Love and Marriage? Father Knows Least?

[FearlessLeader2]

The 'Why did God create athiests' thread spawned a discussion of marriage.

Let's continue it here instead of thread-jacking, okay?

So you do agree with me after all that you're still at risk of STDs if you're married. "Having multiple sexual partners" (as you original talked about as being at risk from STDs) is something which can be true or not independent of whether the people believe in "no sex outside of marriage".

Marriage has nothing to do with this. You can be monogamous to just one person ever, without being married. You can have multiple partners in your life, whilst being married to every one of them.

All of which is true, but completely fails to address the fact that marriage is intended to be a life-long commitment. But the bold part does bear on what I want to discuss...

"Mawwage. Mawwage iv whut bwings us togevver to die." -The Impressive Clergyman

"Got a wife and kids in Baltimore, Jack. I took a ride and I never looked back." --Everybody's Got a Hungry Heart

What does marriage mean to you? Do you think it is still a viable social institution, or have the relentless assaults of so-called 'modern thinking' finally destroyed it?

Marriage to me is a lot like baptism, but instead of devoting yourself to God, you're devoting yourself to your spouse. You're taking oaths to support them, to love them, to hold them as intrinsically more valuable to you than anyone else on the planet, including yourself, for the rest of your life, no matter what the circumstances. It's not an oath to be taken lightly, and since society has chosen to recognise it (with various legal rights pertaining and adhering to it), it seems that society is also obliged to honor marriage by not seeking to interfere between the couple insofar as neither spouse is harming the other.


Unfortunately, I don't see marriage as a healthy social institution anymore. Constant assaults by the media and various 'liberal' organizations have put marriage in the same unenviable position as fatherhood: derided and dismissed as unimportant. The 'desperate housewife' is a staple of modern fiction, the 'hapless dad' likewise. I believe the two phenomena are linked. To destroy marriage, it was neccessary to paint the husband as a cheerless, loveless, money-gatherer (or angry, drunken, wife-beater, choose your own stereotype, there's a million of them) oblivious to his childrens' actions and unresponsive and cold to his wife's emotional needs.

In all honesty, I consider fatherhood and the father to be nothing but collateral damage in the war against marriage. What I'm not really sure of, is exactly what the side that declared war on stable families hoped to gain from their war. Wars are always about profit, all of them boil down to money in the end. So where's the percentage in wrecking the classic nuclear family?

I think it lies in the time-treasured concept of lowering everyone else to the lowest common denominator. At least, that's where the movement is now. Since 'morality is relative', no one is any better than anyone else, so all lifestyles, choices, and actions are as good as any others. What's being gained in this war is social acceptance for personally irresponsible behavior.

With no social stigma, or at least with every existing stigma under siege and falling fast, acceptance rises. When irresponsible behavior is not discouraged, it increases. Irresponsible behavior has negative consequences, in the case of that related to the topic, specific examples of consequences would be unwanted pregnancy, teen parents, and low or no wage families. But rather than 'be mean' to 'unfortunate' people, and hold anyone responsible for the choices they make, society simply whitewashes everything with the 'Bergeron 10-gauge pump Handicapper'. And the problem grows.

So, what say you? How full of crap am I?

 

[SeleucusNicator]

I think it lies in the time-treasured concept of lowering everyone else to the lowest common denominator. At least, that's where the movement is now. Since 'morality is relative', no one is any better than anyone else, so all lifestyles, choices, and actions are as good as any others. What's being gained in this war is social acceptance for personally irresponsible behavior.

You're assuming that there is no defense of monogamy/marriage on practical grounds. There certainly is.

 

[Shadylookin]

marriage is legal institution for monetary gain, and so you have someone to make legal decisions for you in case you get sick or die. I don't really know why people think they need to be recognized by the state and federal governments as a couple to show their love for each other

 

[Grisu]

for me as a non-religious person marriage is pretty much pointless. I don't have to take an oath in front of the state or god to make a true commitment to the one I love. It's between her and me, and that should be enough. Maybe I'll marry her one day, but it will be for financial reasons and not to make a commitment to her, I've made that long ago.

 

[Hitro]

for me as a non-religious person marriage is pretty much pointless. I don't have to take an oath in front of the state or god to make a true commitment to the one I love. It's between her and me, and that should be enough.

Indeed. And the bolded part in the quote FL2 gave in the initial post says exactly why this is the case. What he is wrong at is thinking that this would be a new development while it actually has always been the case.

 

[Akka]

Marriage being imposed to be for life is an absurdity.

If you love someone, you don't need to be forced to stay with her.
If you don't love someone, you have no place being her spouse.

Forcing people to be together while they don't want it is utterly absurd and goes against the very concept and nature of marriage.

 

[Plexus]

"Mawwage. Mawwage iv whut bwings us togevver today." -The Impressive Clergyman

I think I prefer the misheard line, though.

 

[Evertonian]

I think there is a problem in our society with too many marriages breaking down. I don't care if a childless married couple break up, but I do care if they have children, because it creates psychological difficulties for the child.

I don't want to assign blame because I think there are (at least) two legitimate ways of looking at the issue, and one sees men as primarily responsible, and one sees women as primarily responsible.

We know (for a FACT) that most divorces in industrialized countries are instigated by the wife, not the husband. Men are much more likely to stay with a partner who is making them unhappy than women are.

We can see this either as women being unreasonable in not honouring their commitments, or as men failing to be the kind of men that make women feel attracted to them.

Most posters on here are guys, so I'll restrict my comments to the challenges facing guys - (though any good looking girls on here who want advice can PM me, ideally including a recent good quality photo )

Attraction is not a logical process (and I've learnt this the hard way). I bet most guys on here have been in the situation where there was a girl we really really liked, and so we were very generous and accommodating to her, complimented her, put up with her bad moods, bought her gifts, and yet when we tried to make a move, she rejected us despite our efforts. I know I have - many times. I also bet that most guys on here have been in the situation where we acted a bit indifferent to a girl, there was nothing wrong with her really, it's just we didn't think of her in that way, and it turned out she really liked us. What most guys fail to do is learn from that what the correct way to get women to be attracted to us is.

Now, why would men be like that? Why has the art of genuinely making women attracted to us become so rare? Well I think it's a mixture of 3 things:

1) The messages we receive from wider society about what guys need to do to be successful (an example would be Anakin's seduction of Padme in 'Attack of the Clones' - behaving so weak and needy around a woman would make her despise you not love you. Finding more and more expressive ways of demonstrating neediness is not attractive to women, particularly good looking ones who have guys doing to them all the time).

2) The advice we get from females about what is attractive. At worst this advice is totally counter productive, at best it is useless. Women typically have an inconsistency between what they claim to want in a man (usually 'A sensitive nice guy, who can make me laugh' or similar) and what they actually respond to in a man (a guy who is a little bit cocky, acts like he could take her or leave her, teases her, and when she tests him always keeps his power and his composure). Also IME the most common advice offered is 'be yourself' which is completely bogus. On one interpretation you can't not be yourself. On another it means conceding that there is no prospect of ever developing yourself and becoming a better man.

3) Feedback we get from other areas in our life. Eg, our friendships improve if we show great generosity to our friends. Our careers progress if we are very eager to please our bosses. But these DO NOT carry over as successful strategies when it comes to dealing with women.

 

[MeteorPunch]

Marriage being imposed to be for life is an absurdity.

If you love someone, you don't need to be forced to stay with her.
If you don't love someone, you have no place being her spouse.

Forcing people to be together while they don't want it is utterly absurd and goes against the very concept and nature of marriage.

From your belief it seems you are destined for divorce.

 

[Akka]

From your belief it seems you are destined for divorce.

So considering that love is the main reason for mariage is something that make someone destined to divorce

Well, fool am I, love has of course nothing to do with spending your life with someone. Where did I get this idea ?
Hopefully, there is people like you, with clever argumentation and clear sight and belief, to enlight me about my idiocy

 

[Stapel]

I think there is a problem in our society with too many marriages breaking down. I don't care if a childless married couple break up, but I do care if they have children, because it creates psychological difficulties for the child.

What a load of crap. The psychological difficulties are mostly created by the poor relation between mummy and daddy, divorced or not. And that's the way it is!
Kids get in trouble, when they see their father and mother don't love eachother. It can be a great mess!
When people debate the effects of divorce for the kids, they usually tend to compare happy couples (still together of course) with unhappy couples. That is just plain stupid!
If a father and mother have lost the love for eachother, only few are capable of raising kids properly while living together.
In most cases a divorce is bad, but how is the alternative of enforcing a bad-marriage to keep on going any better for the kids?
My parents' divorce is possibly the best thing in my and my brother's life!
I've seen what happens to kids when parents keep persisting in their crap marriages. That's ugly business!
Of course it is a better for kids when parents have a happy marriage!
But once the marriage is bad (and that simply happens), it is not so logical to conclude it is better for the kids to stay together. Statistics that seem to back this up are extemely flawed.

We know (for a FACT) that most divorces in industrialized countries are instigated by the wife, not the husband. Men are much more likely to stay with a partner who is making them unhappy than women are.

Maybe men are cowards?

 

[Evertonian]

Of course it is a better for kids when parents have a happy marriage!
But once the marriage is bad (and that simply happens), it is not so logical to conclude it is better for the kids to stay together. Statistics that seem to back this up are extemely flawed.

I agree with you that children going up with happily married parents is the most preferable situation. I'm a little bit sceptical about your analysis of the relative merits of the 'unhappy marriage v divorce' outcomes, but my mind is still somewhat open on that. It's always tempting to extrapolate from a data set of one, when our own personal experience is that one sample item in the data set, but it sometimes leads to incorrect conclusions.

Where I really disagree with you is the premise that the marriage turning bad simply happens. There are certain behaviours that spouses exhibit that lead the other spouse to be unhappy in the marriage. Men tend to be the worst culprits for exhibiting these behaviours, hence more women instigating divorce. Unfortunately most men don't know what these behaviours are, and tend to persist with them even as their relationship grows colder.

Now a response to this view might be that all women are not the same and that no generalisation should be made. Well, I think that only applies in extreme cases, much like with men. Sure, I think that Nathalie Imbruglia is the most attractive woman going, maybe you think it's Heidi Klum. We have a difference of opinion. But there's no question that we'd both think that both of them were more attractive than Barbara Bush (the President's mother not his daughter), and I think that's similar with women, that there are certain qualities that women pretty much accross the board find more attractive. Of course you get the odd one this isn't true for, much like there might be a man out there somewhere who thinks Barbara Bush is sex on legs.

 

[stormbind]

Marriage to me is a lot like baptism, but instead of devoting yourself to God, you're devoting yourself to your spouse. You're taking oaths to support them, to love them, to hold them as intrinsically more valuable to you than anyone else on the planet, including yourself, for the rest of your life, no matter what the circumstances. It's not an oath to be taken lightly, and since society has chosen to recognise it (with various legal rights pertaining and adhering to it), it seems that society is also obliged to honor marriage by not seeking to interfere between the couple insofar as neither spouse is harming the other.

I have a romantic view of marriage, that is unique and not supported by any church - that I know of.

My definition of marriage is permanent spiritual union.

As far as I am concerned, ceremonies are an official announcement of a situation which already exists and will forever exist

My view of marriage is detached from the contractual arrangement witnessed by government authorities.

Contractual divorce signifies to me that the concerned individuals were never really married: a very regrettable case of mistaken identity!

 

[Kayak]

Unfortunately, I don't see marriage as a healthy social institution anymore. Constant assaults by the media and various 'liberal' organizations have put marriage in the same unenviable position as fatherhood: derided and dismissed as unimportant. The 'desperate housewife' is a staple of modern fiction, the 'hapless dad' likewise. I believe the two phenomena are linked. To destroy marriage, it was neccessary to paint the husband as a cheerless, loveless, money-gatherer (or angry, drunken, wife-beater, choose your own stereotype, there's a million of them) oblivious to his childrens' actions and unresponsive and cold to his wife's emotional needs.

In all honesty, I consider fatherhood and the father to be nothing but collateral damage in the war against marriage. What I'm not really sure of, is exactly what the side that declared war on stable families hoped to gain from their war. Wars are always about profit, all of them boil down to money in the end. So where's the percentage in wrecking the classic nuclear family?

Where is this "side" that is attacking marriage? I don't think you will find many people in the US that would say marriage is a bad institution. Unless you think that there is a big plot or something
No, the breakdown of marriage is directly tied to our economic success. With increased wealth it becomes posible to live and reaise children independently. Women are no longer in economic slavery to their husbands. So they can leave a situation that they don't like, and do.

 

[stormbind]

I consider fatherhood and the father to be nothing but collateral damage in the war against marriage.

This, like the remainder of your post, does not apply to my perception of the scenario.

It is my conclusion that the entire government-sponsored approach to marriage has been so blighted by coldly calculated policies and money-sniffing lawyers, that it is simply no longer a valid representation of love between partners.

The paper-marriage is viewed by me as a set of tools which can be deployed or retracted to achieve calculated political objectives between members of society. I don't really care if a couple signs loveless material documents or not. Perhaps this is a victory for those who are at war with marriage?

 

[Stapel]

I agree with you that children going up with happily married parents is the most preferable situation. I'm a little bit sceptical about your analysis of the relative merits of the 'unhappy marriage v divorce' outcomes, but my mind is still somewhat open on that. It's always tempting to extrapolate from a data set of one, when our own personal experience is that one sample item in the data set, but it sometimes leads to incorrect conclusions.

The problem is: It's close to impossible to select the unhappy marriages, for useful statistics. You can't tell from the outside!

There's another point in many statistics. Some say single parent kids are more likely to end up in crime. This usually goes by the most brilliant flaw of not properly used statistics. An example:
Select 1000 people in Liverpool that have died last month. Note their age and note their length. You will come to the conclusion that long people die earlier!
Now you do the same, but also note the gender.
You will conclude that males die younger and that males are longer. But within the male or female group, you will NOT see a correlation between length and age, whereas the first test did show this correlation.
What does this have to do with divorce, single parents and ending up in crime?
Maybe there is a correlation between ending up in crime and living in circumstances where parents are not together, but not directly one between divorce and ending up in crime:
-In bad neighbourhoods, kids are more likely to have a single parent.
-In bad neighbourhoods, kids are more likely to end up in crime.

Where I really disagree with you is the premise that the marriage turning bad simply happens.

What I meant: Some marriages simply happen to turn bad. There will alway be a percentage of marriages turning bad, whatever the causes are.

 

[Evertonian]

The problem is: It's close to impossible to select the unhappy marriages, for useful statistics. You can't tell from the outside!

There's another point in many statistics. Some say single parent kids are more likely to end up in crime. This usually goes by the most brilliant flaw of not properly used statistics. An example:
Select 1000 people in Liverpool that have died last month. Note their age and note their length. You will come to the conclusion that long people die earlier!
Now you do the same, but also note the gender.
You will conclude that males die younger and that males are longer. But within the male or female group, you will NOT see a correlation between length and age, whereas the first test did show this correlation.
What does this have to do with divorce, single parents and ending up in crime?
Maybe there is a correlation between ending up in crime and living in circumstances where parents are not together, but not directly one between divorce and ending up in crime:
-In bad neighbourhoods, kids are more likely to have a single parent.
-In bad neighbourhoods, kids are more likely to end up in crime.

Stapel, to be honest you've persuaded me that it is probably not going to be possible to accurately determine whether children's interests are generally better served by an unhappy marriage or by divorce.

However I am still strongly committed to the notion (which you also endorsed earlier) that children are definitely better served by being brought up by their happily married (to each other) parents. (This form of words might not accurately reflect my feelings either, since I think a happy stable committed long term relationship of their parents is just as good).

What I meant: Some marriages simply happen to turn bad. There will alway be a percentage of marriages turning bad, whatever the causes are.

It's not clear to me what proportion of the marriages/ltrs that currently either turn bad or end in break-up you think fall into this 'inevitable' category. And I suspect this might be where our main difference lies.

I regard the number of marriages/ltrs that its inevitable will simply happen to turn bad or end in break up, as immaterial compared to the number that currently do.

I also think the single greatest reason for non-inevitable break ups is the women deciding to do it, because the men aren't exhibiting behaviour that makes them attractive to women. And the single greatest reason marriages turn bad is because the men aren't exhibiting behaviour that makes them attractive to women. (Although women are generally either unwilling or incapable of articulating what those behaviours are - instead they use euphimistic platitudes like 'we drifted apart'). I'm sure you know many guys who have been/are currently married/in ltrs. The most accommodating guys do not have the happiest marriages/ltrs, yet many guys who really want a happier marriage/ltr act as though this was the case.

And I think there are number of forces around today (which I outlined above) which push men in ltrs and marriages in the direction of counter-productive behaviour.

 

[Akka]

Considering the many examples I witnessed through my life, a good divorce is infinitely preferable to a bad marriage.

Anyway, I'm still waiting for someone to explain the idea of a loveless marriage. I must be stupid, because I can't grasp it, and consider that it's the polar opposite of the very principle of a marriage. Still, many people seem to not only consider it perfectly fine, but even to enforce it by law.
So ?

 

[Shaihulud]

My experience with women seeking divorce is that the husband is cheating on her. No statistics on, it but I think it is a more reasonable assumption than that hubby isn't giving her the right signals.

 

[MeteorPunch]

Anyway, I'm still waiting for someone to explain the idea of a loveless marriage. I must be stupid, because I can't grasp it, and consider that it's the polar opposite of the very principle of a marriage. Still, many people seem to not only consider it perfectly fine, but even to enforce it by law.
So ?

My question is, why have a loveless marraige? From the time you are getting to know the person, the time you feel you should be married, and all throughout your married life, having love together and enjoying life together should be a top priority.

Obviously given the statistics, people do not know what they are getting into.