Did Brad and Angelina turn their backs on the gay community?

Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie are engaged to be married after seven years together and six kids. Some people might ask what took them so long but others who have followed their journey are probably surprised that they're getting hitched at all, because they publicly vowed to support same-sex marriage by saying they wouldn't become Mr and Mrs until every couple in the US had the right to do so.

Same-sex marriage in America is decided state by state - the US has fifty states so perhaps they figured that it would never happen (or at least not in their lifetime) so they gave up waiting? If so, can we blame them? Well in some respects, yes we can, as they were never forced to proclaim their intentions so publicly.

Their opinion matters
They're only human, but they're humans with an enormous reach and power to communicate to the masses. Angelina in particular understands how to use her fame to drum up support and highlight important causes; the fact that an immensely famous couple has seemed to turn their backs on the issue of marriage equality could negatively impact on the cause - their fans could quite rightly think, if Brangelina don't care anymore, is it still worth my support?

If you think we're being hard on them, they're not just a couple in love who made a few flippant comments when asked about a wedding date. Brad is an outspoken marriage-equality activist who has campaigned to get same-sex marriage legalised across the country. Last year he released a statement supporting efforts in New York to grant marriage rights to all its residents, saying, "It is each American's Constitutional right to marry the person they love, no matter what state they inhabit. Thanks to the tireless work of so many, someday soon this discrimination will end and every American will be able to enjoy their equal right to marriage."

As early as 2006 he said "Angie and I will consider tying the knot when everyone else in the country who wants to be married is legally able," and he's also on record for saying, "When someone asked me why Angie and I don't get married, I replied, 'Maybe we'll get married when it's legal for everyone else.' I stand by that."
Was it just an ostensibly harmless way to deflect questions about a wedding? Perhaps Brad's aim was to bring gay rights to the forefront at the same time as getting reporters off his back. Two birds, one stone. But if he wasn't prepared to stand by his remarks he shouldn't have made them so publicly, and so many times.

Doing it for the kids?
So why did they change their minds? Their children have had a lot to do with it apparently as both have said that their older ones are keen for them to have a wedding. "The kids ask about marriage. It's meaning more and more to them. So it's something we've got to look at," Brad said last year.

Are they saying that gay marriage isn't an important issue anymore? We don't believe they are but that's how their decision to marry could be construed by the wider public. Brange should have been more careful about associating their own personal affairs with a political issue because now that they've caved in and let their hearts rule their heads, it makes all their declarations look wishy-washy.

World affairs are intrinsically tied to their family - Angelina first decided to adopt Maddox after visiting slums in Cambodia and she's been to warzones in Sudan, Iraq and Afghanistan to shine a light on humanitarian causes, so it wasn't out of character for the couple to speak out on a political issue such as gay marriage rights.

But if they used the cause to deflect questions about a marriage date, that's very poor taste. If they were annoyed by the constant interrogations about their marital status, they could have made a joke about it and said they'd get hitched when Simon Cowell denounced his material possessions and became a monk. Why tie their relationship to an issue if they didn't truly have the conviction to follow through with their promise?

The couple's gay fans and gay-rights groups as a whole could be forgiven for feeling forgotten by Brangelina when the engagement was announced. GLAAD (Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation) were gracious about the reversal, saying "We congratulate them on their engagement and thank them for continuing to speak out about the inequality that so many gay and lesbian couples face today." But Hollywood gossip columnist Brian Moylan isn't so forgiving; he has said that he believes that their about-face has damaged the course. "I'm sorry, Brangelina, but real fighters for civil rights don't buckle under pressure when it gets hard," he said.

A flippant decision?
Brad and Ange could never fathom how it feels to not be allowed to marry, so it was flippant of them to suggest that they were in any way like a gay couple fighting for the legal right to get hitched. Because they can, and they will, possibly as soon as the summer when they've apparently chosen the same date that Brad's parents married, 11 August.

Maybe they just caved from pressure from their kids or even the media, or maybe they realised the 'error' of their ways in hedging their relationship status bets on something that they possibly, deep down, knew would never change. However, let's not deny the fact this couple is one of the most loved-up in Hollywood and, regardless of their prior promises, deserve happiness, whatever that may mean to them. And things do change. At least the gay community can respect that.

Plus, Angelina does need to be seen in a big, white dress...

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