A friend of mine linked to this article on her Facebook account. It’s a pretty fascinating piece on the history of specifically no-fault divorce in the United States, with information on demographics and mostly concerned with the welfare of children of divorced parents. I know nothing about the author or the publication.
I just got my paperwork back from the court yesterday, and will be officially and legally divorced later this month, so I have a personal stake in this argument. Luckily I have no children, so this article is not entirely about my situation, but I believe it’s still relevant to me. The article is statedly in favor of making no-fault divorce more difficult to obtain. (The piece is entirely about no-fault divorce. It never suggests that divorce in the case of infidelity or abuse should be more regulated, and even adds that children in abusive households or whose parents fight excessively do better after divorce. For convenience, I’ll be using the general term “divorce” to mean no-fault, unless I state otherwise.) It is also in favor of “preferential treatment by family courts” of parents who are being divorced against their will. It suggests bolstering the federal Healthy Marriage Initiative by increasing funding to programs that are shown to work, and perhaps through social marketing campaigns.
Go read the article. It isn’t very long, and it has some interesting things to say about the demographics of marriage, divorce, and marriage satisfaction, and about the socioeconomic differences in marriage trends. It points out the change in trends—brought on, according to the article, by changing divorce laws—that has turned marriage from an institution whose sole purpose is to support families and children to what the article calls a “soul-mate” model, in the service of the happiness and fulfillment of the participants.
I’m not qualified to comment on the numbers. If there be one among us who is, please do. Meanwhile, I’m going to assume that the numbers presented by the article are correct. It says that marital satisfaction fell about ten percent from the early 70s to the early 80s (“In the early 1970s, 70% of married men and 67% of married women reported being very happy in their marriages; by the early '80s, these figures had fallen to 63% for men and 62% for women”). It uses these figures to suggest that, contrary to conventional wisdom in the 70s that easily-obtained divorce would weed out bad marriages and make marriages better over all, it in fact made marriage more precarious. Farther down, however, it concedes that marital satisfaction reached a plateau in the 1980s, as divorce rates began to decline.
What this suggests to me is that attitudes surrounding divorce, marriage, and relationships are changing, and that this process is naturally going to be rocky at the start. The increase in the past few decades of so-called “alternative” relationships, and heightened awareness of homosexual relationships, supports this. Perhaps this is also good news for children. Again, assuming the article’s numbers to be correct, divorce has a very real affect on children (though it doesn’t factor in age of minor children at the time of divorce, which may make a very big difference). I, again, have no children, and am myself the child of parents who are still married. My experience seeing friends whose parents are divorced, however, suggests that at least some of the negative affects stem from two related places: first, the feeling that at least one of the parents has failed and is no longer worthy of respect; and second, the feeling that they and their families are not “normal.”
Divorce naturally puts strain on a family. I wonder, though, as our relationship politics continue to change, and as our ideals of what makes a good family shift, whether some of that strain might be lessened. The article only addresses nontraditional families in its fairly negative view of unmarried, cohabiting parents, but as nontraditional families become more and more the norm, perhaps children will feel less stigmatized by the breakups of their parents and will do better.
Thoughts?
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Clearly, the implication inherent in this legislation is that marriage has been transformed from a bond between two people based on mutual love to a me-centered pairing whereby if the going gets too tough, then one partner or the other opts to bring it to an end.
As for the statistics, I am notoriously wary of numerical data because it rarely reveals a true picture of much of anything. Numbers can be spun out in every direction imaginable and still not provide anything conclusive. The article also implies that often that in attempting to remedy one problem, we can create another in its place, which happens far too frequently. Still, this happens to conservative legislation as much as it does with liberal legislation.
I'm still not sure I completely believe that, as many conservatives believe, that the sixties and seventies were a grand experiment that failed and should not be emulated in any way, shape, or form. Though I did have many friends who were children of divorce and though their struggles were undeniably difficult, there were some parents who were clearly quite poorly matched and who got married for all the wrong reasons. This survey seems to imply that all marriages are suspect to dissolution based on prevailing culture beliefs, not merely the more simplistic notion that states, with much wisdom, that whomever a person marries ought to be for all the right reasons. The marriages I've known that have failed have primarily been a result of selfish motives going in to them, not necessarily going out.
I've also read some articles (can't find them right now) about how New York is the only state not to allow no-fault divorce, and the horrible situations people end up living through while they're trying to convince the court they deserve a divorce.
I don't know quite what the solution is, but I don't like the idea of forcing people to stay in marriages they hate. I guess one solution is not forcing them to stay, but forcing them to pay more alimony if they left for no good reason.
Right. Forcing people to be married seems like the antithesis of freedom. But divorce has major social costs, specifically in education. I don't think there's a good answer to that.
I'm not sure that's a good solution. I left my marriage "for no good reason" other than I was very unhappy in it, and certainly didn't come out on top financially. Penalizing me for it would have just kept me married, stressed out, and unhappy (possibly leading to health problems), or would have made living single more difficult than it already is.
Maybe more emphasis on premarital education and counseling? Or on aiding families going through divorce to minimize negative effects on children?
Well, I was mainly talking about the case where the partner leaving CAN support themselves and the other person and/or kids (like it or not, that's the most common case when the husband leaves, and I think that's what the article was addressing most). If they can't, then their leaving doesn't affect the finances as much anyway.
If one person has always been the breadwinner and the other person gave up a career to raise their children, you have to take that into account. On the other hand, if two adults have both been working and have not had any kids, then I see no particular reason for financial penalties for getting divorced.
Some people would probably benefit from premarital counseling, but how would we force it on people? And who would pay for it? I don't think *I* need state-sponsored premarital education, and a lot of people probably don't. I think we just have to hope the people who do need counseling seek it out, and let people make their own mistakes.
Hm...I felt the article highlighted the plight of men who didn´t see a divorce comming and end up not seeing their children
Spouses who were unwilling parties to a unilateral divorce, however, tend to do less well. And the ill effects of divorce for adults tend to fall disproportionately on the shoulders of fathers. Since approximately two-thirds of divorces are legally initiated by women, men are more likely than women to be divorced against their will. In many cases, these men have not engaged in egregious marital misconduct such as abuse, adultery, or substance abuse. They feel mistreated by their ex-wives and by state courts that no longer take into account marital "fault" when making determinations about child custody, child support, and the division of marital property. Yet in the wake of a divorce, these men will nevertheless often lose their homes, a substantial share of their monthly incomes, and regular contact with their children. For these men, and for women caught in similar circumstances, the sting of an unjust divorce can lead to downward emotional spirals, difficulties at work, and serious deteriorations in the quality of their relationships with their children.
Most men who kill themselves are actually divorced/seperated.
Those sound suspiciously like MRA arguments.
Look, a marriage is a voluntary contract between equals - and if either one of those equals decides to withdraw from that contract, they should be allowed to, with as little red tape as possible.
If it was up to me, divorce should be as simple as marriage is - just go to the county clerks' office, file a notice of divorce, and pay a modest fee to make sure the spouse has that notice lawfully served.
If the parties can't work out the property and child custody questions, there should be a system where social workers employed by the family courts would serve as mediators, and work out an amicable settlement fair to all parties involved - no lawyers, no prenups and none of that other expensive legal ugliness.
Nobody should be forced to stay married if they don't want to.
It is also pretty much reality. Of course nobody should be forced to be in a bad marriage but there also has to be a focused on fair treatment of men and especially fathers in divorce courts. And that is something I can not see happening.
As far as I know, divorce IS that simple in most states if both parties agree to it and can work out terms they agree on. The problem comes in when they (usually) can't agree to terms on their own, and then we get all the ugliness.
How about making it harder to get married in the first place?
If divorce is so terrible (and it isn't, but say for the same of argument the right wing handwringing is true) then nobody should be allowed to even get married in the first place unless they are physically, mentally, emotionally and psychologically ready and have had extensive premarital counseling to prove it.
Or, better yet trust people's judgment and let them marry at will and divorce at will, for any reason, or no reason at all, as they see fit.
I'm sorry but this article is pretty terrifying, especially when you unpack the oh so innocent gender disparities and how that would play out in real life.
Forcing people to 'pay' for wanting to leave a marriage is coercive, counter productive and un feminist. The real evidence actually shows that unlike the Fox news talking points that even the OP seems to have bought into, on average women end up poorer after a divorce and men end up richer.
I find the numbers in this article unconvincing. The author points out that stastically children of divorce have greater social ills. But he also notes that divorce is strongly correlated to class. So why are these social ills divorce caused and not class caused?
He also gives a completely one sided view of the divorce 'revolution' and its causes. Of course marriages pre 1970s were great - A decent job, a well-maintained home, mutual spousal aid, child-rearing, and shared religious faith'. Please. No rape, no emotional abuse, no alienation of affection, no drudgery, no depression - it was a pie in the sky wonderland.
And follow the logic through to what he is really saying in his statement on the 'rise of divorce'. He criticises churches for this statement;
In marriages where the partners are, even after thoughtful reconsideration and counsel, estranged beyond reconciliation, we recognize divorce and the right of divorced persons to remarry, and express our concern for the needs of the children of such unions. To this end we encourage an active, accepting, and enabling commitment of the Church and our society to minister to the needs of divorced persons.
Well what is the alternative - forcing people to stay married whether they want to or not? Churches followed 'zeitgeist', really? Or maybe they say the true wreckage of many marriages could not in good faith oppose it. Marriage is voluntary and I'm sorry, if you are going to kill yourself because your wife leave you, you shouldn't be getting married at all.
And why would anyone expect the upheaval and change surrounding such an important institution as marriage to be easy or quick? He points to short term declining happiness and the now decline in divorce now as some sort of backtracking from pro divorce liberals who have now seen god and want back into the snuggly stars and stripes conformity blanket. More likely that increased freedoms for women created societal uncertainty and upheaval and those things took time to work out. Remember that many women still would have faced a stigma and discrimination for being divorced which may not have made them 'happy' in the short term. He's also not comparing like with like. Compare unhappy people who stayed in a relationship with unhappy people who left and then I'll listen.
Lastly this kind of thing annoys me so much. Marriage is so material now, it should be about duty, honor blah blah. It's funny how no one opposes any aspect of capitalism and materialism except that which increases freedoms for women. I don't see him arguing for shorter work days, more vacation time, better welfare programs, free marital counselling or better access to contraception, all of which could strengthen marriage.
The women end up poorer and men richer is a myth that just keeps comming back. Men certainly do not end up richer as often they have to pay alimony/childsupport.
Given the facts that:
- Women initiate most divorces
- Women receive custody (not much shared parenting in the USA) in most of the cases (I believe it was above 80%)
- Most male suicide victims are divorced/seperated fathers
One can see that the one benifiting from divorce is not men but women.
You're right, but without any numbers to back me up, I would venture to guess that women don't get richer, either. Women leaving a marriage are less likely to be employed or have the kinds of job skills to support children and/or themselves. The logical thing to say is that people who initiate divorce against the will of the other partner shouldn't expect alimony, but until minimum wage equals a living wage, legislating in that direction would only make it impossible for many people to leave.
I know what you are talking about.
The confusing thing about marriage is, that it is a contract where sometimes the party that breaks the contract gets rewarded.
Looking at the current ruling there is, my main beef is not necessarily alimony but the way custody is a "winner takes it all"-Situation that is for sure not in the best interest of the child.
Maybe this is a good starting point from a FR-perspective -> http://feck-blog.blogspot.com/2009/09/fathers-rights.html
El-Oh-El at your wah-wah what about teh menz bullshit. I love how your type emphasizes child support, making it sound like it's a soul-crushing financial burden. It's not. It's a paltry. It can hardly be called a supplement.
Compared to supplying half or more of the cost of raising children (med bills, schooling and/or school supplies, food, clothes, extracurriculars, etc etc), once divorced, the non-custodial parent pays nothing near that amount in child support. Nothing near. The non-custodials also do not need to get as large of housing as they did when they had an entire family to house, so less money spent there. More free time and more flexibility, so more overtime or a better paying job there. More money.
The custodial parent has to take care of the same housing (or same size), same costs, less flexibility or free time. Ergo, less money.
I'll say it again: child support is a paltry. Nothing. It's proportional to income, and a very, very small portion at that. Nothing.
I can go on. Would you like me to?
Are you putting words in my mouth? Child support is not soul cruching. Not being able to see your child is. But I see where you are comming from. Sadly quite a few men and women believe that money is more important than children.
There are however cases where custody/alimony becomes a problem. Especially in cases where a man lost his job and courts take half a year to reduce payment.
First of all, I'm not sure which "Fox news talking points" I'm supposed to have bought into, just because I didn't unilaterally bash the article. Thanks for the personal attack, and please forgive my lack of vitriol. Second, the article doesn't call for forcing people to pay for no-fault divorce (apart from the legal fees, I imagine, which are already pretty hefty and I'm sure a barrier for many people). Someone in comments brought that up. Actually, the article notes that, in fact, no-fault divorce is something of a luxury (I paid about $600 for mine, and that was only possible because we agreed on the division of property).
I also find the numbers unconvincing and the article unsettling, for the same reasons you do. You actually make some of the same points I do regarding social change. But I don't have a degree in social science and haven't done the research, so, as I pointed out, I'm not qualified to contradict the numbers.
I'm reluctant to support your opinion that "if you are going to kill yourself because your wife leave you, you shouldn't be getting married at all." Suicide is serious, and your statement is just as offensive as if someone had made it about women. Contrary to Gregory's statement, bringing up how something negatively affects men isn't necessarily MRA drivel. It's another facet of the argument--one that in fact the article painstakingly avoids directly pointing out.
Let me be clear--I believe that no-fault divorce is good and necessary. You're right--the article completely passes over many of the scary aspects of a relationship one can't escape. I don't think that anyone should be forced to stay in a situation in which they are unhappy. But I also cannot deny that children of divorced parents, for reasons social, economic, and psychological, face many challenges and disadvantages. That was the article's focus and the problem that the author's presented solutions were meant to address. The author definitely leans to the right, and wants to preserve "traditional" marriage rather than embrace social change, a point on which my OP clearly diverges. After all, and perhaps I should have made this statedly clear in the OP, I find it more likely that it's instability, not divorce, that negatively affects children.
"Marriage is voluntary and I'm sorry, if you are going to kill yourself because your wife leave you, you shouldn't be getting married at all. "
Are you fucking serious!?!? You are posting this on a feminist forum? Would you say the same thing to all those women out there whose husbands left them and basically ruined their lives and who now live in poverty, complete depression, or they committed suicide, etc.? Having a spouse leave you is nothing to joke about. You clearly have no experience in serious adult relationships to make such a callous comment.
And to top it all off, I don't believe making such comments about suicide is ever appropriate, even if it is about men or is true. It's just wrong.
Marriage is voluntary and I'm sorry, if you are going to kill yourself because your wife leave you, you shouldn't be getting married at all.
As someone who suffered from severe depression after the breakup of a relationship (which wasn't nearly as serious as a marriage), I have one thing to say.
Fuck you.
I'm sorry that it was tough for you. And many times victims of crimes would love for their attackers to feel the pain they felt. But courts don't order people to be beat up if they mugged someone, that's because the courts are not meant to be a vehicle for revenge, but for justice.
However terrible that situation was, you have no right to force that person legally to stay or to create legal barriers for that person to leave. You don't get to control someone for the rest of their life just because you are in a relationship. I know some people who would be dead if their partners left them. Seriously. But all of those issues are present right now, only the spouse (in most cases the wife) has taken on the burden of keeping her husband happy as well as keeping the home together. One of my friends works 6 days and week and does all of the housework while her husband barely does 2 days a week work and spends the money. If she left, he would kill himself - not an exaggeration. Absolute fact. They both know it and they have kids so she's staying. He's never 'abused' her so I guess she should be penalised for leaving and then blamed for his issues.
Getting rid of no fault divorces to 'strengthen marriage' is an appalling idea and saying that divorce depresses people is crappy evidence to boot.
1. http://jezebel.com/5139167/richer-poorer-divorce-makes-men-more-moneyed
Evidence out there - women take on the financial burden of children disproportionately and are poorer on average post divorce. The Fox news talking point re gold digging bitches living in luxury off alimony is a lie.
2. FFS yes suicide is very terrible I'm sure but I'd say the same thing to women or men: just because your partner will be made suicidal by your leaving a marriage is not a good reason to stay, neither is it a good reason to use the courts to force people together. Respectfully, someones depression or decision to commit suicide is not a stick to be held over other people's heads. I can't believe that anyone would even defend a hostage situation as a healthy family dynamic. I guess we should all be held prisoner by other people's emotional instability.
Btw *feminism alert* someone threatening to commit suicide 'if you leave them' is the first tool of an abuser. If you think being an adult means sacrificing your entire life because someone else has made you their entire life, then you clearly have no experience of healthy adult relationships yourself. Sorry.
PSA: Marriage is a voluntary act. It's not assault, rape or PTSD and if you can't handle it, don't do it. And if you can't, be a grown up - that means don't come running to the federal govt to make divorce painful enough that your partner may be *forced* to stay with you. If that's too tough, don't get married... or why don't we just give people 40 lashes when they try to divorce, that way we *know* they really mean it. 80 lashes if their partner is depressed!
Oh and women abuse too. If a women was constantly threatening suicide if her husband left her and he stayed for that reason, I'd call that *emotional abuse*. And the idea that you are 'owed' a spouse even if they are incredibly unhappy just because you haven't *abused* them is creepy and weird - coming from a man or a women.
Ah that study. Interesting about it was that they "forgot" to subtract alimony/child support from his income. That post you linked had quite the reaction so even I wrote about it (among others) -> http://feck-blog.blogspot.com/2009/02/divorce-makes-women-poorer-and-men.html
Matter of fact, the biggest problem is not the money, it is the children. It was found that a lot of mothers (about 40%) use their children to punish her ex-husband (thwarting with the father-child contact) and as long as this is not punished this will continue. As a lot of fathers do not have the right to see their children and there is no biological difference when it comes to nurturing are you surprised that men react in such a way? Do you believe mothers would act differently if you take their children from them? Looking at the suicides rates, that is a very serious problem.
"just because your partner will be made suicidal by your leaving a marriage is not a good reason to stay, neither is it a good reason to use the courts to force people together."
I agree, and I agree with your points on abuse, but that isn't what you said. What you said was more akin to "Marriage is a voluntary act. It's not assault, rape or PTSD and if you can't handle it, don't do it."
I don't have a crystal ball, and if I did I wouldn't know how to use it. I don't know that in 10 years, when my partner leaves me, I'm going to fall into depression and spiral down until I kill myself. I didn't know when I got married that two years later I was going to be so unhappy. If I had known that, hey! Wouldn't have done it.
Our culture makes marriage and relationships a big deal. Our culture encourages abject despair at rejection and the end of a relationship. This is absolutely a problem, but it's unfair and unnecessarily hostile to blame individuals for being products of their culture. There needs to be support--familial, cultural, and institutional for those who need it--for people leaving or being left. I would love to see greater popular emphasis on healthy relationships rather than devoted and "perfect" ones.
Agreed!
But removing no fault divorce is NOT supporting marriage or people, it is penalizing people for leaving a marriage and this is what the thread is discussing. Suicide was mentioned in the context of supporting legal punitive measures to stop people leaving a marriage. The idea was that allowing people to leave marriages made the other partners suidicidal. It stopped being about sympathy for a depressed person and became about that person using legal force to keep their partners around.
This is a slippery slope. We're almost reaching George Sodini level where 'if he hadn't been rejected, he wouldn't have killed'. Everyone is responsible for their own actions ultimately.
I'm one of those men who didn't see the divorce coming, and I'm extremely grateful for no-fault divorce. Yeah, it was a rough couple of years, but being divorced beats the hell out of being married to someone who doesn't actually want to be married to you, even if they don't precisely spell it out.
I would have hated to have to go in front of a judge and argue for our divorce, and I'm not sure I could have, since my ex-wife was the one who really wanted it, but I am much happier now than I was then.
I know I am going to be blasted for this but here it goes. I think marriage for most people is a constant state of angst and stress. I tried it myself for twelve years and couldn't wait to get out. I don't see anything wrong with just being with each other, having sex, and having fun as long as the love lasts. No person should be forced to share their lives with someone when they don't want to. I think so often we feel bad about ourselves because we don't feel the way society or tradition tells us we should feel.
There is so much pressure these days to find someone, get married, have great sex, get a house, have kids and somehow make it all work. Not everyone can live up to this. There are some couples that both stay together and are content, but based on what I have read and the people I've known, they seem to be in the minority.
I actually think it might help if we were a little "selfish" before deciding to get married. I think that by actually sitting down by ourselves and thinking about why we want to get married, have kids, etc. might stop us from making a mistake and possibly hurt others.
I say get rid of marriage and divorce. Maybe we all need to sit back and relax, have some fun with each other and stop being so serious and stressed.
That's how I personally plan to live my life. But I'm not going to have kids. Kids need stability, not a casual agreement to stay together as long as it's fun and not stressful.
I'm not advocating limits on divorce, yuck, but it is a serious matter.
It is all fun and games until you have kids....