Julie Bindel on same-sex marriage: Abolish it all and replace with civil partnerships

Guardian columnist Julie Bindel has claimed that all marriage should be abolished and replaced with civil partnerships.

The controversial feminist writer made the comments in an interview with new crowdfunded journalism platform, Byline.

When asked what she thought of same sex marriage, she said: “Exactly the way I feel about marriage in general. Abolish it.

“Give everybody the right to civil partnership if you need legal protection, have a party whenever you want. Feminists used to say that marriage was really bad for women.

“I would argue that it has changed – I think it’s less bad now for sure. But I just think it’s a complete nonsense.”

Bindel also discussed the controversy surrounding her views on the transgender community: “I think that transgender people have been very badly served by the medical profession by not being allowed to live in a body that would serve them perfectly well were they not expected to conform, and that’s what I as a feminist try to open up as a discussion, although that’s been completely silenced now.

“Then there are the transgender people who are perfectly happy being transgender, who have never regretted getting surgery, or their new definition of womanhood, manhood or whatever. Good luck to them, but let’s not pretend that gender is an essential thing. It’s not. It’s a social construction, so there’s no such thing as a real man or a real woman.”

Bindel has previously claimed that a “trans cabal” were “running a witch hunt” against people who offended them, after becoming embroiled in a dispute with trans activists.

In the interview, she also attempted to clarify controversial comments she made  last year claiming homosexuality is a choice, saying: “When I use the word choice, I mean it in an anti-‘gay gene’ way. It’s a terrible word because it suggests that you just think, ‘Oh I’m just going to choose to be a lesbian’, having had no attraction to women, no interest in it – of course that doesn’t happen.

“But if there isn’t a gay gene, then how else do you explain it? Other than a ‘choice’, although that’s a terrible word.

“That’s what I mean by it. If there is a gay gene, there’s a bisexual gene, there’s probably also a child abuser gene, a criminal gene, an I-like-purple-not-yellow gene.

“It’s essentialism. You don’t have a gay gene. If we had a number of people who are born each year, two to three percent who are born lesbian and gay, how do we explain those that shift later in life? How do we explain the vast swathes of unhappy heterosexuals?  You just can’t argue the essentialist notion.”

She has also claimed that gay marriage is “a waste of time and effort”, and claimed that the term “queer” was being used by “anyone who is into kinky sex”.

• Nov 29 2023

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