I feel you, marriage never impressed me either. And I watched a documentary on Netflix about divorce (I am sorry, the name escapes me) and it is a huge industry. The lawyers pit the partners against each other in an attempt to draw out the paper work, and drive up fees. It is ugly and unethical. It costs about $300 to get married, but several thousands to get divorced. That says a lot about State control, right?!
The linkage of diamonds to love and engagement amazed me, too. Whenever a connection feels too natural, we should research the history.
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April 27, 2017 at 11:19 pm
Yes — it does not surprise me about the divorce and unethical practices. Of course, marriage can and does world for some, but the laws should not be written as they are, to punish single people and also to stigmatize children born out of wedlock. (Not to mention the brainwashing ideas our society pushes about ‘love and marriage’.)
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May 3, 2017 at 2:02 am
There was so many gems in this article “love always needs a goal. It cannot just be.” I find it interesting how society plants this uncomfortable seed in our minds that real love equates to being married yet everyday I see miserable married couples “posing” to be happy when they are not. This is not saying that there aren’t many happily married couples out there but this definitely brings a interesting question to my mind which is: Why is it so easy to fall for what society says is love?
-Great article friend
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May 4, 2017 at 7:31 pm
Hey Alia! Long time no see! Thanks for reading this! You are right about people posing. I wonder if it is a fear of loneliness that drives that. We would rather be unhappy but with someone than unhappy and alone. I think it is easy to fall for what society says is love because we learn it as children and are exposed to our whole lives … so by the time we even reach the age where we can be in a relationship, that seed has already been planted and it is damn near fully blossomed.
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May 8, 2017 at 3:34 am
I know I’ve been M.I.A trying to rekindle my creative magic again. LOL. But you made a point there about how as children we are exposed to what society says as love… I remember being younger and watching Disney movies where there was always a princess awaiting to be resuced by a prince. This false sense of reality that woman will receive a perfect man and love is easy and perfect.What a fairy tale because its not at all like that when you are facing reality of people.
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May 9, 2017 at 6:15 am
Glad to see you again!!
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May 4, 2017 at 1:21 pm
Wow! I love this Darryl. You’ve done a great job of highlighting the intersectionality of race, gender and marriage/relationships. There is nothing here I disagree with. Similar to what we’ve talked about before, anything that has to do with an institution (e.g., the institution of marriage, and subsequently, the government) is going to be steeped in institutionalized racism. Marriage in America is no different.
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May 4, 2017 at 7:26 pm
😀 Awesome! Glad you liked this!
I wanted to write this because I hear so many dog whistles when I hear people commenting on the relationships of black folks. There are always judgments about their culture or family formation of some sort – all the while stating it in a matter of fact tone. It has haunted me for a while. I finallllly put my finger on what was bothering me with this post lol
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May 12, 2017 at 12:28 am
You have very interesting topics on your blog site, amazing piece of writing.
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May 14, 2017 at 1:53 pm
There is so much I love about this post. I, myself, have to regularly explain to people that I don’t need the government involve to prove that I love someone. I had a longer relationship with one person, than most of my friends have had (even if you add all of the years of all of their marriages), yet their relationships are always deemed more “valid.” It’s such an antiquated notion that you need that piece of paper to prove that something is real.
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May 15, 2017 at 7:07 am
Exactly! You said it best: it is an antiquated notion to involve government bureaucracy in our notion of love. And I truly despise the hierarchy of relationships. It is anti-love. Ugh!
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May 29, 2017 at 9:27 pm
Very interesting post and I admire the perspective you have given ♡
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June 1, 2017 at 2:06 pm
Thank you!
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September 26, 2017 at 9:21 pm
An incredibly interesting read. Thank you for sharing this, I feel as though I have gained a vital piece of knowledge that I didn’t have before. I will be spreading this message to my friends.
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October 3, 2017 at 7:23 am
Thank you for reading!
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