never Miss a beat

Don’t know about you but I like it when the marriages are REALLY SCREWED UP. This is one of my favourite scenes in a movie ever: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVN4wU7pANw

It is said that Disney/Hollywood has given us unrealistic expectations about love; a perfect world of marriage and 2.4 children that we can live “happily ever after” in. And because it’s unrealistic we relish watching it fall apart. So in American Beauty when Kevin Spacey and Annette Bening get years of Shit Marriage Baggage off their chests, we LOL in recognition of the “dysfunctional family” because it can often be the functional Norm. It’s a perfect scene; the destruction of the middle class, Westernised utopia - even organic vegetables get involved in the soiling of an interior designed home.

Now “Marriage” is a word in danger of losing its meaning. Or so goes the argument that changing the law to accommodate gay and lesbian weddings will “weaken the institution of marriage”. Marriage (that thing that works EVERY TIME) is going to mean nothing if we let every Tom, Dick and Harry (/Beyonce, Kelly and Michelle) enjoy it too… WITH EACH OTHER. The solid reputation of “Marriage”, which we ridicule in movies, soaps, magazines, birthday cards… is going to suffer if we let gay people do it. The concept of marriage is impervious to the reality of many unhappy relationships resulting from long work hours, Skyrim, football, Sex And The City re-runs on TV… Marriage is invincible to all of this in 2012. But if we let “the gays” get married that will make “Marriage” limp and, like, totally lessened somewhat… 

Well, it’s obvious to me that the concept of “marriage” has been under fire from heterosexuals for years. And if we want to talk about “weakening the institution” and making a mockery, I shall explose one person whose escaped blame for far too long. Ladies and gentlemen, WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT PEACHES GELDOF. 

Right now according to the laws of England, girls and boys of the age of 18 have the right to get married. Let’s remind ourselves of what Peaches Geldof did with this law:

1. 19-year-old Peaches met Max Dummey – a man in “a band”. They were a modern couple (they met on MySpace). Max and Peaches went on to experience what many would call a “whirlwind” romance. To elaborate, The Telegraph reports that Peaches and Max had “been friends for a month and dating for a week” before they decided to make things official (ie, get married).

2. On 5 August 2008, Peaches married Max at the Little White Wedding Chapel in Las Vegas. The Hangover came out a year after this event so the reason for a Vegas wedding is more likely due to Glastonbury 2009 being far too long a wait.

3. Max and Peaches knew what marriage in the 21st century was about. Just ask Peaches… “It’s not like I’m going to be donning an apron and rubber gloves. I’m very feminist in that way”.  But she later admitted it was “a bit silly”. “You can’t ignore divorce rates…,” she accepts. “I didn’t go into it thinking, ‘This is going to last forever,’ but I did go into it thinking, ‘I love him right now’.” (Remember “now” means “this week”). This from the daughter of Sir Bob Geldof, a man honoured by The Queen of Great Britain, where Marriage is an old religious “institution” in danger of becoming “weakened” if we allow gay people to do it too.