[Ansteorra] Same-Gender Consort Proposal

[R. Culver]

Wesað ge hal!

   As someone mentioned, some of us do indeed take issue with every mundane
cause being thrust into the SCA.  I know I do.  my mundane life I am
libertarian and just want to leave people alone as I want to be left
alone.  However the SCA isn't just my ream or your Dream it belongs to
everyone.  I think when an issue like this comes up, it should be emotion
but research which truly settles it (hard enough to do in hstory as all the
various viewpoint theories such as queer, Marxist, Conservation,
Neo-Marxist and so forth further taint the research).  I know some people
are more toward the recreation side of the Society while others like myself
leaning more toward reenactment, as best as my budget will allow.  There is
absolutely no evidence that there were same sex sovereigns other than being
related by kinship.  Note hear I said sovereigns, not consorts.  Right now
our Queens act as sovereigns, somewhere between the models of Eleanor and
Elizabeth I, each having tons of clout at th least and ER Ihaving absolute
power in her own right.  However in case where you can document tale sof a
sovereign having a same sex partner/lover it is largely, if not entirely,
something known but not talked about, and more often than not, the person
in question is still betrothed to an opposite sex spouse.

Of course now let us take this to its logical conclusion, which exists in
the mundane debate as well:  What if Count Badass decides that he wants to
fight for three Consorts.  None are his lover, but just friends with whom
he would like to share the expeience, but he plays a Frankish noble across
the 400-800's, where they were known for multiple wives, so it is all
kosher.  Or is it?  However the historical model is that largely even in
this case the consorts involved would not be sovereigns yet afford the
respect of the Crown to which they are attached.  Regina or cwen shows up
very little in Anglo-Saxon charters I know for sure.  Usually if, and it is
exceedingly rare, they show up, the dominant title in Latin is "domina", or
the vernacular, "hlafdige."  Beyond that a great deal of this discussion
has been on "love."  Well until the Industrial Age, in noble circles, who
you loved mattered very little.  To whom you were bound was what mattered.
Most of such unions were business arangements pure and simple.

So do we essentially make the Consort roles purely a matter of being arm
candy or are they Sovereign in equal?  If the former then I have less
issue, but if the latter then I take great issue as, to me, it disturbs the
application of the Dream for me, as someone who wants more historicity.
For a while there was a big surge among the fighters to not worry about
looks and just get to the fight.  That is changing a great deal (to which
in my own experience that owe a lot to knights/brass like Count Lochlann),
but as we settle that do we need to jump into another catering to mundane
life?

So either the issue is of Consorts or Sovereigns and I think that is going
to be the crux of it for me, personally.  That said I am no one of clout or
particular importance.

Gódspéde!
Wihtric hlafard Wihtmunding