Lots of people marrying for the wrong reasons/not ready

[Kargathia]

Or be smart and don't vow to go with someone who clearly isn't a good match...
Clearly if things change after marriage then the people didn't know each other well enough before getting married.

True, but this only applies for those marriages that end after less than a year or so. Even considering the notion you can accurately predict what kind of person both you and your partner have become in twenty years time is ridiculous.

Rushing into a marriage is stupid, but seriously expecting all couples to still like each other the rest of their lives is naive.

Not really. If you get married at around ~28, you won't actually change that much. Just ask your parents if they feel different to how they did 20 years ago. If they were mature when they were younger, then they won't have changed much whatsoever. People don't keep on changing as much as they did in their teenage years throughout the rest of their life. Someone who was mature and easy going at 28 isn't going to be a violent workaholic at 50.

Changes are certainly a lot more drastical in your teenage years, and you - probably - won't have made a heel face turn somewhere along the way, but "the rest of your life" really is quite a while, and that's before all the annoying biological road bumps at various intervals are considered. (eg. That whole 7-year-relationship-thingie, and the good ol' midlife crisis)

Working with a varied age group, I can say that people don't really change much from how they were in their mid 20's. Maybe some-things become more emphasised but that's about it.

And yet, do you think that people can be honestly expected to always make the right long-term decision?

No but that's because of people's own stupidity. If they are immature when they get married, then they will probably not have good foresight, but that's to do with them being immature rather then people inherently changing after the reach age "x".

Don't get me wrong here, I'm not saying that one automatically and arbitrarily changes upon reaching a certain age (ok, except puberty, but that's slightly irrelevant here), merely that for a decision as long-term and important as a marriage it is a good thing there is the option to declare the whole thing a mistake, and move on.

Certainly. I can't see the point in trying to "stick it out" when there is no need to do so. It seems odd that people would change themselves for someone else when surely that's a sign that they don't mix well to begin with...

Self-deception, social pressures, loneliness, and hormones are a lovely combination. And it's not even like we don't make bad decisions without those involved.

Very true.
Out of curiosity what are the social pressures for a relationship like in the Netherlands? In the UK you are pretty much expected to find your "true love" at 17 and if you aren't in a serious relationship in your early 20's, wow, something must be wrong -.-

It exists, but can vary wildly based on your family and surroundings. My 28 year old sister occasionally gets commented on why she hasn't married her boyfriend yet (they have been living together for years though), but personally (at twenty) I haven't heard any kind of suggestion whatsoever that I should settle down.

On the whole I'm pretty sure that we've got ultra-religious groups that'd disown you at the first sign of pre-marital sex, along with unmarried forty-somethings that have been living together for the last fifteen years - and everything in between. Expectations of finding "true love" in your early twenties are by no means common though.

 

[Kargathia]

Spoiler

Whereas anecdotal evidence indeed does not hold the same weight as factual evidence

First off, you're not using the word "whereas" properly. "Whereas" is used only in very formal writing in general address. As you are addressing your point to me, and this is a discussion not an address, the word "whereas" is not appropriate.

We see feminists do this a lot, they try to use what they see as "scholarly" language to appear "educated", but only prove their own ignorance of the basics of English and logic.

declaring him a liar for it not only squarely places the burden of proof on your shoulders, it also diminishes your own standing in the debate.

Uh. No. Burden of proof always lays with the party making the positive contention. Alleging that a claim lacks proof (or was simply made up) does not shift that burden of proof away from the person who made the claim.

Basically, your claim here boils down to, "you disagree with me so you're wrong".

Failing to understand that the burden of proof ALWAYS lays with party making positive contention betrays a lack of understanding of the basics of debate.

There rightly are no defined parameters for when a marriage is "bad". This is entirely up to the judgement of the couple.

Both members of the couple, or only one...?

Trying to define a tipping point for when a marriage should be considered "bad", "toxic", "unsalvageable", or whatever other word you prefer, is irrelevant to this discussion. The mere existence of such a state is justification for divorce.

You can't use a term to define an argument (the conditions under which a marriage should be considered flawed and unsalvageable) then claim the meaning of those terms don't matter.

If the terms you're using to support your position mean nothing, then your entire argument is void.

Laws regarding marriage have at times been shamefully late in updating

By whose standards?

but as of right now every first-world country considers marriage to be a material contract. You're not entitled to sex with, or even the presence of your partner.

I said nothing about sex. I talked about marriage as a material contract.

You're correct, however, that all specific rights, privileges, and responsibilities taken on by the spouses when they entered the marriage cannot be dissolved on a whim. (Religious vows don't count). Divorces, however, can be requested by only one partner. It just tends to involve a lot more hassle.

Actually, no fault-divorce means that, in fact, a marriage CAN be broken up on a whim.

Your accusations of sexism are also, once again, unfounded, and completely irrelevant. I did not state only women were victim to spousal abuse, nor does it even matter which spouse is the abusive one. The same thing goes for your next accusation (this time of false duality). I never specified any gender-based distinction, nor did I even remotely imply that missing a parent is a good thing - merely that it certainly can be an improvement.

But you did - your claims were exclusively about men abusing women, even though the claim was not relevant because the matter in question was no-fault divorce.

So why make an irrelevant point, about only one gender?

Your so-called "evidence" also comes in the form of wild conjecture, coupled with reliance on badly interpreted social stigma. The fact alone you are considering a social stigma to be worthy evidence is laughable.

Stigma is perfectly valid "evidence" in the fields of sociology and anthropology. Stigmas serve useful purposes in society - they are the most basic meter of a society's values.

And by studying common stigmas in discrete human societies, we can learn quite a bit about human nature, which is the point of anthropology.

Just a piece of evidence - or an entire field of study - doesn't favor your political bias, doesn't invalidate that evidence or study.

If your "theory" about stigma surrounding bastards was correct, how is it that people whose mother died in childbirth aren't referred to as bastards? They too have never known one of their parents.

That is a very good question. And the answer, perhaps, betrays something about human nature.

And just to satisfy your desire for evidence I'll link this [http://www.hiddenhurt.co.uk/domestic_violence_stories.html] - even though technically I only need a single example of a case where divorce would be decidedly better than lacking a parent.

Irrelevant. Most divorces are no-fault and perpetrated by women.

You might as well argue for decriminalizing murder on the basis of justifiable homicides.

You're quite amusing, but "whereas" at the beginning of a sentence means "while on one hand", and I so happened to use it that way. There also is no such thing as it being restricted to formal non-specific addresses, and the general formality of my language is solely up to me.

You also did not require burden of proof for the other poster's evidence; by declaring his statement nonsense you accused him of lying, which in your phrasing would be a positive contention. You have no burden to prove he was correct, but you certainly have a burden of proof to show he was incorrect.

But let's leave this sideshow behind, and return to the actual argument.

I tend to have my doubts about the quality of a marriage when one spouse thinks everything is fine, and the other empathically does not. In the end it only requires one to file for divorce, so the answer to your question is "only one".

We can state with certainty that there is, in fact, a tipping point at which nobody can pretend a marriage isn't bad (eg. physical abuse), which makes arguing where exactly this tipping point is found quite pointless. Its exact position is only interesting in a debate as to when one should get a divorce, and not in one about whether divorces should exist.

And the exact laws I were referring to were the acts concerning rape within a marriage, and legal recognition of executive ability by married women (eg. sign contracts). These laws were mostly passed in the last fifty years, which would make them relatively contemporary.

We seem to agree though on marriage being a material contract, and the accompanying relationship to not be governed by law. Would that mean we finally agree on something? How delightful!

We also seem to agree on that divorces can be instigated on a whim, and maybe we'll even agree on that anyone who instigates months, and maybe years of legal scuffling on a whim is kind of an idiot.
And yet, the presence of idiots using something does not automatically diminish the viability of said "something".

I'm also very sorry to say that neither your accusations about me only mentioning one side of the story when detailing personal experience, and your statement that the argument at that point was solely about no-fault divorces lack even the faintest brushes with logic.

I only mentioned my experiences with female victims as I never had experience with organised help for abused male spouses, even though I know of its existence. This, however, does not diminish the fact that in an argument as to whether spousal abuse is a factor it matters a jot which gender is abusing. There is abuse, and that's all that counts.

Stigma is, along with many other social mores, quite interesting in antrophology and sociology. However: the last time I checked, "raising your kid" was still classified as pedagogy. Whatever stigma's may say about human nature is also quite irrelevant. (It probably points at humans being dicks anyway.)

And to round it all off, I'll just mention that in your comparison I wouldn't be arguing for the decriminalisation of murder, but for the importance of legal recognition of justifiable homicide. Divorce in itself has the potential to cause an ungodly mess, but is sorely needed all the same, to prevent unimaginably worse scenarios.

I'm off to bed now though, I'll continue this rather stimulating mental excercise tomorrow - assuming of course you replied. Hopefully said reply will continue its trend of slightly improving debating skills. (Let's face it: that previous discussion on sex objects was a poor show)

 

[Vault101]

snip)

I wouldn't continue wasting your time...he does this..he gets threads derailes/locked with his persistant ranting

 

[SciMal]

Why do you think the rates are so high? Would you agree people should date a good deal longer than they seem to now? If you disagree, why?

Well, marriage in the past was about resources. Period. You married off your children (often arranged marriages) in order to gain power and influence. Women were pretty much just pawns. With the dissolution of monarchies and rise of capitalism and democracies, marriage meant a lot less absolute power and more economic/influential power - which wasn't nearly as substantial or guaranteed.

Then you have the Feminist movements in the early 20th Century where women basically gained equal control of the marriage. If their husbands were abusing them (which was pretty common in the era), they could take control and get a divorce. When you have two people able to break it off - one of which is on the receiving end of a backhand every time the other doesn't make quota, divorces skyrocket.

Then there's the stripping of any religious significance associated with the act. It's a state institution this days - that's why you can get married by signing a document outside of church. Without the fear of "if I get a divorce I go to hell unless I remarry" to keep people together, there's bound to be a few more divorces.

Plus, if you look at recent studies, it was the Boomers and early Gen X which had the highest divorce rates. Late Gen X and Gen Y (or Millenials, whichever you prefer) have significantly lower divorce rates - though they still do hover near 50%.

Personally, I think it will just take time for society to adjust to modern life and for habits to develop. The internet and texting means you can now have as much communication in a single day as you could in a month at a time when missives were quilled and sent on horseback. It accelerates relationships, and what's missing is how to handle the accelerated pace since young generations learned how to deal with the opposite sex from their parents who grew up in a different technological era.

There may be new societal rules developed; instead of the "wait 3 days before calling" rule that existed in the 60s, 70s, and 80s - it could be the "only text between 2pm and 3pm" rule or "date for at least 2 years before marriage" rule.

It'll just take time.

 

[Bara_no_Hime]

The statistics are there. Around a 50% divorce rate (US at least). That mean's it's either going to be you, or your partner... *ba dum tsh*
But seriously- Why is the rate of divorce so high?

Because that number includes a certain amount of repeat offenders.

If, for example, a man gets married and divorced ten times over his life - and the women he marries have never been married before they marry him, then that counts as 10 "first time marriages" - because it was the first time for one of the individuals involved. That one guy just had ten failed marriages - that means that ten people get married and never get divorced to balance him out.

This isn't just hyperbole either. One of my friends is on his first divorce, and none of his exes were ever married before him. One of his issues is that if he dates a woman for six months, successfully, he proposes to her. Six months and a ring. That is WAY too fast, IMO. Hence...

I do agree with your comment about people rushing in to marriage. I lived with my partner for four years before we got married - and we were happier for it. We had our honeymoon phase while we were still dating, and so marriage didn't change our relationship much. Mostly, it got us a discount on taxes, and a bunch of free kitchenware. Been married seven very happy years so far.

Contrast that with my friend above - none of his marriages lasted more than two years. My spouse and I started dating before he met the woman from his first marriage, but we didn't get married until AFTER he was on his second marriage.

 

[VoidWanderer]

My theory, and I feel said this popped into my head straight away, is the whole 'No sex before marriage'.

That and Las Vegas, doesn't help much either

 

[aestu]

You're quite amusing, but "whereas" at the beginning of a sentence means "while on one hand", and I so happened to use it that way. There also is no such thing as it being restricted to formal non-specific addresses, and the general formality of my language is solely up to me.

"When in doubt, deny all terms and definitions".

It's also up to you to communicate in leetspeak or run around with your pants on your head, but don't expect anyone to take you very seriously.

Your justification is incorrect anyway because you did not use "whereas" as a relative conjunction - it looks like you just quickly Googled for the first definition, plugged it in and tried to construct a rationalization around it.

You also did not require burden of proof for the other poster's evidence; by declaring his statement nonsense you accused him of lying, which in your phrasing would be a positive contention. You have no burden to prove he was correct, but you certainly have a burden of proof to show he was incorrect.

I tend to have my doubts about the quality of a marriage when one spouse thinks everything is fine, and the other empathically does not. In the end it only requires one to file for divorce, so the answer to your question is "only one".

How do you know the latter is correct?

What makes the latter position more valid - if one thinks the marriage can be saved and the other thinks it cannot, why err towards the latter?

And why should the former pay the cost of the latter's discontent?

We can state with certainty that there is, in fact, a tipping point at which nobody can pretend a marriage isn't bad (eg. physical abuse), which makes arguing where exactly this tipping point is found quite pointless. Its exact position is only interesting in a debate as to when one should get a divorce, and not in one about whether divorces should exist.

The necessity of divorce in extraordinary circumstances is not the matter of contention - my question to you was what criteria should be used to decide when a marriage is salvageable or not.

Clearly, with the divorce rate over 50%, the criteria are worth considering.

And the exact laws I were referring to were the acts concerning rape within a marriage, and legal recognition of executive ability by married women (eg. sign contracts). These laws were mostly passed in the last fifty years, which would make them relatively contemporary.

Nope. Women have had the right to sign contracts for over 200 years now. And for most of that 200 years, before modern feminism, far more marriages succeeded than failed.

We also seem to agree on that divorces can be instigated on a whim, and maybe we'll even agree on that anyone who instigates months, and maybe years of legal scuffling on a whim is kind of an idiot.
And yet, the presence of idiots using something does not automatically diminish the viability of said "something".

Yes, there are idiots who make bad decisions, but the problem with divorce as it exists today is that it passes on those costs to the other party.

With the divorce rate over 50% and men overwhelmingly paying the financial and emotional cost, any sensible man would see marriage as a risk that is hard to justify. If the failure rate is over 50% then it is clear the viability of marriage for prospective grooms is seriously damaged. Any sensible man would look at other marriages and wonder if they'll be the next one to be thrown under the bus.

I'm also very sorry to say that neither your accusations about me only mentioning one side of the story when detailing personal experience, and your statement that the argument at that point was solely about no-fault divorces lack even the faintest brushes with logic.

I only mentioned my experiences with female victims as I never had experience with organised help for abused male spouses, even though I know of its existence. This, however, does not diminish the fact that in an argument as to whether spousal abuse is a factor it matters a jot which gender is abusing. There is abuse, and that's all that counts.

You're trying to sound "educated" by tossing in unnecessary and pompous phrases "I'm very sorry to say", "lack even the faintest brushes with logic", but you haven't engaged much less debunked the hard counter to your argument.

What you are saying is a much wordier and pompous way of saying, "ur wrong".

Spousal abuse is irrelevant to this issue because the overwhelming majority of divorces are no-fault.

Stigma is, along with many other social mores, quite interesting in antrophology and sociology. However: the last time I checked, "raising your kid" was still classified as pedagogy. Whatever stigma's may say about human nature is also quite irrelevant. (It probably points at humans being dicks anyway.)

Sexist much? Misandrist much?

So actual fields of study, populated by both men and women, are biased against women because they don't agree with the claims of feminists? Anyone who disagrees with you is wrong, is that it?

And to round it all off, I'll just mention that in your comparison I wouldn't be arguing for the decriminalisation of murder, but for the importance of legal recognition of justifiable homicide.

The divorce rate is over 50%.
There were 532 homicides in NYC last year.

The extreme minority of those divorces were due to abuse.
The extreme minority of those homicides were justifiable homicides.

Pointing out the necessity of divorce to escape abuse is not relevant to an analysis of the causes of the high divorce rate.
Pointing out that homicide is sometimes justified is not relevant to an an analysis of the causes of the high murder rate.

Divorce in itself has the potential to cause an ungodly mess, but is sorely needed all the same, to prevent unimaginably worse scenarios.

Again, fallacy of extremes.

Arguing that divorce is necessary in a discussion about the divorce rate being over 50% is like saying that anyone who opposes the Iraq War must be a pacifist.

The question is not whether war or divorce are necessary, the question is whether the situations in which those extreme measures are being applied warrant them.

Then again - that all divorces are being conflated with the very few due to spousal abuse by men, is testament to how the anti-male hate spewed by feminists has corrupted marriage and turned men and women against each other - with children in the crossfire, or, at worst, used as pawns by vindictive former spouses.

 

[aestu]

Western culture teaches us to throw things out when they appear to be past their use. We discard water bottles, shoes, clothes, houses, cars, tools, appliances, you name it, because they are either broken or we lose interest in them. Why should marriage be any different to people who never grew up learning that fixing something or making something work despite its flaws is the proper way to live? "Broken" is synonymous with "beyond repair" in this culture in nearly every way it's used, and it affects marriage as well.
..

This is a common interpretation but I don't agree with it.

Consumerism is the value that deserves blame for social problems - but I don't agree that material disposability is the driving force. Rather, I believe, consumerism's message of "nothing should be difficult or require patience or sacrifice," is the problem.

And that is not a Western value...it is an abberation from traditional Western values...it is a venal social attitude that has reared its head in the last 40 years in response to deindustrialization and social atomization driven by unrestrained capitalism.

 

[Tiger King]

my opinion: a relationship takes work, couples argue, it happens even though some people try as hard as possible to look perfect to outsiders.
basically a relationship will last as long as the ammount of effort put into it.

But good relationships should be effortless. My folks have been married for decades and they rarely argue and state how effortless the relationship has been. That's a real relationship; why force a square into a circular hole?

I would say a good relationship should LOOK effortles and perhaps feel it most of the time too.
being with someone is more than living together and sharing a bed. after awhile it's easy to stop doing the little spontainius things you did when you were dating. But doing little things to please your partner should make you happy too.

also I wouldn't call it putting a square peg into a round hole, more like rounding off the edges.
I've had some quality arguments with my misses, at the time we were both quite angry over something incredibly petty. It's usually instigated by stress from a third party such as work etc.

but after a couple of mins to calm down we are ok and laughing about how silly it was.
on more serious topics we disagree on we sit down talk and listen to each other and compromise.

I count my fiancé as my best friend and you wouldn't ditch a friend just because you didn't agree on something.

 

[KRAKENDIE]

Defining marriage as this deep inherently special institution doesn't help. People think the rules change when they get married, just because of what they've been told "married" means. And shit about "wrong reasons" and "what's wrong with marriage these days" is reaffirming nonsense that lends clout to the sanctification of what is pretty much a passive agreement.

 

[DreamaSkylar]

After recently (and currently) going through a divorce myself, I feel like I can perhaps impart some wisdom to those currently thinking about getting married:

-Don't get married before you are 25. Your early 20s are filled with various changes (lifestyle, location, maturity-level, emotional, etc.) which usually don't even out until you are around 25. Of course there are some exceptions to this rule, but generally, this is a good rule of thumb.

-Make sure you're getting married for the right reasons. For example, don't get married because your friends are doing it, or because you feel pressured by family, a baby on the way, etc. If you feel pressured, that is generally a very bad sign, and should be a huge red flag when it comes to marriage.

-Don't get married if you're not the "marriage type" (duh!). If you find yourself thinking more about other people than your potential life-partner, you should absolutely not consider getting married.

-Try living with your potential marriage partner first as a "test-run" for the real thing. There might be something you're not seeing during those amazing dates or sleep-overs.

 

[Tiger King]

my opinion: a relationship takes work, couples argue, it happens even though some people try as hard as possible to look perfect to outsiders.
basically a relationship will last as long as the ammount of effort put into it.

But good relationships should be effortless. My folks have been married for decades and they rarely argue and state how effortless the relationship has been. That's a real relationship; why force a square into a circular hole?

I would say a good relationship should LOOK effortles and perhaps feel it most of the time too.
being with someone is more than living together and sharing a bed. after awhile it's easy to stop doing the little spontainius things you did when you were dating. But doing little things to please your partner should make you happy too.

also I wouldn't call it putting a square peg into a round hole, more like rounding off the edges.
I've had some quality arguments with my misses, at the time we were both quite angry over something incredibly petty. It's usually instigated by stress from a third party such as work etc.

but after a couple of mins to calm down we are ok and laughing about how silly it was.
on more serious topics we disagree on we sit down talk and listen to each other and compromise.

I count my fiancé as my best friend and you wouldn't ditch a friend just because you didn't agree on something.

Being considerate should be a natural trait of the person; not "effort".
I don't argue with my friends, so why would I marry someone I argue with? Seems that people have lower standards in a partner then they have for friends.

As for serious issues I don't understand why you have to compromise who you are to suit someone else. Surely that's a sign of incompatibility?

your reading "effort" in a negative light, to put the effort in to make someone happy is a good thing I would say. you make it sound like its hard work or something or that there has to be an incentive.

your saying you've never had a disagreement with your friends? 

yeah your right if you were with somebody and your arguing over everything marriage would not be the best idea. but to think your never going to have a disagreement or argument is unrealistic.

"I don't understand why you have to compromise who you are to suit someone else. Surely that's a sign of incompatibility?"

fair point but who said anything about compromising who you are? I said serious topics not serious moral issues, I wasn't referring to personal problems, I should of been clearer sorry. I was thinking more along the lines of getting a house together or starting a long term savings fund together or something that can affect your long term futures.  perhaps you wouldn't label those as "serious" but it's something you would need to sit down and talk about.


"Seems that people have lower standards in a partner then they have for friends."

how so?