Divorce Culture

[John Young]

by Michael Roesch Review of Barbara Dafoe Whitehead's "The Divorce Culture" "... society balked at the idea of divorcing one's spouse on the grounds of simple unhappiness. This c...

Divorce Culture

[composer]

What is marriage? From a secular point of view it seems the only main difference between cohabitation and marriage is a legal one. From a traditional religious viewpoint however (I'm talking monotheistic religions) a marriage is a promise a man and a woman make before God (and secondarily, a church community) to stay together, until death do they part. In the Bible Jesus makes it clear that sexual immorality is the only grounds for divorce, and when he came upon the Samaritan woman at the well, he said she had had several husbands, but none of them were her husband. For him, starting a sexual relationship was the same as entering into marriage. There are other things marriage represents from a uniquely Christian view, such as it being a picture of Christ and the church (with all members of the church being the bride.)

When someone writes a book about changing views on divorce and marriage in culture, one cannot ignore the changing views on religion in the culture.

[rob_brown77]

You are right -- religion manifests in values, and values affect divorce.

[activitiesincommon]

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[RobWinfield]

This is a very important topic.

I think that young people who are getting married need to understand that marriage is about raising successful, healthy children first and foremost; the whole "romantic love" thing is biochemically indistinguishable from eating a pound of chocolate, and choosing divorce because of loss of "romance" or "wanting to trade in the mother of one's children for a new model" is reprehensible and a betrayal of one's children.

Children will be most healthy if they can grow up with both biological parents. I am fortunate enough to be raising my daughter in such a situation. My daughter's happy situation is the exception; most of us grew up in broken homes. And I see a huge difference in my daughter. She is secure; she has no inclination to "go find a new tribe." She isn't willing to degrade herself in order to keep friends/boyfriends. She still goes on family outings with us and enjoys them, despite being a typical teenager. And she shares our goals for her -- she wants to get into an Ivy League school and is willing to work towards that goal.

The older a kid gets before he or she tries drugs/sex et cetera, the less a problem these things will be, and the less likely they will be involved in drug abuse or abusive relationships. The reason drug abuse and couple abuse is so widespread is because they start so young. I got my start in sex and drugs at age 11, courtesy of "babysitters" after my mom kicked out my dad, then pursued her dreams of a career. Needless to say, I had a horrible chlidhood and I definitely could have achieved more in this life had I had a better start. Nevertheless, at age 42 I'm studying calculus and chemistry and going to UConn Storrs with the hopes of getting a B.S. in calculus and working in the petrochemical industry.

There are some things in life that are hard facts; facts that no liberal can talk you out of, or scorn you out of, because I have lived and suffered from these hard facts of a broken home; and conversely, I have proven to my own satisfaction the counterfactual. Namely, that it's possible to raise happy children in an unbroken home.

Latchkey kids, drug abuse, child molestation, race mixing, sex trafficking, and even untimely death of chlidren -- all this can be laid at the doorstep of the feminists and liberals. They are truly evil monsters. We have a clearcut, black and white moral war to wage. I see it as an analogy with the religious wars of the middle ages, such as the 30 years war and the 100 years war. We have been in a 100 years war without fighting back. I think, judging from the comments of online newspaper articles, we have begun to enjoin the battle.

[John Young]

There is no question that the existence of no-fault divorce, coupled with the fact that in 90% of cases where custody is contested, the woman wins, has created a system of perverse incentives that are detrimental to children being raised in intact homes. Obviously, men are incentivized to stay married no matter what, even in the case of severe physical and emotional abuse, whereas women are incentivized to abandon a marriage for even relatively light reasons. This differential in incentives is reflected in the rates at which men and women initiate divorce, with women doing so twice as often as men. If we can accept as a given that men and women are of equal moral stature and thus equally likely to be toads within a marriage, the differential in rates can be entirely explained by the perverse incentives of our system.

Obviously, even before the no-fault revolution (which was quite specifically championed by persons who self-identified as feminists), divorce was an option for FAULT grounds -- abuse, neglect, insanity, criminality, infidelity, drug addiction etc. There were plenty of reasons allowed for ending this lifetime commitment. But even these grounds were insufficient for the self-identified feminist who would not rest until divorce could be granted for light and transient causes. Of course, these same champions worked non-stop to turn child support into one of the most draconian and punitive systems imaginable.

To their credit, based upon the work of their Frankfurt School mentor and author of The Authoritarian Personality, between insane levels of divorce that have turned marriage into little more than a shack-up arrangement and men literally going on marriage strike out of sheer fear, men have been effectively removed from the lives of more than half of European-American children. Fully a third are born with no father in the home at all. Half of the remainder wind up without a father within five years of being born. Many of the 1/3rd born without their fathers in the home are on various forms of welfare because the men only agreed to the impregnation under terms of not being legally identified. In essence, a great many European American women are using the government as a surrogate father for their children.

The statistics on what happens with children raised without their biological father in the home are quite grim. Obviously, these are averages and there will always be some kid who defies the odds, but overall it is clear that lack of a biological father in the home dramatically increases rates of teen pregnancy, drug use and criminal behavior while severely inhibiting academic achievement.

I would certainly like to see no-fault repealed; as no-fault is a no-win for the future. But too many people have a vested interest in their hedonistic whim worship. They got married under terms that were no more binding than shacking up, and they won't accept a change in the rules.

I believe it would indeed be possible, though, to create contracts for marriage under which the parties surrender their no-fault rights and agree to joint physical custody at the outset, which would make the incentives more fair and thereby reduce divorce overall.

[composer]

I think that young people who are getting married need to understand that marriage is about raising successful, healthy children first and foremost; the whole "romantic love" thing is biochemically indistinguishable from eating a pound of chocolate, and choosing divorce because of loss of "romance" or "wanting to trade in the mother of one's children for a new model" is reprehensible and a betrayal of one's children.

Kudos to your daughter for seeking a prestigious college - if she works within the "system" and can hold her moral ground in the face of liberal education's influence, she can even be a good influence on other college students.

I think you touch on the heart of the issue when you open the discussion of what marriage is about, because marriage means different things to different people. I could tell you more about marriage from the Christian/Biblical standpoint, which can be informative even if you do not believe it (and I know most people on this site do not.) It's hard for me to refer to an ultimate authority as to what marriage is within mere moral and cultural relativism. I would encourage more discussion in this forum thread about seeking to define what marriage is, and how you would teach it, because that understanding plays a big part in reducing divorce.

Just a brief run-down on some aspects of Biblical marriage: Marriage in Genesis is described as "becoming one flesh" until one of you dies, which doesn't mean you become the same person, but your bodies belong to each other. Jesus says the only excusable reason for divorce is sexual immorality, and that marrying a divorced person is the same as adultery. Paul and Peter emphasized that the primary role of husbands is to love their wives and make sacrifices for them, and to be a spiritual leader, and wives are primarily to respect and submit to their husbands (so long as the husband is not doing anything wrong.)