A letter to the prime minister, who has announced that he has no plans to define and protect marriage as what it is – the union of one man and one woman.
Dear Mr. Harper:
I have wonderful news and I’d like to share it with you and the government. I’m going to marry myself. There, I’ve said it. The same-person marriage has given me that freedom and I’ve never been as happy or as proud. Well, both of us are really. Equally happy and proud. I’m going to rush down to City Hall with myself and get a marriage licence and everybody in that office will cheer and applaud, because finally freedom has been achieved.
I love myself. I really, really do. Genuine, deep love. We’ve been together for years now and there is no way we’ll ever break up. It’s a special love and I know that not everybody will understand it. But you, dear prime minister, seem to be on side. Anyway, what does that matter if some people don’t get it? We think alike, laugh at the same things, enjoy the same food. Even dress alike. Cute, I know.
It’s true we can’t have children, but we can always adopt. Or one of us could have brief, loveless sex with an obliging woman who will then hand over the little person after nine months. Nothing odd about that; it happens a lot these days. You say that these children are pawns, being used and exploited and indoctrinated, but there’s no evidence for that. Okay, it’s just started and we don’t know what will happen in the future. But if I’m willing to take a chance on the lives of numerous little boys and girls, so should you.
There are always those religious nuts who will call me, call us, crazy, but they should look at themselves first. There are only a few dozen of these evangelical Christian types around and they all live in one small town in Alberta . So, who cares? You, more than most people, know that they can’t stop your party from being elected.
I mean, I may not have read the Bible or anything and I don’t actually know any real Christians, but I’ve been told that the Bible in fact allows self-marriage and that the church has persecuted and executed millions of self-lovers over the centuries. Didn’t Jesus say, “Never, ever, ever judge anyone or anything and do whatever you like at any time”? Nothing more to be said on that one, then.
Then there are the hysterical people who say that it’s all a slippery slope and that next we’ll be marrying brothers and sisters and men to four women. But incest is illegal. Mind you, so was same-person marriage until recently, so I suppose the law can be changed very easily. And why not, indeed? Love is everything.
It’s all about equality. I demand to have what you have. In fact, I want more equality than you have. I demand that whilst I can say lots of nasty things in my community, in my newspapers and on friendly and sympathetic television and radio shows about your alleged stupidity and bigotry, if you dare say anything like that about me, I’ll sue you or take you to a human rights tribunal. And you can be sure they’ll hear my case.
Even if I don’t win, it’ll cost you thousands of dollars and lots of stress to defend yourself. Sorry, but that’s the price we have to pay for equality. You see, society is evolving. Just because you say society might actually be getting worse with all of the materialism, moral decay and the rest it, I know that the very fact that I can now marry myself means that it’s getting better and more enlightened.
It’s been argued by some selfophobes that many, if not most, of the writers and columnists who support self-marriage have nothing to say about, for example, Arab children being bombed to death by super-powers, about poverty in the Third World caused by the West or any other major issue. But they are obsessed about self-love.
All I can say to these people is that they don’t understand just how painful it is for a person when he or she or it is not allowed to marry his or her self. It’s probably the most important issue in the history of the world. If you understand that, you’d understand why the views of the majority of Canadians are totally irrelevant.
Wish us luck on our journey of devotion and discovery. Marriage is a lot of fun and getting funnier all the time. Dearest prime minister, thank you for being on my, our, side. Thank and bless you – you are a friend and an ally.
Coren can be booked for public speaking engagements at www.michaelcoren.com.