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Teh gays ruining the sanctity of marriage!

croxiscroxis I am the walrus
[url]http://msn.match.com/msn/article.aspx?articleid=7279&TrackingID=516365&BannerID=542339&menuid=6[/url]

[quote]
[B]Look who’s happily unmarried[/B]

By Rory Evans Get your grandma her fan and smelling salts: More and more couples are living in sin. The recent report of a Census Bureau survey found that married-couple households in the U.S. are now outnumbered. A hair more than half — 50.3 percent — of households are headed by unmarried people, and 31.7 percent of American children are being raised in unmarried homes.

No offense to Granny or anything, but “these numbers suggest that couples living together can’t be scandalous,” says Nicky Grist, the executive director of the Alternatives to Marriage Project (unmarried.org). “It’s hard to scandalize when you’re the majority.” Sure enough, the number of people reporting themselves as part of unmarried couples spiked about 14 percent in the past six years.

Unmarried couples seem to be part of Hollywood’s old guard — Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell, Sam Shepherd and Jessica Lange, Susan Sarandon and Tim Robbins, Oprah and Stedman. Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, meanwhile, seem to be carrying the torch for a younger generation — with some social consciousness, too: Let the weekly celebrity magazines keep on with their “Wedding Plans Afoot?” headlines, but Pitt recently said, “Angie and I will consider tying the knot when everyone else in the country who wants to be married is legally able.”

As much as the Jolie-Pitt relationship may inspire new couples to forge long-term relationships without a trip down the aisle, they’re really just a reflection of a trend that’s already in place—as the Census survey showed. These statistics have been covered everywhere from [I]The New York Times[/I] to [I]The Colbert Report[/I] to those maddeningly irresistible factoid screens in elevators, and anyone in a long-term unmarried relationship probably greeted the news with a resounding yawn.

“Unmarried long-term relationships are absolutely more accepted than they were a generation ago,” says Elana Katz, MSW, a psychotherapist specializing in family therapy and divorce mediation in New York City, and a senior faculty member at the Ackerman Institute for the Family. “These relationships are also popular with different age groups for different reasons. They’re an alternative for people who were divorced and don’t want to be married again. They also allow 20-somethings to dress-rehearse for either civil or religious commitments.”

Becky, in New York, was one of those 20-somethings. Nine years later and still with her partner, she says, “I have not felt any real pressure to get married, and no one has made me think that our relationship is less stable. Before we had kids, I imagine some people wondered if there was a fundamental problem, and we probably did have some commitment issues, but now, with two kids, no one questions it.”

[B]A world with no divorce…[/B]
As Grist points out, one of the greatest benefits of being part of an unmarried relationship is that “people are happy about defining themselves outside an institution and all its baggage,” she says. After all, unmarried relationships tend to defy the stereotypes that plague marriage and keep the sitcom writers busy. “There’s a real sense of independence separate from how marriage gets defined.” It’s not such a trivial concept, considering that Oprah Winfrey — the very woman behind the worldwide brand — essentially admitted to not marrying Stedman Graham for fear of losing her own identity and devoted an entire show to “unmarriage.”

For some unmarried couples, there is concern about “What will happen if we break up?” Those who marry don’t have to wrestle with that. As Grist notes, marriage is a legally binding agreement that has no written contract spelling out all the stipulations, but it does spell out what happens when the relationship ends—which is among the greatest advantages marriage has to an unmarried partnership. “Whether it’s by death or divorce, when a marriage ends, the partners’ rights are clearly defined by law. Some people see that as a big protection,” Grist says. “Some people in unmarried couples are embarrassed to admit that they worry about their rights in a breakup, but the law [with partnership agreements] is slowly catching up to that.”

At the same time, for some couples, there’s comfort in knowing that breaking up — without a messy divorce — is an option. “My girlfriend and I have been together for almost seven years, and we’ve broken up for very brief periods at least four times,” says Frank, in New York. “But now, I think knowing we can do that at any minute keeps us together and then brings us back together in a way I don’t think we’d reconcile if we were married. I know it’s a little crazy and a lot about semantics, but it works for us.”

[B]…And maybe no health insurance[/B]
For a while, Frank and his partner even worked at the same large company, and each always had his or her own health insurance. Access to partners’ health care and work benefits are, understandably, a top priority for those in unmarried relationships. “That’s the single most frequent complaint we hear on our web site—that they can’t get benefits,” Grist says.

In fact, it’s often those very privileges that inspire long-term couples — opposed to marriage in principle — to get hitched nonetheless. “I remember calling my partner in tears because I took a job and couldn’t get him health insurance unless we were married,” recalls Catherine Newman in Northampton, MA, mother of two and author of [I]Waiting for Birdy[/I] and the “I do. Not.” essay in the best-selling anthology, [I]The Bitch in the House[/I]. “And he said, ‘Is this your idea of a romantic proposal?’”

She hastens to point that their city-hall wedding — which she treated much like an errand; she wore yoga pants and then went to the drug store immediately after to buy yeast-infection medicine — “didn’t change our relationship, although my parents were thrilled to be able to call Michael their son-in-law instead of, er, their daughter’s, um, special friend—which always made it sound like he was a little impaired or something,” Newman says. “I admit that when I call the plumber, I like saying ‘I think you already talked to my husband.’ It’s much less exhausting.” Besides, Newman says that she and her partner Michael had made a commitment much larger than marriage when they had their first kid. “Talk about ’til death do you part,’” Newman says. “A kid is totally forever.”

A wedding, on the other hand, “is one day that can cost between $25,000 and $100,000,” Becky says. Indeed, the preparation and thought involved in planning a wedding can scare couples off the prospect. “We decided we wanted a baby and didn’t want to plan a wedding before the baby,” Becky says. “So we put off the wedding. Then we were too busy after the first kid to plan, and then we had another kid.”

And so their unmarried life looks a lot like a married one. Which is true of so many unmarried couples: As Michael, in Westchester County, New York, says of his 13-year relationship, “We are among the most conservative middle-class couples we know, in terms of, we live in the suburbs and have two kids and two cars and the kids go to public school. We have retirement plans and we spend the weekend driving the kids to dance class.” (When they went to City Hall to get married five years into their relationship, she had an anxiety attack and couldn’t go through with it.) And — Grandma, cover your ears — “We live as though we’re married,” he says with a smile, “but we still have sex.” If you believe Michael, then that’s another benefit to avoiding the “I do’s.” [/quote]

Comments

  • Sick sad world.

    Glad I'm not part of that statistic. (And never will be a part of it).
  • David of MacDavid of Mac Elite Ranger Ca
    Frankly, I just can't get it up about people not hating each other.

    Ooh, there's [i]unsanctioned love[/i] in the world. What [i]ever[/i] shall we do?
  • Never said I hate them, just that I'm not going to go that route.
  • Marriage is older than the bible itself and was ment as protection for the woman or counterpart. These days men seem to need more protection than women. Can anyone say Prenup?

    Watched my parents seperate , then get back together and divorce a later. For a long time we had the cops over here alot. Now I won't say marriage isn't good but it does change the structure and goal of the relationship. Its more like a chore then an act of love.
  • David of MacDavid of Mac Elite Ranger Ca
    [QUOTE=A2597;156822]Never said I hate them, just that I'm not going to go that route.[/QUOTE]

    Didn't say you hated them, just that I didn't see what was so upsettingly sad and sick about it. Of all the pains and travesties in the world, improper love is fairly low on my list of priorities to correct.
  • Space GhostSpace Ghost Elite Ranger
    Throughout history, marriage has had little to do with love. Instead, its been about property, plain and simple. Today of course, at least in the western world, it usually is about love. However, with the divorce rates being what they are, maybe some people should think twice about getting married. I think living together without the legal problems associated with breaking up should the relationship fail has its merits.

    With that said, I'm going to propose to my girlfriend pretty soon (I already have the ring, just waiting for the right time). So, I'm probably just full of shit. ;)
  • FreejackFreejack Jake the Not-so-Wise
    SG, I think you are right on the money, but I would say for the vast majority of humanity, it wasn't about property, but survival. People needed the economies of scale and specialization of labor that came with being married. That's not to say that those who married didn't love one another, or fell in love.

    Move into 20th and 21st century, where, especially in western society, one can survive quite well without a partner, and purpose of marriage has shifted to love and relationship. And, of course, a loving relationship can exist without marriage, hence the decline in couples interested in marriage.

    Jake
  • CurZCurZ Resident Hippy
    I see marriage as a piece of paper and legal rights. Today, when you need paper and legal status to be able to move around in the world, it's necessary if you want to live together.
  • Well, for me to make clear WHY I hold marriage so highly would require a much longer post than I have time to make right now. And would detail why I belive there are so many failed relationships in this world right now.

    Basically, it boils down to one principal:

    Selfishness rather than Selflessness.

    Love, naturally, must be selfless.
  • BigglesBiggles <font color=#AAFFAA>The Man Without a Face</font>
    That does raise the obvious question of why selfless love can only occur with marraige?
  • [QUOTE=Freejack;156853]

    Move into 20th and 21st century, where, especially in western society, one can survive quite well without a partner, and purpose of marriage has shifted to love and relationship. And, of course, a loving relationship can exist without marriage, hence the decline in couples interested in marriage.

    Jake[/QUOTE]



    I was thinking along those lines about the era we are in , back in the neolithic and bronze age the life expctancy was 18-20 years of age. So basicly you would have to get married around 13-15 and have kids before you died of old age at 20. Marrage was just to make people feel happy with such short lives and the need to procreate before death. I am sure if the life span now was 18-20 years divorce rates would not exist.
  • Space GhostSpace Ghost Elite Ranger
    If the life span was 18 to 20 years, few people on these boards would exist, period. :p But I get your point.
  • oh, of course it can occure outside of marriage. I suppose I was hitting on multiple subjects pertaining to it.

    But someone said the divorce rate was so high...that to me says people are doing one, or both of 2 things...
    Marrying to soon, for the wrong reasons.
    or
    Being selfish.

    Generally, it's both.
  • [QUOTE=A2597;156879]oh, of course it can occure outside of marriage. I suppose I was hitting on multiple subjects pertaining to it.

    But someone said the divorce rate was so high...that to me says people are doing one, or both of 2 things...
    Marrying to soon, for the wrong reasons.
    or
    Being selfish.

    Generally, it's both.[/QUOTE] I agree with your first statement. Alot of my friends are getting married and its mostly based on sex which I can't say whether that can't work or not. They treat each other like crap though and they love it. One person's asshole is another persons nice guy. Someone want to explain to me why abusive relationships are more succesful than sober ones?
  • FreejackFreejack Jake the Not-so-Wise
    I think it has much to do with an individual's perception of their own self-worth.

    Individual's who have a healthy understanding of their self-worth will not feel the need to either A:control others or B:allow themselves to be controlled. It seems that often in relationships, those two types mate simply because it there is a fit.

    Jake
  • Very well put Freejack. :)
  • SanfamSanfam I like clocks.
    [QUOTE=A2597;156879]oh, of course it can occure outside of marriage. I suppose I was hitting on multiple subjects pertaining to it.

    But someone said the divorce rate was so high...that to me says people are doing one, or both of 2 things...
    Marrying to soon, for the wrong reasons.
    or
    Being selfish.

    Generally, it's both.[/QUOTE]

    Doesn't this, in effect, make marriage impure by the very action of getting married without "definite" love?

    Speaking as someone who doesn't really see marriage as much more than a legal benefits package, I just do not see how suddenly getting married changes the entire nature of a relationship. If a deep, trusting relationship with mutual respect from both parties existed beforehand, it'll carry over. If not, it will not just be magically created.

    What I'm getting at is that, wouldn't this postponement/indefinite hold on marriage end up actually benefiting your case? Lets use this example with two groups of people. Couple 1 are genuinely in love for the "right" reasons (though I think it's a poor use of words to call one person's definition of love correct and another wrong) and choose to get married later on in life to make their financial dealings less complicated. Couple two are having trouble, constantly entering and exiting "committed" relationships but never move towards marriage because the appeal of "sealing the deal" is no longer such a social imperative. If this scenario occurred across society as a whole, would it not grow the respect of the system of marriage through the increased "legitimacy" of the marriages? That is, with more people marrying for reasons of financial soundness versus marrying for locking someone into a monagamous relationship, the overall image of marriage would be that much more respectable and valuable to those in one. The divorce rate would plummet.

    One of the big issues as I see it is that too many people expect marriage to work like a drug (almost). By taking the pill, they expect a change in both their base personality and that of their partner, a modification that simply cannot happen by agreeing to a social contract. When this is the case, the marriage starts to fall apart fairly quickly, while the previous relationship may very well have been quite stable due to the assumed state of independence between the two individuals. Not being in a marriage did not put any pressure on either party, for whatever reason, to change for the other and flaws went pretty much ignored (perhaps because the perception was that they would be fixed through marriage).
  • FreejackFreejack Jake the Not-so-Wise
    Sanfam, I can sum up your last paragraph through one of my favorite lines about marriage:

    A man marries a woman hoping she won't change, a woman marries a man hoping he will...

    Jake
  • BigglesBiggles <font color=#AAFFAA>The Man Without a Face</font>
    If marriage is so sacrosanct in the US, why are a man and a woman able to meet for the first time in a Las Vegas bar, get drunk, and then get married while clearly under the influence of alcohol and not making sensible decisions?
  • don't know about others but I make the most sensible decisions when drunk
  • bobobobo (A monkey)
    IMHO, it comes down to if your entering a marriage covenant (agreement between two people) or vow (agreement to oneself).

    Personnally, my beliefs led me to enter marriage as a vow that I would remain faithful to my spouse and our marriage, regardless. I waited until I found someone who had the same understanding.

    Such a view of marriage cannot be, and has never been able to be, defined or instilled by law.
  • SanfamSanfam I like clocks.
    Once again, a case of mutual understanding and respect for a self-determined moral code more than anything else. To be successful in such an area is to be successful at communicating one's desires and intentions properly.
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