A good friend of mine and regular reader of this blog has started his own blog. He recently wrote a post about “heteronormativity.” It reminded me that I had posted about this issue and I looked up my old post. Man, back in 2010. Time to update with a new post on the matter, since back then my (then) partner and I were not married, and we are now.

And with same-sex marriage hitting the headlines again due to U.S. Supreme Court inaction, heteronormativity has become a topic of conversation again. What does same-sex marriage and heteronormativity have to do with each other, if anything?

I looked up the definitition of “heteronormative.” I found that the word was first used in 1991, and means this:

a pervasive and institutionalized ideological system that naturalizes heterosexuality as universal; it must continually reproduce itself to maintain hegemony over other non-normative sexualities and ways of identity construction.

Or, as Wikipedia defines it:

Heteronormativity is the belief that people fall into distinct and complementary genders (man and woman) with natural roles in life.

It refers to marriage, traditional family values, values of organized Christian religion, suburbia, and the ‘the American Dream’.

Once again, this caused quite a discussion in our household. Are we “heteronormative?” Well, it did not take long for either my spouse or myself to answer, “yes we are.” My spouse and I have traditional values in that we believe in personal integrity, financial responsibility, and monogamity. We live in the greater snoburbs of our nation’s capital, but not in the city itself. We both do not like city life.

However, my friend’s blog took it from a different angle. To him, heteronormativity also has to do with one partner in a relationship assuming a male or dominant role, and one partner assuming a female or submissive role. The male was the breadwinner and the female was the housekeeper and caregiver of children. He went on to describe how the view of a “normal” married life has been portrayed, dating back to the 1950s sitcoms of Leave it to Beaver and Father Knows Best.

That was the 50s, this is now. Nowadays, most couples, gay or straight, divide household duties rather equally, as well as childcare duties. I sure see that in my family among my nieces and nephews. And the same is true for our household, where we are equal breadwinners, equally financially responsible for paying our bills, and also equally divide household duties where each of us does things that we are good at or don’t mind doing (such as I do the cooking and my spouse does the laundry).

I guess one difference from the dictionary definition is that neither my spouse or I are dominant or submissive. We are truly equal. (Go figure that out when it comes to intimacy, but it works. And works well!) My friend’s blog post also stated (from quoting a famous lesbian):

that heteronomatively defined gender roles don’t have a place in same-sex relationships. Both come to the table as partners and equally share in the responsibilities of the relationship, both in and out of the bedroom. Neither expects to be the husband.

Well again, while both my spouse and I prefer to call each other spouse, we are indeed the husband to the other. Equally.

My spouse and I have a single family home in a nice neighborhood. I have a good job and my spouse is retired from a long career. Between us, we own three vehicles (my Harley being one of them.) In essence, we are living the American Dream.

There are only things that were not stated: 1) we do not owe money on credit cards or car payments, which is unfortunately typical of American Dreamers; and 2) we do not go along with the hypocrisy of organized Christian religion, though my spouse is a practicing Catholic. Yet we violate his religion’s tenets, but I will not explain why. You can figure that out.

Is there anything wrong with being heteronormative? That is, because we are gay, does that mean that we must reject all things considered to be values and lifestyles of heterosexual couples? Was that a reason not to marry?

I do not think any of these things are true. We value living a good, decent life, taking care of ourselves and our loved-ones, doing the right thing, and affirming our commitment to one another. The only things we have deliberately chosen not to do is to adopt children and to spend money we do not have. Otherwise, we are as heteronormative as they come. And married, to boot. So what?

Life is short: live normally, however that is defined.