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T<\/span>he lavender marriage \u2013 that administrative convenience and PR fiction of golden age Hollywood \u2013 is back. The Washington Post recently covered its reinvention, meeting Jacob Hoff, who\u2019s gay, and Samantha Greenstone, who\u2019s straight, a blissfully married couple with a baby on the way (they \u201cbirds\u2019d and bees\u2019d\u201d Greenstone explained for the pruriently curious). The Post also spoke to friends April Lexi Lee and Sheree Wong, both \u201con the asexual spectrum\u201d, who say they \u201cbestied so hard we got married \u2026 platonically\u201d.<\/p>\n Of course, if you\u2019re talking openly about a lavender marriage, it isn\u2019t one. The point of them was to confer a fig leaf of heteronormative respectability at a time when that was professionally and socially essential; these people aren\u2019t in it for appearances. Hoff and Greenstone don\u2019t like the term: \u201cIt cheapens what we really have, which is a love match,\u201d Greenstone says. But \u201clavender marriage\u201d has been co-opted online as a shorthand for different forms of loving, committed relationships that do not centre conventional romance and sexual desire, both as jokey aspiration and lived experience. They need another name: some people call themselves platonic life partners (PLPs); I\u2019ve seen \u201crainbow marriage\u201d on TikTok.<\/p>\n If you\u2019re my age, in a heterosexual marriage in a North Yorkshire suburb rather than a Portland, Oregon polycule, there\u2019s a spectrum of options for how you may view these unions, ranging from \u201charrumphing great-uncle\u201d to enthusiastically onboard, with a real danger of sounding like a groovy vicar, effortfully down with the kids, when discussing it. I\u2019ll run that risk: groovy vicar here, reporting for duty, to address a few harrumphing points. The HGU (and I assume he\u2019s not a homophobe, just a bit baffled) might say something like, \u201cAren\u2019t these just friendships?<\/em> Why treat them as something different? Why get married?\u201d<\/p>\n Hoff and Greenstone absolutely don\u2019t see their relationship that way, but for those that do, why not<\/em> get married? I don\u2019t consider my union as having some exalted status, just because it was forged in conventional romantic connection or sexual attraction \u2013 it\u2019s still mostly two people watching TV and bickering about bins. We\u2019re past treating marriage \u2013 a property-based transaction historically and a patriarchal institution still \u2013 as a sacrament capable of being sullied by extension to other types of love, surely? \u201cJust\u201d friendship is as sacred and worthy of formalising; it has been sometimes, and in some places. In her recent book Bad Friend<\/em>, Tiffany Watt Smith describes the history of friendship pacts and ritualised contracts, from 13th-century Iberian coniurationes<\/em> <\/em>and early-modern French affr\u00e8rements<\/em>, to the choosing of a belayDo<\/em> \u2013 an intimate friend elevated to kinship status \u2013 by Aku women in Cameroon at puberty.<\/p>\n There are very good reasons to marry a person you love in any way, not least simple economics. The \u201csingle penalty\u201d is real: rent, bills, not qualifying for tax breaks all add up; in the US, health insurance is a huge additional consideration. Exploring the nu-lavender phenomenon, Vice and Business Insider framed it as a gen-Z response to economic struggles (coupled with an understandable weariness with dating). And marriage, rather than ad-hoc cohabitation as platonic companions, is good for us in other fundamental ways: married people enjoy longer life expectancy and better health outcomes (especially, I\u2019m compelled to mutter, men). The intimacy \u2013 physical or not \u2013 emotional support and sense of security a good marriage can offer is protective; as Lee says, \u201cI realised how much easier it is for me to move through this world with a partner.\u201d<\/p>\n An HGU might also object that relationships like these have always existed, privately, quite contentedly. Why broadcast them on social media? Both couples in the Post piece are proudly vocal about the particularities of their marriages online (content creation is Hoff\u2019s main income source), responding to the hostile or simply curious, and actually, I find that especially admirable. Because unlike the lavender marriages of the 1930s, these ones are, by their chosen visibility, making a powerful case that love of all shapes is worthy of official recognition and celebration. They\u2019re cracking open what marriage can be and yes, this is an awfully groovy vicar statement, but in our age of submissive tradwives, book bans and narrowly defined, exclusionary \u201cChristian\u201d values reframing empathy as sinful, I find that enormously exciting.<\/p>\n Emma Beddington is a Guardian columnist<\/p>\n