The word "husband"

You should know whether or not you'd personally like to use the word "husband" to describe your committed other, would you not?

 

I think it would be awkward for me at first. But I said the same thing about coming out, I though it would be tough and hard to be around people who know you're gay.... but surprisingly its not at all. I imagine I wouldn't mind it after a bit of doing it.

 

This is exactly the reason that I predicted as to why gay people, especially men, would not want to use "husband" as their first choice of a term describing their committed partner: gay people in society have grown up to learn that the concept of marriage is between "one man and one woman." We are so accustomed to that, that even for these gay people, "two husbands" or "two wives" is considered awkward at first. And you can see that with a lot of people who replied here: They don't like the term "husband" to describe their "partner." They say that while they don't mind the term "partner", "husband" causes them to think of their relationship as heterosexist. While many others who replied here had their own personal reason as to why, I just think that your statements describing why you wouldn't choose the term "husband" at first might be the above-all unconscious reason as to why gay people generally don't want to use the word, "husband": They don't want to use the term because the idea of that being in their relationships is still unfamiliar to them and it would cause them an awkward feeling at.

That said, I think that once gay marriage is well-known and mainstream, a lot of gay guy's oppinion on the word would begin to shift, similiar to your prediction of how you might use the term "husband" once you have used it for a while and became more comfortable with it.

 

...(edited out)...

 

I personally dont like the word husband either, and i much prefer the term partner, or boyfriend while im younger....but i definately wanna have a life long commitment one day

 

After some thought, i realised that 'husband' and 'wife' has a mild religious context. Really heterosexual couples too have "partners".

Ive met many people throughout my life who decided to forgo all religious ceremony in favour of a secular institution. Although they still call each other husband and wife, it really isnt proper, is it? Technically they too are just "partners".

Sure, if you got married in a church or whatnot then of course, at the end they pronounce you 'husband and wife'. Ill jump onto the opposite side of the fence to say i think "partner" is a nice term for people who perhaps dont want a religious context, but if they do, they too should have the small comfort to be pronounced 'husband and husband'.

To me the question now is; should heterosexual couples who enter secular civil unions call each other "husband and wife"?

 

Today was weird. I am a consultant for businesses to improve customer service aspects. So, sometimes I have to go into businesses and “pretend” to be a customer and I never get to tell them I am just checking out their skills.

Sometimes I have to pretend to be married (have to blame something on my spouse – ie buying a duplicate item so I need to make a return). Anyway, before coming out, it was easy for me to say, “ya, my husband…blahblahblah”. Today, I had to think about it. Was I going to say husband, or spouse, or partner, or what? In the final analysis, it doesn’t really matter because they don’t know I am not really “taken”, “married” or whatever. But, it was kind of freeing to say “my spouse” versus “husband”. Probably sound weird, but I have agreed with myself to not pretend anymore, and I think this was one step toward achieving that goal – although my whole job sometimes is pretending, but that’s different.