Love Lawfully

Disclaimer:

The views in this article are solely my own and do not speak for the student body or the school. Sensitive topics such as interracial marriage, the caste system, and gay marriage are discussed here. My goal is to encourage thoughtful discussion, not to offend or alienate anyone.

This is a personal reflection, and I encourage open-minded engagement with these complex issues and welcome respectful conversations. Thank you for your understanding!

Introduction:

Half of the songs out there are about it. Rarely books do not speak of it. We even have an entire day dedicated to celebrating it. All you need is love, right? And yet, despite the monumental importance our media and we ourselves have given to the concept of love, it has always known boundaries. Think of interracial couples in the 20th century, or gay men in modern day Japan.

The Caste System in India:

Another version of this story can be found in India, in the age-old Caste system. Weaponized by the British to keep the country under their control, the scars left over by the centuries of discriminating between castes are still fresh. Although intercaste marriage in India has been legal since 1872, even now, only 5% of India’s marriages are inter-caste, a measly figure mostly influenced by social pressure. Young people who challenge the norm are rejected by their communities, and women especially face the danger of ‘honour killings’ for failing to uphold their family’s honour. 

Homosexuality and Gay Marriage:

In our modern world, there are still 71 countries in which being gay is a crime, and only 38 out of the 193 countries on our planet have legalised same sex marriage. We can blame the ripple effects of colonialism for the banning of homosexuality in areas like the Middle East, Africa and South East Asia. During the colonial era, Europeans exported their legal systems to such places, which included a complete rejection of queerness and gay marriage. Around 50% of the countries that still forbid homosexuality today can trace the roots of their laws back to Great Britain. Even in the countries where the LGBTQ+ community is relatively accepted, many still harbour an irrational fear of gay marriage, imagining that it somehow poses a threat to heterosexual relationships. It’s so depressing, remarked a certain Instagram reel I encountered while doom scrolling some weeks ago, that out of all the terrible things out there in the world, love is the one thing that humanity chose to be afraid of. 

Conclusion:

Love has always had restrictions. Not only between gay people, mixed race couples, but also between social classes, nationalities, and transgender people. Even the story of Romeo and Juliet, despite the pair’s shared whiteness and social class, is arguably about the limitations society places on love. We take for granted that love comes without a price or taxes. That may be true for the market in which you live, but there are millions of others who are not afforded the same privilege. Because love is not free. We caged it long ago. 

Sources:

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-47823588

https://www.thepinknews.com/2024/06/21/how-many-countries-is-it-illegal-to-be-gay/

https://encyclopediaofarkansas.net/entries/anti-miscegenation-laws-3508/

https://www.hrc.org/resources/marriage-equality-around-the-world#:~:text=There%20are%20currently%2038%20countries,%2C%20the%20Netherlands%2C%20New%20Zealand%2C