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Jun. 27th, 2023 09:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
conulyDear Prudence,
My older brother “Ethan” came out to the family as gay a few years ago. It went well within our family, but our extended family has had mixed reactions. Our paternal grandparents were not pleased and have not spoken to him since. Our dad passed away about a year ago, and their other children are childless, so we stand to inherit their fortune. Ethan is no longer in our grandparents’ will. Ethan recently introduced us (me, my mother, and our other siblings) to his fiancée Emily. He says he’s marrying Emily, while his boyfriend marries Emily’s girlfriend. They’ll have what he calls a “lavender marriage.”
The four of them seemingly have this all planned out. Both couples want kids, it’s far easier to have kids in a heterosexual relationship even if they aren’t likely to have sex. They’re worried about tightening restrictions for same-sex couples and they have plausible deniability if that happens (they live in a very blue state but I suppose anything could happen nationally). He then plans on going to our grandparents and telling them that he made a mistake, that he isn’t actually gay, and some sort of script about finding God again or whatever that will make our grandparents hopefully put him back in the will. I feel like there are a lot of reasons why this isn’t a good idea.
I’m not gay and I’m 20, and Ethan is gay and he’s 30, so maybe I don’t have the life experience to speak to this, but wouldn’t it be better for Ethan and his friends to speak up and out against homophobia rather than try to hide? I am a wheelchair user and a woman and if they made laws that similarly restricted me, I wouldn’t be able to hide so I guess I’d have to fight back. My siblings and I all support Ethan, and I don’t think there’s any rule against us all giving him a portion of our inheritance after our grandparents pass. But I guess he has it all figured out so I’m not sure that I can change his mind. How can I support him when I feel so uneasy about this? My other siblings feel the same way that I do. I don’t think our mother fully understands Ethan’s plan.
—Lavender Marriage
( Read more... )
My older brother “Ethan” came out to the family as gay a few years ago. It went well within our family, but our extended family has had mixed reactions. Our paternal grandparents were not pleased and have not spoken to him since. Our dad passed away about a year ago, and their other children are childless, so we stand to inherit their fortune. Ethan is no longer in our grandparents’ will. Ethan recently introduced us (me, my mother, and our other siblings) to his fiancée Emily. He says he’s marrying Emily, while his boyfriend marries Emily’s girlfriend. They’ll have what he calls a “lavender marriage.”
The four of them seemingly have this all planned out. Both couples want kids, it’s far easier to have kids in a heterosexual relationship even if they aren’t likely to have sex. They’re worried about tightening restrictions for same-sex couples and they have plausible deniability if that happens (they live in a very blue state but I suppose anything could happen nationally). He then plans on going to our grandparents and telling them that he made a mistake, that he isn’t actually gay, and some sort of script about finding God again or whatever that will make our grandparents hopefully put him back in the will. I feel like there are a lot of reasons why this isn’t a good idea.
I’m not gay and I’m 20, and Ethan is gay and he’s 30, so maybe I don’t have the life experience to speak to this, but wouldn’t it be better for Ethan and his friends to speak up and out against homophobia rather than try to hide? I am a wheelchair user and a woman and if they made laws that similarly restricted me, I wouldn’t be able to hide so I guess I’d have to fight back. My siblings and I all support Ethan, and I don’t think there’s any rule against us all giving him a portion of our inheritance after our grandparents pass. But I guess he has it all figured out so I’m not sure that I can change his mind. How can I support him when I feel so uneasy about this? My other siblings feel the same way that I do. I don’t think our mother fully understands Ethan’s plan.
—Lavender Marriage
( Read more... )