Marriage

I am a fan of tradition and culture and try hard to uphold customs and rituals. I am one who wishes that she was born hundreds of years ago when things were simpler. I like social norms and become uncomfortable when they are crossed and when I am faced with rebels. So although my questioning thoughts surprise myself, I try to justify them with current times and the evolution of social systems.
In this day and age when men are marrying men and women are marrying women, when women are being impregnated by a frozen sperm that comes out of a bank, when a man in surgically transformed to an actual woman, when a couple has a child using a third person's body, how can the institution of marriage stay strong and relevant, or even make sense?
I wonder, why did marriage originate? Why the cold legality? Why the court, the signatures, the contract, the official promises? Why the ritual ceremony? Is the love and commitment that two people share not enough? Why does it have to be sealed into a legal contract? I wonder, is it so that they would not be able to breach it? So that others know not to cross any boundaries? Does that not dismiss the true essence of what love holds, trust and faith?
My romantic heart likes to believe that true love would not need a contract to stay committed, it would not require a judge and witnesses in order to keep promises. My innocent heart would like to think that two souls who have found their missing piece in one another would not want signatures to join those pieces forever. Love, joining of two hearts, bonding of two souls is too great to be stained with ugly things like legal papers and labels.
So why do we do it? To prove to the world that we are in love? To show the world that we are committed? Do we do it to ward off other possible interests? Is it to secure the permanence of the relationship?
The institution of marriage is not about love, it is about security, status, fear and conforming to the social norm, it is about giving in. This is not to say that those who are in the contract of marriage do not love one other, but the point is that marriage is not about love. My proof is Prenuptial agreements, extramarital affairs, the countless number of unhappily married individuals and divorces.
At the end, marriage is always the easier path to take rather than going against one of the biggest social norms and having to live the rest of your life explaining your decision. Yet love has little to do with marriage, two unmarried individuals who are in love and committed to one another could be much happier than two who are together with a dead bolt contract. I think that the institution of marriage is an insult to true love.