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Elentari
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Re: On Canon - Marriage
Jan 12th, 2011 at 4:03pm
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Alba wrote on Jan 11th, 2011 at 12:46pm:
The Australian forces on the other hand prohibit this only for instructor/trainee pairs, everyone else may date, have sex with or marry whoever else. This also goes for GLBT pairs.

The trainee/instructor rule is very strictly enforced too, especially as recruits/trainees can be under 18 and the military has a duty of care to those personnel.

While on the face of it everyone else may date, relationships between service people of differing ranks who work in the same section may (or have the perception to) cause conflict and it is possible one of the personnel concerned could transfer to another section (especially if one is an officer and the other is not, or where there is a DIRECT chain of command - ie boss/employee). It can be a delicate situation I guess.  These relationships are allowed but it pays to tread carefully.

BTW there are rules about attending the various messes.  For instance, if you were an officer required to attend a compulsory dining in night with your spouse who was a warant officer or some other non-officer rank, permission would have to be obtained from the officer's mess president AND the president of warrant officer's mess for the spouse to attend the function.  If the spouse was a civilian...no problem.  Cool

Oops! I forgot to add - this rule works in reverse,  If the officer is invited to a function at the warrant officer's mess he will need to have permission to attend from both mess presidents.
  
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Re: On Canon - Marriage
Reply #1 - Jan 12th, 2011 at 4:27pm
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Grumpy here....
 
This topic has started because I have a story ( Rachel Chronicles) in which Ed and Rachel marry...

I will have to rewrite the whole bloody Chronicles.  Angry


Bugger.

AND - just this afternoon I actually found the very very first Rachel story that I  then canibalised for assorted other stories.

and another one that  I chopped up for Brief Encounters, The Bodyguard and Dark Matters!

( I need to clear out my memory stick!)

  But.. I  really wanted to marry Ed and Rachel.... .. rats - because now I  feel that I can't. Cry
  

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MkIXHawk
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Re: On Canon - Marriage
Reply #2 - Jan 12th, 2011 at 5:56pm
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Alba wrote on Jan 11th, 2011 at 12:46pm:
The British forces as well have no anti-fraternization rules in place, except for instructor/trainee. No idea about GBLT pairs.




Not, strictly-speaking , true; Commissioned Officers are discouraged from fraternization with Non-Commissioned Officers, let alone Other Ranks. Officers are expected to behave as Gentlemen at all times.
Should such a relationship occur, one or both the parties would be expected to resign

Thus when talking about mess functions, the invites would refer to:

Officers and their Ladies
NCOs and their Wives
Other Ranks and their Women
  Shocked

  
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Re: On Canon - Marriage
Reply #3 - Jan 12th, 2011 at 8:59pm
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I don't believe that , after the Mary debacle, Straker would ever allow himself to get that close to another human being
  
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Re: On Canon - Marriage
Reply #4 - Jan 13th, 2011 at 9:30am
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Well, as this seems to be a thread about Rachel and Straker, I will add my tuppeny’worth to the discussion! Wink

It wouldn’t worry me too much not to let them marry, although as someone who has been married for 33 years now I do think that marriage has a lot of ‘plus’ points. Yes,. there are the ‘bad aspects’ and it’s falling out of fashion, but,  despite that,  marriage provides  a commitment that many people still want. It’s a personal matter and as such, the actual consideration of whether marriage is necessary is not really a part of this discussion. I know many people who have chosen not to marry their partner, but likewise many couples who have married. And personally I think that Straker, in the situation  he is in with Rachel, would want to offer to marry her.  :Smiley

And I am afraid that Rachel  is, for all her modern ways and independence,  a woman who wants that. Not  the ‘Big Day’ with the church and  dress and the flowers etc, (and she isn’t going to get it either !) but that commitment. After all the military is founded on commitment, on oaths and  the  ‘family within the service’ and marriage is just an extension of that in a way. Maybe a different woman would be happy not to marry.. but unfortunately, when I started writing Rachel I had this image of her married to Ed…. !!

  Sad    Sorry.   Sad

(you should be grateful.. that first story that I recently found had Rachel  not only married to Ed, but with children as well..!) Grin

However, I do understand and appreciate the  different viewpoints. At this moment I am unsure where to go with the stories.. whether to simply not write that last one where they  marry, and to leave it ‘hanging’  unfinished. But that is, to my mind, unsatisfactory.

It needs a conclusion. Other wise I might not move on. There are options that I have  to consider; but it might, just might, come down to me writing a story that falls outside the ‘canon’.  I don’t really want to do that, because I think that I have stuck pretty close to canon in the series….. I do think Straker would have acted as he did in many of the stories ( although given the chance I would totally rewrite Verified- and might in fact just do that)

I don’t know.  Really.  And until I feel happy with what I am going to do to them.. well Ed and Rachel will just have to wait!!
  Wink

  

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Re: On Canon - Marriage
Reply #5 - Jan 13th, 2011 at 1:21pm
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Shaking my head here, but you also know that, I am sure


Laughing here as well!!

It is a very interesting thread though, with some  important points to consider!   And it has really made me think about where i am taking my writing! Wink
  

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Re: On Canon - Marriage
Reply #6 - Jan 13th, 2011 at 7:23pm
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Hey guys -  Smiley

Alba wrote on Jan 12th, 2011 at 4:54pm:
Which is why I would wish her to get a much more modern, less ... errr ... conservative ending.

But it's all perception, isn't it? Why is marriage conservative? I've no idea what proportion of long-term relationships turn into marriage nowadays but is marriage still the conservative choice? I know lots of people who co-habit, very few bother with marriage. Is choosing marriage the action of the non-conformist nowadays?  Wink


Alba wrote on Jan 12th, 2011 at 4:54pm:
Oaths and serious commitment can be had without marriage. The complete negation of that is what usually irks me so much about "romantic stories". It also is a direct slight and negation of the commitment of couples who live outside of marriage. As if you get commitment only via attending a marriage service.


Some people simply do believe that. And that is their right, of course, as is your right to feel marriage is irrelevant – though I can’t see why one should feel slighted by someone else’s reasonable preferences and beliefs. Do what are actually conventional choices need to be validated by other people? If someone felt so inclined, they could take umbrage over comments about (paraphrasing) marriage not being suitable for a contemporary, independent woman... but who'd bother?

I have gay friends who utterly resent the fact that someone who doesn’t believe in their God can marry in church and yet they – faithful churchgoers since childhood – cannot. They want marriage and they don’t believe the alternatives show the same level of thought and commitment. Other gay friends also view their recent commitment via a civil partnership as distinctly second-best. They’d "marry properly" (their words) in a heartbeat if the law changed to allow same-sex marriage in the UK. Relationships don't come much more modern than that.


Alba wrote on Jan 12th, 2011 at 4:54pm:
Actually it is such couples which to me show what real commitment means and is, staying together and taking care of each other without the pressure of law and order, of having to do it.


The divorce rate suggests that whatever pressure of law and order you think is implicit in a marriage certificate is no guarantee of sustained effort or success. But, of course, what we all think of marriage or the alternatives for ourselves is irrelevant because what matters here is what the character of Straker would think of marriage or the alternatives.

I think – once he’d committed himself to a relationship – he would propose marriage. It’s part of who he is. For me, it's a given that Straker's character will always want the affirmative aspects of marriage. Recognition and respect for the other person, respect for and seriousness of the relationship... commitment... he would always consider that marriage was the right basis for a permanent relationship.

Unless…  Grin

...would there be a religious side to that decision? I don’t know – did he ever indicate religious beliefs in a UFO episode? I know some fanfic has him as Catholic – as do you, Guina – but is that based solely on an extrapolation: he’s from Boston and Boston has (had?) a heavily Catholic profile? Because if he is Catholic then, of course, he might be conflicted over whether or not a divorce and a living ex-spouse leaves him free to marry again.

Something I do agree with you on, Guina, is that Straker would be unlikely to become a father again without severe misgivings. If ever. There's a fanfic tendency to populate his life with more kids and I think he is probably so anguished and eaten up with guilt about John that he would not lightly enter into fatherhood again. Perhaps to punish himself but also to prevent him ever having to prioritise like that again.

I think he'd get over... no, rationalise... the failure of his marriage to Mary because as time passed it would be obvious to him that family life with a civilian who thought he was a business executive could never work. He'd take responsibility for his bad decision and, with many regrets, let it go. But not his "failure" to save his son.
  
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