An equal marriage retrospective in two voices: Where have ten years taken us?

Abstract

This article represents the reflexive journey of one of six couples that launched a Constitutional Challenge to the definition of marriage. An account of our motivation for marriage deconstructs the experience from two disparate, yet shared, spaces. Using reflection and documentation, we explore multiple truths and realities of what the case, and the ‘right to marry’, meant to us: then, and now – 10 years later. In recounting our story, we expose the embodiment of risk taken by sexual minorities when engaging in activism and claiming heteronormative public spaces. Each with our own epistemological foundation, we explore the pitfalls and possibilities of marriage activism and consider its role as a space of queer liberation. Illustrating how the struggle for equal marriage is situated in the messy notion of what it means to be queer, we posit two narratives as a means of challenging dominant discourse. To research marriage as an objective ‘reality’ is to desexualize and depersonalize queer identity; an autoethnographic account claims the subjective sexual identity and facilitates a discussion of the nuances and complexities of queer lives and choices.

Given the vitriolic marriage debate, documenting and deconstructing our experience is an important element of queer history and praxis. Using reflexivity to explore our individual and collective perspectives and reflect upon how those experiences were shaped through intersection with family, friends, each other, community and society allows us to claim our insider positionality and challenge queer/straight binaries, force conversations about these binaries, and demonstrate how the personal is political.

Keywords

Critical co-constructed autoethnography critical reflexivity same-sex marriage queer liberation queer studies

Dawn: Above all, it is my love for Julie that drives me to seek recognition of same-sex marriage. Not just marriage for the sake of marriage but marriage contextualized. I love this person with all of my heart and soul. I will spend the rest of my life with her regardless of the obstacles we face together and as individuals, and regardless of whether or not the law grants same-sex marriage.

(Affidavit, Ontario Court of Appeal)

Julie: I opened a wedding gift from Dawn’s aunt and uncle and was invited to tea at their house. I knew they understood our relationship when I was kissed on the cheek and asked ‘How it felt to be a married woman’.

(Affidavit, Supreme Court of Canada)

This article pieces together the story of a significant historical event – the Constitutional Challenge to the Government of Ontario’s definition of marriage as being only between one man and one woman. From the standpoint of one of the six Charter Challenge appellant couples, drawing upon individual memories, reflections, discussions, and excerpts from documentation, including media, personal communications and affidavits, we present an autoethnographic account of our own motivations for marriage and deconstruct the marriage experience from two disparate, yet shared, spaces. Each with our own theoretical and personal perspectives, we explore the pitfalls and possibilities of same-sex marriage activism and consider its role as our space of queer liberation. Given that there is no one approach to autoethnography and that autoethnographic work can represent multiple points of time with multiple interpretations (Ellis, 1999), we purposefully enter into reflection that represents three time periods significant to our personal journey with same-sex marriage. Autoethnography gives us the methodological tools to bring the present and the past together and enables us to reinterpret and re-experience our journey (Denzin, 2006). This article is a means of reflecting on and documenting our multiple truths and realties of what the right to marry and our role in the Ontario Charter Challenge meant to us – then and now, 10 years later.

Given the significance of, and debate about, same-sex marriage from within the LGBTQ community, documenting, reflecting and deconstructing our conflicted experience is an important element of queer praxis. This autoethnographic retrospective demonstrates what can be considered a sometimes invisible link between queer theory and praxis. Illustrating how the struggle for equal marriage embodied queerness, we explore two narratives as a means of challenging the dominant discourse by claiming the right to marry, while simultaneously attempting to resist the assimilation of heteronormativity. Our discussion differs from the polarized debates (pros and cons) that exist within the literature in relation to same-sex marriage (Hull, 2006; Sullivan, 2004) as we bring to it individual lived perspectives and relational experiences that stem from the participation in an unfamiliar event – as appellants in a court challenge. Our experience offers value as our personal and lived experiences represent a unique perspective as they intermingle with a legal process over which we had little control, yet has great personal, social and historical import. Our approach to telling our stories relies on autoethnography’s potential for sharing personal and emotional experiences offering accessibility and commonality (Ellis, 2014). Given that the fight for equal marriage and the related experience of being involved in the court challenge transformed our queer identities, this also becomes the story of the personal and transformative nature of equal marriage. We enter into this autoethnography as an emotional journey, a practice radically unlike the linear and rational legal progression that guided our earlier interpretation of equal marriage. Thus, this autoethnography moves beyond the academic debates of marriage pros and cons to ‘produce[s] evocative stories’ with a goal of engaging queer culture and breaking down insider/outsider binaries, thereby contributing to cultural and personal transformation (Ellis, 1999: 669).

We use critical autoethnography, constructivism, queer theory and reflexivity to explore our individual experiences and collective perspectives as one of the couples in the Charter Challenge for equal marriage and reflect upon how those experiences were shaped through intersection with family, friends, each other, the broader community and society. While we use autoethnography through the telling of our personal stories and reflections, the article is more than a personal account; rather, we aim to make a contribution to an exploration of the disruptive, or assimilationist, nature of the legalization of same-sex marriage and to advance the conversation on how equal marriage has, or has not, contributed to transformative discourses.

Methodology

Our involvement in the case was a privilege: in many ways it was simply a case of being in the right place at the right time. We were reminded of this when the judge marrying us paid homage to all the queer people who led to this moment and reminded us that there were many queer people who paved the way but were not able to see their desire become a reality. The telling of our story, through reflexivity and autoethnography, makes us accountable to the privilege of being able to participate in the case while concurrently acknowledging experiences of marginalization and the interpretative nature in our retelling of the events (Boylorn and Orbe, 2014).

Our fight for equal marriage was a relational effort lived out through the experiences of two people. Therefore, our methodology draws on co-constructed critical autoethnography (Cann and DeMeulenaere, 2012) as a way of understanding the points where our individual stories intersect and diverge, ultimately coming together to construct and understand our own, and each other’s, unique experiences. We use autoethnography and reflexivity in order to illustrate how the representation of marriage, on both a personal and political level, evolved over the course of time, with each shift revealing new truths about why the right to marry mattered, or indeed ceased to matter. We intentionally chose to re-live and re-create our experience through autoethnography because of its ‘ability to invite readers into the lived experience of a presumed “Other” and to experience it viscerally’ (Boylorn and Orbe, 2014: 15). Further, the connection between two people represented in critical co-constructed autoethnography is relevant to both the construction and documentation of knowledge (Cann and DeMeulenaere, 2012). In our case, the co-construction of knowledge has occurred over many years and through multiple conversations, presentations, interviews and debates, all of which form a part of the narrative on which we draw to construct this story. Co-constructed autoethnography acknowledges and embraces the role that our relationship plays in telling this story.

The choice to use autoethnography to tell a queer story was intentional as ‘autoethnography, queer theory, and reflexivity share commitments that are personal and political, tense and complicated, disruptive and open-to-revision, human and ethical’ (Adams and Holman Jones, 2011: 111). Queer theory challenges the heteronormative discourse; it is countercultural and disruptive (Warner, 2002). Additionally, queer theory provides a method of challenging the conventional norms of heterosexuality by offering a means to share personal stories against the surrounding backdrop of sexual identity politics. However, we argue, queer theory can run the risk of remaining in the theoretical realm, forgetting to acknowledge the lived realities of members of the LGBTQ community, and neglecting to recognize the queer disruption of hegemonic discourses. Positioning autoethnography against queer practice aligns with connections between autoethnography and queer theory described by Adams and Holman Jones who state that:

Autoethnography – a method that uses personal experiences with a culture and/or a cultural experience with a culture and/or a cultural identity to make unfamiliar characteristics of the culture and/or identity for insiders and outsiders – and queer theory – a dynamic and shifting theoretical paradigm that developed in response to a normalizing of heterosexuality and from a desire to disrupt insidious conventions. (2011: 110)

We borrow from Adams and Holman Jones by bringing together queer theory and autoethnography as a way of challenging normative assumptions and discourses which, in our case, relates to the discourse surrounding marriage. We assert that through the sharing of personal stories about our struggle for equal marriage, the methodology of autoethnography will assist as a means of bringing outsiders into an otherwise unavailable culture and creating opportunities for awareness that begin to disrupt normative conventions.

This article makes a link between queer theory and praxis by reflecting on the struggle for marriage as a countercultural and political force that disrupted the heteronormative institution of marriage and the struggle for personal acceptance which, at times, required assimilation into the mainstream dominant discourse. Our dialogue moves queer theory out of the theoretical realm, placing it into practice through the personal and reflexive use of autoethnography that enables us to step back and deconstruct the journey and ponder whether or not it made a difference, personally and/or politically. The complexity of the struggle for same-sex marriage, the sacrifices and the gains, are not accessible to outsiders; therefore, an approach to autoethnography through accessible language and storytelling draws people in and opens doors to deeper understanding. This approach is important for breaking down the binaries that exist between insiders and outsiders (Boylorn and Orbe, 2014). Finally, autoethnography provides us with an opportunity to reflect and deconstruct what was a lived experience. Autoethnographic writing enables us to claim authority over how we tell, interpret and give meaning to our experiences, whether it be in the present, through reflections of the past, or in our co-constructed recounts (Richardson, 2001). While others have claimed segments of our affidavits and stories for their own use, such as evidence in marriage challenges, in sermons, and in arguing for AND against marriage, we have not stepped back to reflect and comment on the meaning and contribution of our experiences from our own perspective(s).

For the purposes of this autoethnography three time periods were chosen as a framework to guide us in reflecting on and retelling of our story. We view our journey for equal marriage on a 10-year continuum, along which there are significant points in time, each with its own events and stories. The time periods represent the actual passage of time, with significant event(s) and moments, as well as how we have tended to reflect upon and talk about our experiences. Thus, while arbitrary and constructed, the timeframes stay true to our personal construction of events. The first time period, Is Marriage for Us? represents the period prior to the court case when we were invited to become applicants in the legal challenge and includes the decision to become involved and prepare for legal action. The second time period, Court Challenges, Public Activism and White Weddings, follows the 2003 decision by the Ontario Superior Court wherein we won the right to marriage and is the point on the continuum where the actual wedding took place. Within this period the Federal government referred the question of same-sex marriage to the Supreme Court of Canada and we were again asked to write legal affidavits. The focus of the affidavits at this juncture was to comment on whether marriage had made a difference, given we had been legally married for approximately two years. This was also the time of tremendous public debate and social upheaval regarding the validity of same-sex marriage. Ten Years Later, represents a noteworthy ‘moment in time’ post-Canadian legalization of same-sex marriage. This was significant to us as the marriage debate gained traction globally and, in particular, in the USA with the introduction of Proposition 8 in 2005, there was once again great and unrestricted vitriol from all sides. For us, the very public legal and personal conflict reopened visceral emotions and reactions on a personal and political level. When the opportunity presented itself in 2013 to present on same-sex marriage at a Queer Studies Conference we relished the opportunity to share our experiences and reflect on our own journey. The choice of the Ten Year timeframe, while rooted in a political and global context, is also personal; converging with our tenth wedding anniversary, a personal milestone for married couples, we embraced the opportunity to reclaim the emotional and relational meaning of marriage from what had become a legal and political exercise for us; we did this through the medium of co-constructed autoethnography.

For the first two time periods, we draw on drafts of and the final affidavits prepared for the Ontario Superior Court and the Supreme Court of Canada. For the third time period we draw on a presentation we did at the Queer Studies Conference, Asheville North Carolina. We undertook a process of reviewing and engaging in a discussion of the available documentation from each time period. Individually and collaboratively we engaged in critical reflexivity through journaling, writing and conversations for each time period. We use the language of reflexivity to engage personally with our own stories and come up with a process for telling them in a way that resonated with us (Ellis, 1999). Reflexivity allows us to examine our experiences from a new lens, untangling our personal experiences from emotions that intermingled with our experiences as applicants in a court challenge. Based on our conversations we co-constructed narratives for each time period. By using co-constructed knowledge as a means of collaboration (Cann and DeMeulenaere, 2012), we have co-created joint stories for each time period that are reflective of the shared construction of our journey. Our methodological approach moves in and out of the plural (us) and the singular (Dawn or Julie). For each time period the plural use of ‘we’ signifies a collective voice, a co-constructed point of view. Davis and Salkin (2005) use co-constructed autoethnography to explore their relationship as sisters, one of whom is disabled and one who is not. Dawn and I use co-construction in a similar way to explore our individual and interrelated interpretations of the present and past in terms of the personal and relational impacts on each other and those around us as well as in its connectivity to the broader political influences occurring at the time. Using critical reflexivity is our way of saying that we went beyond self-analysis and introspection (Charmaz, 2006) to investigate our own beliefs and assumptions about our role in the case and the meaning that we now give to those experiences in the form of this autoethnography. During the process of critical reflexivity, we uncovered how our own experiences were shaped by many intersecting factors impacting our interpretations of each time period. We have created a queer autoethnographical journey that is co-constructed and individual, personal and political, reflexive and subjective.

Autoethnography is not an ‘easy choice’; with a methodological emphasis on accessing emotion and vulnerability through storytelling approaches that contribute to new understandings (Ellis, 1999), this approach requires the interrogation and exploration of events and intentions that call on us to go to ‘uncomfortable places’. Our involvement with the legalization of same-sex marriage was embedded in legal processes, naturally devoid of emotion. Recounting and resituating our journey in a place of emotion and sentiment requires accessing a vulnerability discouraged as a part of a rational judicial process. Indeed, as public discourse became heated and passionately positioned against same-sex marriage, as appellants we were increasingly pushed to respond and act as rational and detached beings. Retrospectively, we see that this was emotional protection and a means of mainstreaming and distancing applicants from expressing opinions that could negatively impact the case. Like the challenge with emotional storytelling, co-construction of a shared experience was counter to our involvement in a legal process that demanded our stories to be separate. We wrote the first affidavit for the Ontario Court of Justice together, as a couple in a world that denied our ‘coupledom’, in one unified voice; we were told that we had to write individual affidavits and that our claims needed to be separate. At times our autoethnographic accounts of stories appear linear, detached from the larger narrative, and emotionally distant; this feeling of rigidity and rationality brings the reader into our emotional experience of becoming a part of a regimented process that brought with it expectations about how we behaved, what we said, and how we handled ourselves. Co-constructed autoethnography allows us to bridge personal space and relationship, in our case marriage, to collaborate on what the meaning of the experience meant to us (Cann and DeMeulenaere, 2012). We draw on Ellis (2014) to justify the emotional element we bring into what was, in many ways, a detached process for those involved in the legal process. We offer this autoethnography as a course of reflection, a way of understanding a transformative experience, not only for us but also for those with shared experiences and for others who seek to understand.

Is marriage for us?

We sat on our living room floor. It was in the fall of 1999 (we both remember the pink television set in the background – Dawn painted it after she pulled it from the trash). We were on the phone with our lawyer discussing the possibility of joining a Constitutional Challenge to oppose the heterosexual definition of marriage. Julie was excited about the prospect of joining the case. She was hoping that marriage would make some members of her family take their relationship seriously. Dawn was hesitant as she did not identify with the institution of marriage. She had experience as an activist and was worried about the personal costs that could result from involvement in the case. She was concerned as the relationship was still new. Both of us were students without secure jobs and involvement in the case could result in serious repercussions. We had recently been victims of gay bashing when our car was intentionally rear ended by a transport truck after the driver witnessed Julie kissing Dawn. Although this was witnessed by many bystanders, the police dismissed us and sent us on our way. What would be the repercussions of being involved in a highly public act of resistance? Ultimately, for different reasons, we both decided our involvement in the case was important. For Julie, the fight for same-sex marriage was driven by personal motivations for validation and acceptance. For Dawn, the decision was politically motivated by the desire for equality rights as, through work in the queer community, she had seen many examples of partners being denied access to rights at critical times such as the need for health benefits, and involvement in end-of-life care decisions. Once we made the decision to get involved in the case we still struggled to find the financial and emotional support. There were moments when we thought we might have to withdraw as applicants. However, once the lawyers received our affidavits, there was no turning back.

In 1999 we joined five other couples to launch a Charter Challenge to the definition of marriage. In 2003 the Ontario Superior court ruled the definition unconstitutional and we were married immediately. It has been 10 years since the court ruling which paved the way for the legalization of equal marriage in Canada – and, ultimately, across the world. The passage of time has presented numerous opportunities for reflection and it is through a process of reflexivity that we have discovered that, while our individual reasons for becoming involved in the Charter Challenge seemed to diverge at the outset, there were multiple points where our understanding of equal marriage intersected and converged. Perhaps, more importantly, we have come to understand that our reasons for involvement in the case have continued to develop and shift and, that what represented our truth as represented in the 1999 affidavit has continued to evolve into new and more complex truths about equal marriage, equal rights, and queer identity.

Julie: Reflections on ‘Is marriage for us?’

As I reflect back on my affidavit and what it meant for me to get involved in the marriage case, a number of themes emerge: including, a need for personal affirmation, a desire to be recognized as ‘normal’ within my community and the desire for societal change.

When I wrote my affidavit in 1999, my desire for recognition and equality came from a personal place: I believed marriage and the commitment it signified would be ‘knowable’ to my family and friends. I came from a conservative Christian upbringing that did not condone homosexuality – let alone same-sex marriage. I felt that if I were to marry they would see the significance of my relationship and not dismiss it as a passing phase. I was a young woman who was not always taken seriously by her family. At this time, I felt that marriage offered me a mode of communication with my family that, while they may not agree with it, they would understand. Acceptance of family, friends and co- workers was important.

Although we consider our relationship to have the same importance as any heterosexual marriage, it is important to us that our marriage be sanctioned by society. I want to tell Dawn that I love her in a way that can be understood by everyone. I was raised in a family where marriage was understood as a life commitment to be entered into when you love someone. I grew up reading books about people who, when they fell in love, they got married. The television shows that I watched had people who, when they wanted to make a life commitment to each other, got married. (Affidavit Prepared for Ontario Superior Court of Justice)

Like any queer couple, Dawn and I have faced challenges and sometimes a lack of acceptance. Therefore, I felt marriage would normalize and legitimize our relationship in a way that could be understood by others, keeping in mind that this was a normalization driven by a desire to be loved and respected while still maintaining my sexual identity. At the outset I talked about our relationship as being distinct and challenged criticisms that marriage is only a heterosexual institution. In reflecting on the words in my affidavit they foreshadow my future insights into how I see my marriage as unique and different in its own right.

Dawn and I are not mimicking a heterosexual model of family. Dawn and I are choosing to define for ourselves the bounds and structure of our relationship. We should have the right to choose marriage and how we live our lives. (Affidavit)

I also felt that I had an opportunity to make a contribution in a way that would help others in their fight for equality. From the start of my involvement in the case, I recognized that the struggle for equal marriage was much bigger than my own personal struggle for acceptance; I knew that it was a fight beyond me: ‘Even if a civil marriage to Dawn did not change my father’s mind, it may someday help another daughter and father. Legislation may not change attitudes immediately, but it is a start’ (Affidavit). While much of my passion and drive for marriage came from a personal place, broader recognition and equality was intrinsic to the fight for equality: ‘Granting same-sex spouses the same right to marry as opposite-sex spouses will bring us closer to respect and understanding. It will begin the long process of changing attitudes and beliefs’ (Affidavit).

My friend Amelia lost her love

To cancer’s slow and painful glove

The dying was no easier

Than my father’s was back then

No black-rimmed cards came to her door

Her grief and anguish all ignored

Except, of course, for closest friends

Who tried to understand.¹

Dawn: Reflections on ‘Is marriage for us?’

My entry into this trajectory of social change was as marriage activist sceptic. Indeed, as a self-identified lesbian, feminist, socialist, when I was invited to be an appellant in the Equal Marriage Charter Challenge, I did so with reluctance and suspicion. I feared that the privileging of marriage would reinforce socially constructed Euroheteropatriarchal norms, effectively ending queer liberation discourse. I stated in my affidavit:

As a feminist and social justice advocate I have often heard the argument: Marriage is a heterosexual construct and why would you want to model your relationship on this archaic, misogynistic structure? Indeed, these are arguments I have often agreed with and espoused myself.

I decided to enter into the fight for equal marriage on behalf of those in the queer community who had suffered so much because of inequality. In working with LGBTQ people and people living with HIV/AIDS throughout the 1990s I witnessed many same-sex spouses denied the right to make decisions for an incapacitated spouse, denied inheritance rights upon the death of a spouse and refused recognition at the funeral of a deceased spouse. As I observed the alienation and rejection experienced by same-sex couples, and the invisibility of same-sex relationships, I questioned the way in which society systemically and thoroughly obscures and devalues same-sex relationships. From a personal place, I feared possible repercussions for my own relationship because of a lack of social and legal recognition. While I believed that the fight for marriage was problematic, I also knew that I was in a place of privilege where I could participate in a political act that could offer some sort of redress – for at least some members of the LGBTQ community. Thus, I knew it was something I had to do, no matter how imperfect.

And there were no tears for the widow

No tears for the widow

For the woman who had lost her love

And must carry on alone

And Amy still writes ‘single’

In the space on all the forms

But she rages at the lie it tells

And the loss that it ignores.

And who can tell how many other women

Live their lives in shadows

Unrecognized, unsympathized

Unseen and disallowed

Who've lost not only lovers

But often hearth and home

For ‘marriage’ is a special word

And only meant for some ¹

Court challenges, public activism and white weddings

Fast forward to June 2003: we are in a new town, in a new apartment. Our lawyer called to tell us that the Ontario Court of Appeal had struck down the definition of marriage – effective immediately. We were excited and nervous. After the court ruling things moved quickly. The lawyers requested that we get married immediately because the Federal government was going to apply for a ‘stay’ on same-sex marriage licenses – meaning no same-sex couples would be able to get married, pending an appeal of the lower court decision to the Supreme Court of Canada. At city hall we were told that they were not issuing licenses to same-sex couples because the case originated out of Toronto; when we advised city hall officials that they could speak to our lawyer, and that we were one of the applicants in the Ontario Court Challenge, they consulted their legal counsel and agreed to issue the license. City hall was very quiet; each person we encountered stared at us. When we got to the office to pay the fee for the license there were a lot of people gathered – waiting for us. There was a tension in the air. There was a positive moment when a woman said: ‘Someone should take a picture. Does anyone have a camera? This is an historical moment’ – for us: a humanizing moment. As we left city hall, one of the photographers from the horde of media leaned over to us and whispered: ‘Do you hear that?’ Someone had put a song over the speaker system that was the number one wedding song that year. It was these little acts of solidarity and support that have remained with us – the song, the picture.

A whole new world (Don't you dare close your eyes)

A hundred thousand things to see (Hold your breath, it gets better)

I'm like a shooting star

I've come so far

I can’t go back to where I used to be.

(Kane et al. 1992. A Whole New World, from Disney’s Aladdin)

Later that week the local newspaper called. We quickly became frustrated with the reporter’s questions – they felt intrusive and trivial and completely unrelated to the fight for equality: ‘What are you going to wear on your wedding day? How long have you known that you are gay?’ From that point forward we decided this fight was not about us, it was not about personal publicity, it was about equality. We decided that we would limit future interviews to those that would contribute to meaningful discussions.

‘The couple plan to marry in Windsor in a ceremony with friends and family’.

(Greeno, 2003, report in the Waterloo Record)

The wedding took place in Toronto. We had three days to plan it. We lived in a housing co-op and the people there took over and planned a wedding – they made silk flowers – they encouraged Julie to wear a wedding dress and veil – Dawn wore an old blazer and black pants. We had support from Julie’s mother – she paid for Julie’s dress and rented a car to get to Toronto for the wedding. Ironically for Julie, we were married on Father’s Day. Julie's father has to this day never shown any acknowledgement of our relationship or the marriage. We were married in the chambers of Justice Harvey Brownstone. His partner was present and photographed the event. We had our pictures taken in the courtroom. Only a few friends were present, no family. We drove around Toronto with a ‘just married’ sign on the back; honking and waving; Julie’s veil blowing out the car window. A month or so later, our friends threw a party for us in their backyard; there were pictures, a wedding cake and presents. Just like any wedding, ours happened in a blur of excitement, panic and anticipation. While our wedding was driven by a court process, it was also made of the stuff of traditional weddings. For some, the wedding was an opportunity to show their love and support. (There was the unexpected wedding card with a $100 check from Dawn’s great aunt and uncle – they later told us they knew about gay people from Oprah and Dr Phil). For others it took years for them to mention the marriage but gradually started to acknowledge us as a couple, and for some it was the end of their contact with us – it was too public – too real. There were the little changes: family started to introduce the other more often as partner or spouse while, before the wedding, the word ‘friend’ was more often used. Then – there were the cards that did not arrive, the acknowledgment from family and close friends that never transpired. We pushed down the emotions and the pain, but those feelings mark you and never really go away. Eventually you let go of the expectations, along with the unsupportive relationships. We grew tired of the intolerance.

In 2005 the Canadian government referred the constitutionality of the definition of marriage to the supreme court of Canada, and Canada became the fourth country in the world to allow same-sex marriage. As applicants in the original Charter Challenge we were asked by our lawyers to prepare affidavits to the Supreme Court to discuss the impact of marriage on our lives over the past two years.

After the wedding, waiting for the Supreme Court to respond to the reference question, was an emotionally taxing period – it felt as if our very identities were on trial. Being a part of the case, people did not hesitate to come up to us to share their opinions. They did not hesitate to challenge our reasons for involvement. We remember the angry people who accused us of taking something from them that was sacred and special and perverting it as a part of a ‘political agenda’. We try to forget and bury those conversations – but the hurt remains. It changed how we saw the people around us and how we saw ourselves within our community. During this time homophobia and heterosexism emerged from the shadows – no longer hidden in an insidious veil of political correctness. Hate slapped us in the face: hate was everywhere and we often found ourselves on the receiving end of that hate. Hate was represented in picket signs, the voices in the marches, the echo from the pulpits asking parishioners to pray that same-sex marriage did not come to be (I was at one of those services with friends for Easter). We watched busloads of protestors arriving on Parliament Hill to protest same-sex marriage; we experienced the stares and whispers as people recognized us from the newspaper; we felt the little personal attacks – like the people who deleted us from Facebook. We feared the hateful words graffitied in our back alley, ‘Die Dykes’, and questioned the job offered and then quickly denied. We could not escape the anger and hate as it was there every time we turned on the television, picked up the newspaper, listened to the radio. It felt that everywhere we turned someone had something to say. Views were polarized – but the loudest voices were the ones that were the most hateful.

Julie: Reflections on ‘Court challenges, public activism and white weddings’

In reflecting on the time immediately following our marriage two themes emerged: First was the personal shift, whereby I internalized the legitimacy of my marriage and, second, the political shift when I started to move from a personal journey to a political struggle. I became increasingly aware of homophobia and heterosexism as evidenced by the strong negative reactions to same-sex marriage. Our involvement in the case was now a part of the public discourse. I worked in a small community agency and remember being challenged by a co-worker who had no hesitation telling me her dismay that I was trying to co-opt and take something that she considered sacred. She asked me to let the case go, to back away. This felt like a deliberate attack on me and my identity. Adams’s (2014) use of autoethnography to explore relationships and reactions of his family to experiences of coming out evokes a pain and a feeling of discomfort to which I can relate. The public nature of marriage was for me a painful process of perpetual coming out. My role in the fight for same-sex marriage became a public displayof trying to justify my sexuality to family, friends, co-workers, acquaintances while rallying against anti-marriage rhetoric I experienced as homophobia.

On a personal level, marriage offered me a space wherein I felt my sexuality was normalized and legitimized. It was as if I had internalized society’s lack of acceptance and the legalization of marriage brought with it a sort of legitimization, which I was able to internalize.

The biggest impact of our marriage is the impact it has had on me personally. I feel stronger in my relationship with Dawn since our marriage and I can speak about my relationship with Dawn since our marriage with more confidence. When people used to ask, ‘Are you married?’ it would provoke a lot of emotion and internal conflict. Now when people ask ‘What is his name?’ I say: ‘Her name is Dawn.’ It is a powerful feeling for me that my government, the court and people who pass legislation, support me. (Affidavit)

Marriage also provided me with a sense of autonomy, security and political space from which to claim my sexuality. Prior to the legalization of marriage I would use the word ‘partner’ to describe my relationship with Dawn; however, more often than not this resulted in assumptions that Dawn was male, requiring me to either ignore or explicitly correct and ‘out’ myself. Following the legal right to marry, I was able to avoid this confusion by using the word ‘wife’ to refer to my relationship with Dawn – after which there was no longer confusion and I could avoid the ongoing and prolonged process of ‘coming out’ over and over again. This desire for normalization and legitimization of my relationship were at the root of the reasons that I engaged in the marriage case initially.

My relationship to Dawn has been forever changed because of our ability to marry. Our relationship is no longer a relationship that some people do not have to regard as legitimate or valid because it is a marriage that is legal. Our love is real.

I began using the words marriage, spouse and wife without apology. I decided that whether or not my family decided to support us, they knew that my relationship to Dawn was not a phase that would simply pass. I felt a sense of power and a new sense of legitimacy in my relationship. In fact, people were telling me that I had a new sense of confidence and even Dawn could feel a difference in our relationship, which I now attribute to a newly acquired and internalized sense of security. Marriage provided me with a way to take a place in Dawn’s family in a way that may not have been possible previously.

Our wedding gave friends and family an opportunity to show their support for our relationship. My marriage to Dawn has allowed me to assume a place as a member of her family in a way that would not have previously been possible. (Affidavit)

I am one of Dawn’s family in that I am referred to as daughter-in-law and am included in all the family events from serious decisions and conversations to the holidays and celebrations.

The more dramatic shift was from the personal to the political. While in my original affidavit I state that same-sex marriage was something I was doing for more than just me, I do not think I understood just how political the act of marriage would be. I did not anticipate the reactions by broader society and how these reactions demonstrated hatred toward sexual minorities. There were many protests, much hatred, and a tremendous amount of anger; I began to see the anti-marriage vitriol as a personal affront to me and other queer individuals, to my sexuality, and to my commitment to Dawn. This rejection on a personal level caused me to understand marriage as a political act. The disdain is less about my marriage to Dawn and more an opportunity for them to make a judgement about my identity. I feel the right to marry has given me a starting block from which I can challenge the rejection of queer identity.

Dawn: Reflections on ‘Court challenges, public activism and white weddings’

Marriage was not something I ever thought was for me – my affidavit to the Supreme Court of Canada stated that my ideal outcome would be to: ‘win the right to marry and, en masse, go to city hall, get marriage license and, on the steps of city hall, tear them up!’ For me a win was important because without the right to marry, same-sex couples were being denied the right to choose; the significance of which is exemplified by writer and activist bell hooks who aptly states: ‘oppression is the absence of choice’. Furthermore, I hoped that with same-sex marriage would come rights that make a real and tangible difference in the lives of individuals and families – inheritance rights, decisions for health directives, and decisions in the lives of children. It was certainly not about my personal goals (at least that is what I claimed at the time)!

‘It was a big relief,’ said Kitchener resident Dawn Onishenko, who is planning to marry her partner, Julie Erbland, at the end of June. ‘It was a surprise, it was wonderful. I was filled with tears and emotion.’

(Greeno, 2003, report in the Waterloo Record)

After the ceremony, Julie and I went with a friend to a local park to take pictures. It was quite the eye opener: Julie in a full-on wedding dress and veil and I in nondescript slacks and a blazer, while our friend, a young man, was wearing white dress pants and a blue shirt and tie that just happened to match the colour of the silk flowers Julie was carrying. (Remember, much of the wedding paraphernalia is due to the support and encouragement of the straight neighbours from our co-op building – we got married three days after the court ruling!). It was very interesting to watch onlookers smile and nod in a pleased manner as they assumed the bride and groom to be Julie and our male friend. And then came the look of shock, confusion and often, finally, disdain that crossed their faces (in addition to a few overt rude comments meant for us to overhear) as I took my place in the picture – beside Julie with my arm around her! While it was uncomfortable for us, we argued that there would be many interesting conversations around dinner tables that evening! I asserted that these encounters provide a symbolic confrontation to dominant structures as traditional social codes and appropriate social behavior are subverted and destabilized. It is in this counter-hegemonic public expression that dialectical exchange, overt or inadvertent, is stimulated. Equal marriage functioned on a structural scale, forcing the masses to step back, to say maybe I need to take this relationship as legitimate, as well as opening the space for LGBTQ people to claim that legitimacy.

However, reflecting on my writings in preparation for the Supreme Court Reference, five years after my first affidavit and two years post Ontario passing equal marriage, I do not think that I anticipated the impact that marriage would have on me on a profoundly personal level. The journey of marriage forced me to a place of reflexivity where I have had to challenge myself to look at both the inward and outward impacts of marriage. As an activist, I regarded the fight for equal marriage as something that I engaged in that was bigger than me and indeed approached it with reluctance and scepticism. It was the inward, personal reflection that surprised me, and did not come easily. I started to see how marriage has to be both a personal and political experience and it is an act that involves people at its core. Before he died, my elderly grandfather expressed that he was so happy that I had found someone to be with for the rest of my life. I do not think that there would have been a way to tell my grandfather about my relationship without the vehicle of marriage. Marriage offered a common language that we could both understand. My right to marriage paved the way for this personal transformation. While marriage facilitated personal transformation, my political motivations for equality solidified.

Ten years later

Our trip to Asheville, North Carolina, to present at UNC Queer Conference, marked the 10-year anniversary of winning the right to marry in the Ontario Superior Court and the 10-year anniversary of our marriage. Being in Asheville in 2013 reminded us of the period in Canada when same-sex marriage was being publicly debated. Everywhere we went there were signs that the USA was in the middle of the campaign for equal marriage, even the airline steward had the symbol for equal marriage tattooed on his wrist. Our presentation at the conference was a reminder of how polarizing the debate surrounding same-sex marriage could be within the queer community. We were challenged as to why we would subscribe to such a heterosexual institution and were questioned about the risks of assimilation and loss of queer culture. We challenged back: no one has defined our relationship other than us. We have taken marriage and queered it as our own. We shared stories of discrimination and homophobia that we had faced in the weeks just leading up to the conference as a way of illustrating that marriage is one step toward a larger struggle for acceptance and equality. We asserted that marriage is not the end of the journey for equality or acceptance, but one point on the queer continuum. To us, marriage is still as relevant as it was 10 years ago because queer people are still fighting to be seen, fighting against discrimination, fighting for basic survival; queer identity still intersects with many other marginal identities, making the fight even more complex. It was at this time that we realized that our experience needed to be shared as a way of reflecting on the personal and political nature of same-sex marriage and the importance of recognizing the profoundly human nature of the struggle.

Our 2013 attendance at Queering Spaces/Queering Boarders 2013 Queer Studies Conference at University of North Carolina provided an opportunity to again write, reflect and share our experiences of marriage. This conference, the stories we shared, and the dialogue we engaged in, represents a milestone for several reasons. First, the conference marked 10 years since our wedding and winning the marriage case in Ontario; with the passage of 10years we have had significant time to reflect on our journey and what the right to marry means to us – and has meant to us in the past. Secondly, the conference took place in the USA at a time when that country was in the midst of fighting for equal marriage. This provided an opportunity to us to reflect back and share our learning from our 10-year journey as much of the dialogue and debate that people were engaging in within the USA context overlapped and was similar to our own experiences in a Canadian context.

Julie: Reflections on ‘Ten years later’

At the conference, I shared how I felt about the right to marriage for same-sex couples 10 years after the Charter Challenge in Canada. I shared that I still feel strongly about what I said in my affidavits as they were prepared from a real and personal place that represented the truth to me – in that moment. However, what is also true is that the meaning of marriage has continued to evolve. Although marriage continues to have significance in terms of internalizing society's acceptance of me, the fight for marriage also made me more political when it came to queer issues. I also became less interested in educating others and became less tolerant of ignorance. Perhaps the case and what we were exposed to tired me out or perhaps I feel that it is not always my role to educate others. Regardless, I now feel no need to hide, apologize or justify my queerness to others. With the passage of 10 years I also have the recognition that marriage has not ended the marginalization and oppression faced by sexual minorities. Rather, reflection has brought an understanding that the marriage case was a platform from which to continue to fight for equal rights because of continued discrimination and oppression. Recently when discussing my experience as a sexual minority I was told ‘being gay was so last year’; I was also challenged by a co-worker that I was promoted only because I was willing to ‘work longer hours as they didn't think I would have kids’. While the attainment of rights present opportunities, it also creates new challenges as homophobia and heterosexism become more invisible. What I also remind myself is that what I have learned over the 10-year journey is that this is a struggle that continues to be composed of people’s personal journeys and stories. We need to respect how people choose to be a part of that journey. For Dawn and me, part of that journey was the fight for same-sex marriage: no, we were not assimilated; rather, we have embodied marriage and politicized it and queered it as our own.

Dawn: Reflections on ‘Ten years later’

Ten years later, I find myself in Ashville, North Carolina – once again reflecting on whether or not this struggle was worth it – whether it fits with my politics or was a waste of activist energy. My truth in this moment is, I believe, a bit of both. What I mean is that the question of marriage is a complex issue that impacts individuals and society on multiple and intersecting levels. The question of marriage cannot be reduced to a good/bad binary; rather, marriage needs to be considered in all its complexity. Furthermore, given the personal and political nature of marriage I realize 10 years later that marriage has been personally transformative on multiple levels. The struggle for inclusion (equal marriage) itself is the embodiment of person. The struggle for recognition transcends all aspects of our being. The act of marriage is publicly visible and impacts our social, physical, mental well-being. I have also confirmed for myself the danger of the normalizing function of marriage; through marriage, society begins to see queers as ‘the same as’ straight people and that those who fall out of the norms (the outsiders) and conventions become even more marginalized. Indeed, equal marriage may work to privilege those of preferable ethno-racial, gender, ability, sexual identity, cis-normative, and socio-economic standing. Thus, 10 years later, while we won the victory for same-sex marriage in Canada, the reasons that I got involved in the case, are still just as, or even more, relevant today than they were 10 years ago. I continue to try and embody this struggle by claiming the language of marriage whenever possible, by challenging dominant notions of what it means to be queer, and being vigilant to the oppression and marginalization that may be further concealed in an era of equal rights.

Conclusion

Through storytelling and reflection, this critical co-constructed autoethnography illustrates how our experience of marriage was far from fixed; rather, it was an interpretive dance with the meaning shifting, often ambiguous and, not infrequently, tenuous. Through the sharing of how we were impacted by society around us, we have attempted to demonstrate the intersection of the personal and political, recognizing that our reasons and expectations for marriage were influenced within a context that was broader than the personal experiences of two people. We share these stories, not only for ourselves, but also for others as a way of offering insight into an experience otherwise unknown and invisible. The fight for equal marriage in Canada was a unique and historical point in time; therefore, our critical reflections provide an opportunity to learn through our experiences and reflect upon how we can make meaning of a complicated event, fraught with contradictions and controversy. Although we were two people going through the same journey at the same time, the truth of what marriage meant to us, then and now, remains partial, perspectival, and evolving; indeed, liberation struggles happen differently for different people and the experiences, the transformation, and the lessons are not always as they appear on the surface. Further, the reasons and expectations for why individuals decide to (or not to) become involved in such personal and political liberation struggles are often happenstance. These decisions can be complicated, both positive and negative, for personal and political reasons, and may involve unexpected motivations that even the individual does not understand or acknowledge at the time.

While queer theory tends to dismiss civil rights in favour of a politic of transgression and anti-assimilation (Butler, 1990; Warner, 2002), queer praxis allows for the intersection of queer theory as it integrates into lived realities. It is crucial that queer theory is inserted into practice in order to enable the disruption of dominant discourses, as the alternative is that queer theory remains detached from lived experience – running the risk of becoming an abstract theoretical construct and failing to disrupt hegemony. We demonstrate this link through the example of the fight for equal marriage; rather than dismiss the fight for marriage as assimilationist and ineffective, marriage and other ‘mainstream’ equality struggles must be considered in context of lived realities and human experience, and then deconstructed through a lens of resistance. This autoethnographic account of equal marriage puts queer theory into practice by deliberately queering marriage as our own, by claiming the institution as an embodiment of our queerness, and by challenging the dominant discourses of marriage and opening spaces for alternative and countercultural discourses and identities.

And there are no tears for the widows

No tears for the widows

For the women who’ve lost lovers

And must carry on alone

And life goes on, but for them

There is no space on any forms

Yes, ‘marriage’ is a special word

And only meant for some.¹

Footnotes

Note

Dawn Onishenko is an assistant associate professor in the School of Social Work at Ryerson University. Her research interests include LGBTTI2SQQ rights, identity and liberation and anti-oppressive social work practice. Dawn has engaged in research and published in the area of social movements and social change, citizenship, equality rights and the role of jurisgenerative politics/praxis in bringing about social change. Her current research explores how the perception of increased access to human rights for sexual minorities wanting refugee status in Canada, particularly in light of recent changes to the Immigration/Refugee Act, has created a precarious situation for sexual minority refugees seeking refuge in Canada.

Julie Erbland is a doctoral student at Ryerson University in the Policy Studies program and is currently working on research related to the intersection of youth justice and social policy. Her research interests include social inclusion/exclusion, the criminalization of youth, youth rights and citizenship and queer youth. She has extensive experience in developing and carrying out evaluations of youth programs. Julie has dedicated the past 15 years to social work and policy analysis related to diverse and marginalized populations.

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