Dammit, I’m finally blogging about it

So, in case you haven’t seen the discussion over here, there’s a lot of people saying that if Lyn-Z doesn’t want to be known as Mrs. Gerard Way, she should just divorce Gerard.

So, here’s my big ass commentary on it:

What people don’t seem to be realizing are that there are two issues here, NEITHER of which has to do with Lyn-Z not wanting to be married to Gerard or be his wife.

The first issue is the core of it: she’s married to a more well-known celebrity and interviews are going to ask her questions about him or call her Mrs. Gerard Way in order to name drop and gather readers. Like I’ve said, it’s not different from Ashlee Simpson being brought up in every mainstream article about Pete Wentz…her name is bigger, she’ll draw in more readers/viewers/listeners in a lot of circles. Lyn isn’t getting called “Mrs. Gerard Way” as an insult. She’s being called “Mrs. Gerard Way” as a marketing tactic. No, it’s not fair to her, but it’s how it works. She’s speaking out and saying she wants people to recognize her more for what she does, which, hey, she has every right to. And she’s probably upset because originally Gerard’s band opened for hers, she was one of the people who pushed for MCR to open for MSI back in the day. And now MCR is the more famous band. It’s an obstacle and it sucks for her, but it might just be something she has to learn to roll with.

Odds are, even complaining about it isn’t going to make reporters stop doing it. In fact, she’s more likely to get questioned time and again about “Why don’t you want to be known as Mrs. Gerard Way? What does your husband think about that?” And as I’ve said elsewhere, Gerard referring to her as “my wife” in interviews, instead of as “Lyn” or “Lyn-Z” probably isn’t helping. Because the language makes it sound like he just thinks of her as his wife, not as an autonomous entity. GRANTED, that is largely a case of Gerard Way’s “I Say Stupid Things, So Thank God I’m Pretty” disease, but it doesn’t help. And it raises questions for me of if he really just does think of her as “his wife,” or as his last ditch effort to not get left behind when his bandmates get married (before you >:( at me, consider that he’s said thing in interviews that raise my eyebrows. I think he loves her, but I really think he might have jumped into marriage too quickly for the wrong reasons. Doesn’t mean it won’t work out, just means there’s a high risk factor there). But that’s me.

HOWEVER, there is another issue here, and that’s Lyn-Z suggesting that in our society a lot of women lose any social identity other than Mrs. “so-and-so.” It suggests they don’t have their own desires or likes or strengths independent of their husband. While that’s not really her case, it IS the case for a lot of women and Lyn, being a feminist, doesn’t like that. You can be proud to be someone’s wife, but at the same time still want to be seen as yourself. It’s not just a name thing, it’s indicative of a particular social attitude: that once you’re someone’s wife that’s ALL you are. It’s also eerie because it implies you’re someone’s property, you’re ringed, you’re marked, you’re HIS.

If you don’t totally understand what I’m talking about, I suggest you read The Handmaid’s Tale. It’s devoid of sparkling vampires, but it contains the story of a woman who is living as a birth mother of sorts in a futuristic USA run by a conservative right wing group. Shockingly? Not a true story.

Anyway, the Handmaids in the story don’t have actual names. They are instead referred to by Of(their owner’s name). For example, if Lyn were Gerard’s handmaiden, she’d be known as OfGerard. And as women are traded or “disposed of” due to not being able to produce children, their names change. They have no self. That’s the sort of thing I think Lyn is afraid being called “Mrs. Gerard Way” indicates. As I said, in her case it’s a celebrity situation, in other cases? Not so much.

In the end, Lyn marrying Gerard has probably attracted a lot of new fans to her band, and has brought a lot of publicity on them. But when you’re in a lesser known band and you marry a bigger celebrity in a sensational way (and the sudden “OH, HEY, WE’RE MARRIED WTF?!” definitely counts), reporters are going to pay a lot of attention to it.

Especially moronic ones who don’t want to do any extra research, despite it being their job and them getting paid for it.

Oh, spit. Where DID that last link come from?!