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Hedgehog's View on Marriage

By Hedgehog.

I used to provide prickly thoughts for this august journal, but decided to retire some years ago. However, I now find there are new subjects causing my prickles to rise, and, not being the kind of hedgehog who curls up into a little ball and waits till the source of annoyance goes away, I’ve come out of retirement to ask the question: What do we mean by ‘marriage’? The answer, at first blush, seems obvious: one man, one woman, for life.

But you don’t have to go to a church or registry office, swear solemn vows and come out with a piece of paper in your hired suit pocket to be ‘one man, one woman, for life’. And anyway, how can you possibly know when you’re barely old enough to grow a November moustache that the relationship will last for life? And what does being together for ‘life’ mean – could be anything from a few minutes to 80 years?

In the warmth of my burrow, I followed the process of passing the law making same-gender marriage legal, and I noticed something which disturbed my preparations for winter hibernation – no-one seemed to want to ask or answer the question: “What makes a relationship into a marriage?” The silence was deafening and disturbing in equal measure.

And the reason no-one could answer that question is because there is no definition of marriage which fits the whole population. It’s a big, muddy puddle of mixed and contradictory ideals which are impossible to make work.

Don’t misunderstand me – Mrs Hedgehog and I have been together for a long time and we’re very happy together, thank you, but of course we hedgehogs don’t have any legal or religious processes for our relationships, so we’re a bit confused by the way humans go about it. As far as I can tell, we’re a lot happier together than many married humans, so we find ourselves wondering why you bother. I’ve got nothing against marriage. It’s just that we don’t see the need for it, so we don’t really understand how it works in most others.

For example, it’s generally assumed that marriage should be lifelong. Snag is that, a hundred years ago, lifelong was rarely more than twenty five years or so, because so many female humans died in childbirth and so many male humans died of work-related and poverty-related diseases. Nowadays, for all you humans out there, if you marry young and stay healthy, you could be stuck with each other for as much as 80 years! Gosh, I’m glad I’m a hedgehog and not human!

It also generally assumed among humans that marriage leads to having children, but you can do that without getting married. In fact, lots do! I understand from my clergy friends that it’s not unusual to have a couple’s children serving as bridesmaids and for the best man to be the groom’s son!

And what about childless marriages? Are they marriages – or something else?

What about older couples, well past childbearing age, who seek a partner for mutual comfort and company? Do they need to marry before they’re allowed to share a bed?

To us hedgehogs, it all seems terribly confusing. It gets even more so when people talk about same-sex marriages. We assume they mean ‘same-gender’ marriage, but since no-one seems able to define ‘marriage’ very clearly, it’s hard to know how it applies to same-gender couples.

So why do humans get married? Is it just because it makes the relationship legal in some way? In which case, what is the status of a couple who love one another, have been together for many years, share a home, a mortgage, have children and grandchildren and are looking forward to a happy retirement, but have never been to a registry office or church for a formal ceremony of marriage. Does marriage depend on a contract or on commitment?

So many questions! My prickles are feeling extra prickly. Time to hibernate, I think.