O nooooo a word that is completely fucking accurate but does not directly reaffirm my cis het self!! The horror.
I like the term partner because girlfriend sounds like Im in high school. But throw in the added benefit of not heteronormalizing basic conversation AND making intolerant people uncomfortable… good stuff.
I always liked “cosmic orphan buddy” instead of “girlfriend” even though I was never really sure what it means. I solved the whole problem by becoming permanently single.
I remember first hearing “partner” when I was in high school and I LOVED IT. It’s such a nice term - it says you’re a team. What’s not to like?
A Singaporean coworker once described her relationship status as “oh, I’m attached” and I loved that, too.
In reverse, my colleague called her husband “adventurous”, I thought that sounded really positive - it means he has affairs
Yeeeesh that’s one way to put it
We see conservatives complain about teachers’ sexuality being “shoved down their throat”.
But this seems like a way to avoid that. Maybe we should encourage it for all teachers gay or straight, married or in non-married relationship. Then the conservative complaint could be taken at face value and the woman teacher married to a man could avoid “shoving their sexuality down your throat” even when that sexuality is within a heterosexual marriage.
As a heterosexual married man, if I suspected I was dealing with a homophobe, I might refer to my wife as my partner, just to mess with them. And because the identity of my partner isn’t any of their business
I have pretty much always used the term “partner” for my hetero relationship. A coworker once asked me why, since they had met my partner and knew their pronouns and that it was a hetero relationship. I explained
- I feel that it’s a better description. They are my partner in my life. “Boyfriend” / “Girlfriend” feels kinda immature/weak.
- People don’t need to know my damn business. If I’m talking to a stranger they don’t need to know that much about my life.
- If it helps to normalize the use of the term, then that’s great.
Hell, we’re getting married soon, and I will probably still use it. Or maybe say “my spouse” instead. Right now I say Fiancé / Fiancée which I do like. Since when said aloud, it still has the ambiguity.
but how does anyone know I own them as property? /s
We see conservatives complain about teachers’ sexuality being “shoved down their throat”.
It was never about being against their sexuality, it’s being against anything outside of the heteronormative ideal of husband, wife and children. Saying partner could be a way of hiding some kind of “degeneracy”, like not being straight or even having multiple partners.
I use partner because it’s exhausting explaining to people that I have a wife and a girlfriend and we’re a throuple and fine. The amount of people who get upset and pry in your personal business when you drop a hint of being different is ridiculous. Like one day at work one of my coworkers caught me saying girlfriend knowing I have a wife, and started playing 20 questions. What business is it of yours who I’m with or how we live our lives.
In the UK this is really normal, we do it because it’s normal in many circles, and to mess with people for whom it’s not normal 😅
Is this homophobia or is there some other reason to not like the term partner?
Pretty sure it’s homophobia. Or just general conformist bigotry because it’s not like heterosexual couples couldn’t use the word too if they wanted.
Well, they do.
I realised it could also be a sex before marriage thing
I think it’s both, or rather that the word “partner” doesn’t fit in their very narrow view of acceptable relationships (heterosexual marriage)
I like the term buddy, because it’s all about the buddy system
it’s homophobia and also a lot of traditional straight people don’t see their partner as an equal
Conservatives don’t like their traditions challenged with the acknowledgement of alternatives. They’ll vaguely grumble about the weakening of “social foundations” or some other social myth. They’re insecure & need society to validate their myths.
And hopefully the teacher catches that and understands it means their child will likely need more support because these parents likely turn that same face on their kids over the stupidest shit that shouldn’t bug anyone.
I’m in a hetero relationship and I use it. To me it just seems like a much more descriptive term, since they’re literally your partner in life’s highs and lows.
Not a native speaker here. I infer from your statement that partner is not the default term in english, then ? Or are you colloquialy supposed to specify the gender ?
In general, the norm is boyfriend/girlfriend, husband/wife, etc. I never heard partner until after college and started using it pretty regularly (I mean, it just sounds so much more eloquent. Also anyone can be partners, married or just dating), but I think it’s an easy way for LGBT+ folk to not ‘out’ themselves when talking to inconsequential people.
but I think it’s an easy way for LGBT+ folk to not ‘out’ themselves when talking to inconsequential people.
This is why conservatives hate the more general use of “partner.” It became a way to out gay people because it became a common coded term to not out themselves.
Using the term to not out yourself was a way to out yourself that is being unwound by common usage of “partner” by everyone.
The more typical words would be “husband / wife” or “boyfriend / girlfriend” which have gender built into them. Whereas “partner” is more popular with lefty folks who want to use the same word no matter what the gender of their partner is.
But importantly there will be gay men who say “husband” or “boyfriend” when referring to their partner, and lesbians might say “wife” or “girlfriend”, and some straight people will say “partner”, so partner doesn’t only mean homosexual.
Some straight people say it to provide cover for homosexual people who say it, so that it remains an ambiguous term, but also a lot of people of all sexualities like the term because it shows a commitment to their relationship without involving marital status. Like “boyfriend” can feel a bit new, or a bit highschool. But not everyone gets married anymore. So maybe you’ve been together for 12 years, but you aren’t married, so you can’t say “wife”, but “girlfriend” maybe feels a bit childish for this women you’ve been committed to for over a decade and live with and maybe even have pets or kids together. So even for straight people “partner” can be a mature, committed, term without relying on marriage.
Some people will use “significant other”, sometimes shortened to “SO”, as a different way of saying the same thing. That one feels even more… dry?.. to me. It feels like something you’d see on a government form. But some people use it and love it. And sometimes people will say things like “my better half” or something like that to refer to their partner, and that one is a little more folksy and warm.
So to wrap up, partner has been gaining popularity for a while, and has some advantages, but most of those advantages apply to non-traditional situations. The traditional version would be man meets woman and gets married quickly. So in some places and communities and cultures “partner” will be a very normal word, but in some more traditional areas it might make people suspicious when you use it because they’ll think “why did this guy not say wife… is he secretly gay?” or something.
It’s interesting that most people make the assumption that if you describe your significant other as “partner” it is likely a same sex couple. That’s my usual first take as well, but I actually like the term to describe a significant other better than say, boyfriend/girlfriend, husband/wife, ya di ya di.
Yup, I’ve been in my (heterosexual but not married) relationship for long enough that the word “girlfriend” doesn’t really feel like a good descriptor anymore.
And “significant other” is such a mouthful. Partner makes sense and is easier to say.
Boyfriend/girlfriend felt like a bit of a weird way to talk about each other when we were both in our 30s. And then fiancee was an awkward word. Maybe we should have used partner
It feels like I’m a caveman who only has one female friend when I use the word girlfriend. You know the friend which is a girl: it is descriptive because ALL my other friends are males.
And you can greet them with “Howdy Partner!”.
I use it all the time, who is making this assumption?
Bigots, often. No offence to the person you are replying to (they said they default partner = same sex) but really it’s mostly just people who refuse to broaden their worldview or accept neutral descriptive terms. Partner could mean any number of things and to assume it’s just a same sex couple is ignorant.
Mine absolutely adores messing with that assumption. I’m nonbinary and she’s bi though strongly prefers women and more ambiguous to fem leaning nonbinary people. She looks like a very Butch lesbian but together our relationship is straight passing since I’m built like a fridge cosplaying Harry and the Hendersons and when my joint pain acts up like the most tips fedora Neckbearded MF to ever haunt the halls of an anime convention.
So when she’s alone and everyone has her pegged dead to rights as a textbook carpet muncher she plays into it going “My partner this, my partner that,” just to see the look on their faces when my literal grizzly bear ass shows up with our 3 kids or she decides to switch it up to mention her husband and kids.
it is hilarious.
That is due to frequency of use in past decades carrying over as a habit. All the gay people I’ve known in the US used partner in the 90s through whenever we finally legalized marriage (2015?) because they weren’t legal.
Those same people tend to still use partner, because old habits are hard to break.
There is so much disrespect
