They call themselves a ‘throuple’ and they consist of three women who say they are ‘married’ to one another and are expecting a baby. A ‘throuple’, since you ask, is a variation on the word ‘couple’ but is made up of three people, not two.
Now, here is my question to those who support same-sex marriage; if gender is not essential to the nature of marriage then why limit it to two people? Why not allow multi-partner marriages like this if more than two people are willing to commit to one another?
A standard objection to multi-partner marriage is that it tends to arise in very patriarchal societies. But a ‘marriage’ between three women overcomes this charge automatically.
In Brazil, a civil partnership involving three people was recognised by a local notary 2012. At least one person in the relationship was reportedly bisexual. Should a person be limited to marrying just one person of the two sexes they desire? It’s hard to see how this kind of relationship is ‘patriarchal’ either.
In addition, if one woman can marry two men, or two other women, or three men can marry one another, then the charge of ‘patriarchy’ loses even more of its force.
At the end of the day, once we think marriage is simply about consent then the argument in favour of limiting it to just two people starts to crumble. And if multi-partner relationships that include children are becoming a reality, shouldn’t we simply recognise that reality by creating legal structures for them?
Indeed, if consent is the essence of marriage, then why do they need to be sexual unions?
So what we see is that once we decide that marriage is not by definition the sexual union of a man and a woman, it becomes very hard to hold onto certain other features of marriage, for example monogamy and sexual union.
To repeat, the challenge here is for those who support same-sex marriage; if the sex of the spouses has nothing to do with the nature of marriage, then why limit marriage to couples and why should marriage have to involve sex?
Answers on a postcard please.