Pioneering gay-marriage couple to split

[TriSec]

Same-Sex marriage icons split up

They told the world that their relationship was like any other and that's why they should be allowed to marry. Now, friends say, they are showing once again that they are just like any other couple: Two years after getting married, Julie and Hillary Goodridge, lead plaintiffs in the state's landmark gay marriage case, are splitting.

Mary Breslauer, a spokeswoman for the couple, confirmed the separation last night. She said the couple are focused now on trying to do what is best for their daughter, Annie, 10.

``Julie and Hillary Goodridge are amicably living apart," Breslauer said in a telephone interview. ``As always their number one priority is raising their daughter, and like the other plaintiff couples in this case, they made an enormous contribution toward equal marriage. But they are no longer in the public eye, and request that their privacy be respected."

Breslauer said they have not filed for divorce. She would not comment on their plans and offered no other details.

Supporters of gay marriage had cast them as the face of their cause: happily together for two decades, financially stable, loving parents, and in 2004, able to legally wed. Julie Goodridge, 49, is president of NorthStar Asset Management, an investment advisory firm, and Hillary, 50, is program director for the Unitarian Universalist Funding Program.

[Solly Mack]

1. Couples separate/divorce all the time

Being human, that will happen

Course, you have to be seen as human first for people to understand that

If the GLBT community was seen as people, as citizens...as equals, there would just be marriage and divorce...not "gay" marriage and "gay" divorce.

People are hurting, yet their hurt will be used by the haters as something to gloat over

[Name removed]

2. Deleted message

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[Ayesha]

3. Blah

I know I shouldn't be, but I'm kind of pissed at them. It sucks but as an oppressed minority we have to be twice as good to be seen as half as equal. Lots of married couples stick it out for their kids' sake. If their split is so amicable, why can't they do the same, not just for their daughter's sake but also for all those same sex couples who look to them as an example, and the haters who do too?

[Exiled in America]

4. I don't really feel that's fair

First of all, who are we to say which is better for their daughter? The notion that staying together is always best for kids is clearly false. Sometimes that's the case, other times it is not. I'm not going to second guess a couple I don't even know and their decision on what is best for every member of their family. Living together unhappily is not necessary "best" for children.

Second of all, I understand the sentiment behind the idea that an oppressed minority must be twice as good to be seen and half as equal. But in the end, when it comes down to matters of the heart, I don't think that is practical or just. Asking two people to continue to share the lives and the most intimate parts of themselves when they don't believe that to be best for their family is asking too much.

To be honest, I really believe that a life story such as this one can go a long way to humanize the entire issue by saying, hey, these are real people - no better and no worse than any one of us. They face the same challenges, joys and heartaches as everyone else does. They fall in love, and sometimes fall out of it. They fight to make relationships work and don't always succeed just like everyone else in this nation. We are all equal and all in it together.

[Sapphocrat]

5. Whew!

For a second I worried the couple in question might be Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon!

And if that ever happened, I would have no hope for any couple!

My response to the story: Sad, but stuff happens. The saddest part for the rest of us is that the haters will now hold these two up as an example of how unstable gay couples are. Oh well, whatever. They'll always find something.