The Times Are Changing

BOSTON -- Matt Laderer figured it was the kind of stuff straight people talk about with their moms and dads: When is the right time to get married? How do you pop the question?

“I realized, I don’t know that information,” the 24-year-old mechanical engineer said on a recent night out with his boyfriend at Club Cafe, a gay bar in Boston’s South End. “I don’t know when to buy the ring.”

When Massachusetts became the first state to legalize same-sex marriage one year ago, it was hailed by gays and lesbians as a milestone in their struggle for acceptance. But it also added a new dimension to the gay dating scene -- the pressure to get married. (source)

This is something new to think about. I also realize that I never really gave much thought to how this would change the dating scene for gay and lesbian people. Questions like, “Should I propose?”, “What’s the right time?”, were never an option for Kent and myself. We just kind of... happened, over time. Part of that angers me greatly. We overcame all kinds of bad stuff to be where we are today because we had zero support, and that didn’t have to happen. Are we stronger because of it? I think we probably are. We know that, no matter what happens, we can rely on each other, because on so many occasions in our adult lives, we’ve had to do just that.

But for a lot of gay and lesbian people who are dating, this adds a new dimension to the scene - commitment. And not only commitment, but societal commitment - it’s marriage. We’ve never had that before or had access to that. This is new for the couples in Massachusetts. For the first time, but only in one state in this nation, we actually belong and are part of society.