The Absurdity of the Marriage Debates
This week a study came out that shows how unilateral divorce laws make divorce more frequent. The empirical research shows what any sensible person would already guess — easy divorce laws make for more divorces. This is only magnified by the fact the divorcing party usually has great incentives to divorce and few incentives to stay (independent of whatever marital problems may exist). The fact that this is even a debate in academia shows how politicized and irrational the academy has become. Sure, there are plenty of other reasons to divorce that also drive the high rate of marriage failures, but government incentivizes failure, not success. That certainly doesn't help.
Add into this debate on divorce law the current debate on gay marriage. With easy divorce, marriage has been demoted to the status of a contract. If it's just a meaningless contract, why can't any combination of participants enter into it? A good question that cannot be easily answered when framed that way.
First off, marriage in this society (independent of its religious roots) is not even a contract. Contracts are designed to be enforceable in the event of a breach. Divorce rewards the breaching party most of the time. None of the terms of marriage are enforceable in any real way. There are no options for a spouse to rein in an adulterous partner and the few laws still on the books against adultery are waiting to be declared unconstitutional.
Further, easy divorce ends up putting the entire lives of the parties into the public record and under the control of a judge. One can walk to any courthouse in this country and start reading detailed accounts of broken marriages. Judges have tremendous power to allocate assets, assign living arrangements, and exercise large amounts of control over the parties. This should greatly worry any libertarian.
One wonders why gay people want a piece of that action. Straight couples are putting off marriage because many wonder if it's really worth all the risk. Gay couples certainly aren't immune from divorce either. Marriage is a loaded term devoid of any meaning behind it. It appears that gay marriage is an attempt at social acceptance, not any desire for benefits. Any real look at marriage shows that on the balance, marriage confers a net liability, not a net benefit.
Before discussing who can participate in marriage, the discussion that we should be having is what the institution of marriage should mean. Right now, the institution currently in place in the United States (again separated from its religious roots) is bordering on meaningless. There is certainly no shortage of people who think so considering every time a government program comes down to support marriage, the usual suspects try to stop it.
The fact is, any serious look at the history of the institution of marriage will show that it is a religious institution. Governmental recognition was not only a later development for marriage, but it also is a secondary aspect. The argument that marriage is a legal institution, a mere creation of government, is a profound mutilation of marriage. One would think that the myriad of governmental forms throughout history would have produced a myriad of forms of marriage, but it has not.
If there is going to be public recognition and support of marriage, there needs to be a corresponding public good and duty. Government shouldn't give out money simply because someone wants a paycheck. What public good is fostered by the recognition of gay marriage? The same could be asked of marriage in the way it is practiced here also. The fact is, until the promises made and the obligations uttered on the wedding day are actually binding in any real way, it's hard to find much of a public good.
Instead of arguing the particulars of marriage and haggling over the petty details, it's time the question of marriage in its fundamentals enters the public discourse. What should marriage mean? Should its obligations be actually binding? What public good is to be fostered? These are the questions that really matter.
John Bambenek is the Assistant Politics Editor for BC Magazine and is an academic professional for the University of Illinois. By trade, he is an information security professional, part of the Internet Storm Center and a courseware author and certification grader for the GIAC family of security certifications. He is a syndicated columnist who blogs at Part-Time Pundit and the executive director of The Tumaini Foundation which helps AIDS orphans and other children in Tanzania to get an education.
John Bambenek is the Assistant Politics Editor for Blogcritics and is an academic professional for the University of Illinois. He is a freelance columnist who blogs at Part-Time Pundit and the executive director of The Tumaini Foundation which helps AIDS orphans and other children in Tanzania to get an education. He is the current owner of BlogSoldiers, a blog-only traffic exchange. | More from John Bambenek
Stumble It!
July 26th, 2007 at 12:44 pm
The Gonzman – And here’s where your ability to selectively read to support your idiotic assertions makes you look like a tard. Go all the way back. It isn’t marriage – as you so dishonestly try to paint – that I haver a problem with; it is secular marriage and the contract attendant thereof which is useless.
Except, Super-Angry Divorced Guy, I’m not a Statist. I get it. You’re Super-Angry Divorced Guy, so you get to make all sorts of wild accusatiosn against me. Whereas, since I’ve Never-Been-Divorced Guy, then I have no excuse. Your pain gives you license.
At 12:00pm you say that people don’t need permission from the State to get married. But at 12:01pm, you say it’s the State’s responsibility to enforce the marriage vows. These two ideas are self-contradictory. Because only those with power can deny permission. If my father forbids me from marrying a woman, it’s only because he has power: more life experience, better judge of character, better sense of who I am, and so on. But if my father is a moron, then his forbiddence is insignificant.
” And if you – or Julie – have a genuine and rational dispute with this, by all means, articulate it.”
Men who portray marriage as a State-created problem only sit back and wait for the State to fix things. Whereas men who see marriage as a personal duty both (a) fight against the State’s perspective and (b) have the ability to marry happily despite the rising divorce rates.
Men who portray marriage as a State-created problem don’t understand that values are the currency by which marriages either succeed or fail, not State enforcement!
You might not believe this, but if the government gave me a card which said, “MMX is entitled to rape one woman and be free of prosecution.”, I would never exercise that permit! Why not? My values don’t permit me to engage in such behavior.
But when men espouse that the State is to blame, they do so because it moves the discussion away from Values and towards the power of the State. For when the discussion is centered on Values, then every divorced man has to crucially examine his own Values to see what he permitted his wife to get away with. (John, she told you she admires the characters from “Sex and the City” and you married her anyway!?!? What were you thinking!?!?)
And it’s really difficult to claim Moral Sanction Through A Painful Divorce while constantly fielding questions about your own conduct… (Where did you meet? When did you sleep with her? Did you observe how her mother treats her father? Did you outline the rules by which she must conduct herself, or did you leave it all to fate?)
Naturally, since these questions are designed to make a man realize, “Well, damn. I shouldn’t have done that! I guess I played a major role in creating my own pain…”, some men do their damnedest to assure that no one is allowed to ask them.
July 26th, 2007 at 9:46 am
She tells of a completely different culture where marriage is important. And that not only is the marriage important but so is extended family. Infact it is not unusual to have four families living in the same home and their elderly. And they are happy, she says.
And this requires an “Ofisshul Guberment Dokument” Why?
July 26th, 2007 at 9:04 am
Mr. Farrell’s historical treaties was enlightening.
in the way that marriage is treated it is & enforcible contract, just only against the men due to the naked bias of the Guild, its courts, & the laws it authors as our shadow government (wait til they find out that they have been had by a power that they fostered which will cast them into prison because they have out lived their usefulness to the marxist plan.)
In penetrating the minds of the Guild, the weakness of written law and due process which opened up the destroyers & plunderers of marriage was unfortunately Blackstone.
For in even opening the door the law has redefined abuse from the state’s perspecctive, allowed a man to be called down under the witness of a single woman not two, & thus by crook entered into the home.
The former protections of woman going to her friend, then to friend’s husband, then to church council, council appearing at his door for account & inspection, & if then necessary immediatly administering the lash before all, reduced he said she said & subjected the evidence directly to the public eye, not what a lawyer could twist it to be.
Men walking or shrinking from this responsibility has now made Man’s life tyranny.
Child seeing father beaten was told to obey his father when council departed, woman tended his wounds knew she would be next if he had a complaint, man knew the penalty for failure to use council of the church for greivence against his wife.
So the cycle would begin & marriage defended, home secure from state (the king-who is never to be in the home for one day all he sees within will be his…is it not so now?) and all parties understanding the pain &penalties of their disobedience & contention.
That was when there was church and spirituality. The cohabitation laws were effective in forcing relationships to be accountable spiritually, by the state splitting the parties up, especially when thie contentiousness became a nuisance.
It failed at Blackstone, & church relinquishment of duty.
July 26th, 2007 at 7:30 am
Gonzman,
I was talking today with a very intellect Indian lady about their way and the Western way and feminism. She told me that women have always been put on a pedestal in her country and that they don’t have to work. Unlike in the west where we do to survive and where we end up putting our children in childcare. I am generalising here.
And we have big problems from parents not being home to take care of their children. We are all to soon see the effects of that if we haven’t already.
She tells of a completely different culture where marriage is important. And that not only is the marriage important but so is extended family. Infact it is not unusual to have four families living in the same home and their elderly. And they are happy, she says.
And to me that is what it is about. It is about family and belonging to something bigger that yourself.
For you, I guess, life is free where you already have offspring and you have love, companionship and sex withouth being married. There is nothing wrong with that if that is what you want.
I cannot guarantee that a marriage is going to even provide you with family and especially for life. Not now a days.
As for the paperwork, I don’t know. I hear that 90% of pre nuptials don’t work.
July 26th, 2007 at 4:21 am
Oh – and if you do assert that it is “useful” – pray list for me all of the marriage vows you made attendant upon entering into your contract that your government will actually – you know – enforce.
July 26th, 2007 at 4:18 am
Think about it. Humans have been alive for thousands of years before the Gonzman was born, and they’ll likely persist for thousands of years after he dies. The vast majority of human beings before his existence believed in marriage in some form or another. Future humans will likely believe in marriage, too.
And here’s where your ability to selectively read to support your idiotic assertions makes you look like a tard.
Go all the way back. It isn’t marriage – as you so dishonestly try to paint – that I haver a problem with; it is secular marriage and the contract attendant thereof which is useless.
The government-stamped permission slip that you statists with your slave-mentality worship is of about as much value as toilet paper. Less, even – at least toilet paper has a useful function.
Truly free and mature people don’t require a “Mommy, May I?” from the #(&@%$! gubbmint to conduct their lives. And if you – or Julie – have a genuine and rational dispute with this, by all means, articulate it.
July 26th, 2007 at 3:05 am
“When any State legislature shall pass an act annulling all marriage contracts, or allowing either party to annul it, without the consent of the other, it will be time enough to inquire, whether such an act be constitutional.”
Steve Farrell, a question for you: Has the Court ever addressed whether “such an act be constitutional”?
July 26th, 2007 at 1:36 am
I don’t want to be challenging MMX but just want to say that my bitch is not about men wanting to be victims.
Infact, it is just dynamics of learning how things work. There is alot of people in the MRA and they have different positions in society and have different ways of doing things.
Since I am still at a new stage, I have to try and pick up 20 years worth of movement and understand the bigger picture, not just the small picture. And besides, I am not a male so it is not my call on how things should be done. It is just a part of growing in a different scene than what i am used to.
Gonzo,
I think you are a yuppie with an attitude. lol
Who cares if you don’t get married. It is not that big a deal. Only you can decide whether it has any worth to you or not. And if the risks are too high, then don’t take them unless you want to.
July 26th, 2007 at 12:50 am
amfortas – “Cricky man, haven’t you noticed?”
Consider the idealistic statement, “It’s always better to eat a ripe apple than a rotten one.” This statement remains true regardless of: the cheaper price of rotten apples, the number of people who prefer rotten ones, the state’s encouragements to eat rotten ones, and other peoples inability to find ripe ones.
For the exact same reason, “It’s always better to be married well than to be married poorly, or to not be married at all.”
July 26th, 2007 at 12:03 am
MMX, you seem to be confusing yesterday’s marriage concept with today’s. In between then and now, Feminazis and their socialist running dogs smashed it to pieces. Cricky man, haven’t you noticed? Are you naturally obtuse or is this just practice?
July 25th, 2007 at 10:40 pm
fourthwire – In other words, MMX – even a “genius” like yourself realizes that you cannot logically and rationally refute the Gonzman’s statement and so you stick your head back inside your vagina after posting such obvious nonsense.
No, it’s not the Gonzman’s argument I cannot refute, but his approach.
Think about it. Humans have been alive for thousands of years before the Gonzman was born, and they’ll likely persist for thousands of years after he dies. The vast majority of human beings before his existence believed in marriage in some form or another. Future humans will likely believe in marriage, too.
So the Gonzman could just say, “Hmm, I’m only one person in the grand scheme of things. And the very fact that so many people have done this would imply there’s something there. And, since I’m only one person, it’s my job to sincerely look for the answer.” If he took this humble approach, he’d figure it all out eventually.
But instead he says, “I’m such a big individual, that everyone else has to prove the worth of marriage for me.” His aggressive questioning of julie was not designed to find a sincere answer, but instead to intimidate a woman who is stronger, healthier, and more concerned with the world than he is.
Thus, fourthwire, it’s not his argument, but his arrogance. No man can defeat another man’s arrogance.
July 25th, 2007 at 9:28 pm
MMX said: “Some men, despite their protestations, love the fact that women screw over men in divorce, because it (a) gives them moral authority over the problem, and (b) justifies their own inaction. The victim position is just as seductive for men as it is for women.”
If think this would apply to very very few people, if any. I really don’t know anybody who enjoys having their kids taken away, being robbed of their homes, having to fork over a large part of their paycheck, etc.
What do you base this claim on? Pure theory of your own devising?
July 25th, 2007 at 9:09 pm
EG said: “Only in the West, which has a feminine materialistic psyche …”
The whole world seems to be materialistic George. Is Russia a paragon of spirituality? What about warlord-run Africa? See much nobility there? What about communist/atheistic China? What about Japan? And do you think intolerant hate-filled muslims are really spiritual?
July 25th, 2007 at 9:01 pm
EG said: “From the largest nebula down to the smallest form of life know as the monera, all life engages in that activity.”
Nebulae are clouds of gas and dust, they are not life forms.
July 25th, 2007 at 8:41 pm
For those who know the answer, no explanation is needed. But for those who don’t know, no explanation can possibly suffice.
IOW, you got nothing.
Thanks for playing, f**knozzle.
July 25th, 2007 at 8:40 pm
It’s because, 4thwire, the only thing a secular marriage contract can give me is an opportunity to be bilked of everything I have earned, and to have my children stolen from me. (For those of age to be fathers)
Everything else you don’t require that contract for. And I know this – because I do indeed have it.
Like vampires, the “marriage license” is an invitation to the family court to intrude on your life. It serves no other useful purpose
July 25th, 2007 at 5:43 pm
The activity of the universe is the propagation and preservation of the species. From the largest nebula down to the smallest form of life know as the monera, all life engages in that activity. Among humans, marriage was practiced in North and South America, among the Polynesians, Africans, and Asians. The propagation and preservation of family was the focal point of societal activity and the extended family and tribe provided the basic societal structure.
Only in the West, which has a feminine materialistic psyche, is the right to self-indulgence of the individual held in higher regard than the propagation and preservation of the species. For men who have an understanding of their purpose in life few laws and or religious sacraments are required to maintain that institution. For those men who have no understanding of their purpose in life, no amount of religion and/or laws will preserve that institution, as is obvious in America today.
There is no substitute for the understanding and practice of patriarcy—none.
July 25th, 2007 at 5:25 pm
“Gonzman – Please name me one thing a secular marriage contract can gain me that I cannot readily obtain without entering into such a contract.
For those who know the answer, no explanation is needed. But for those who don’t know, no explanation can possibly suffice.”
In other words, MMX – even a “genius” like yourself realizes that you cannot logically and rationally refute the Gonzman’s statement and so you stick your head back inside your vagina after posting such obvious nonsense.
Keep trying, girl.
July 25th, 2007 at 1:23 pm
julie – How many men’s rights activists are actually part of the problem?
There you go! Once you ask that question honestly, and trust in the brain, heart, and soul God gave you, then you’ll see exactly which MRAs are part of the problem. Some men, despite their protestations, love the fact that women screw over men in divorce, because it (a) gives them moral authority over the problem, and (b) justifies their own inaction. The victim position is just as seductive for men as it is for women.
Gonzman – Please name me one thing a secular marriage contract can gain me that I cannot readily obtain without entering into such a contract.
For those who know the answer, no explanation is needed. But for those who don’t know, no explanation can possibly suffice.
July 25th, 2007 at 6:58 am
Steve Farrell: I assumed all along we were in agreement generally. I did pick up that your church has it mainly right. In fact I have moved and my new church seems to be much better then others I’ve belonged to, and I immediately got a meeting with one of the assistants and laid out my concerns and though clear to not be trying to change anyone, that’s presumptuous if I did, I was direct and he was very interested and in fact he already had concerns wanting some relational accountability built into the churches doings. All is well there. I’d share with you why I am all about this if I could. If you care to email me to communicate via blog.
Just one little tidbit I saw recently surprised me and I thought nothing would. My family was traveling and we attended an out of town church. On the bulletin the Mens Pastor was listed AS A WOMAN!!!!
July 25th, 2007 at 5:37 am
Julie:
Please name me one thing a secular marriage contract can gain me that I cannot readily obtain without entering into such a contract.
I can have love.
Sex.
Family.
Friendship.
Companionship.
Maybe an individual woman who is obsessed with being “married” will not give this to me unless I pay the price; but, there are plenty of others who WILL.
Since I have had a vasectomy, I do not risk unwanted children, and I already have mine anyway.
About the only thing I would get from doing the whole marriage contract thing would be risk – I would give a woman claim to half of my assets.
The secular marriage contract is a Bad Deal ™ for men.
You would like men to “trust” women and do it anyway? How about this – you “trust” us FIRST. We’ll have a ceremony, but you get not license and contract to abuse – and since there “is no intent” to abuse it anyway, it should be no problkem.
Right?
July 25th, 2007 at 1:59 am
In that case Julie, well done. Keep up the good work.
July 24th, 2007 at 10:54 pm
Conservativation #9. Agreed on your belief that the church ought to have a separate, more serious covenant, and discipline for its violation. Mine does, which I addressed on another thread recently that I think we were both involved with. True enough I was honing in on the civil contract because that is all I had time for at the moment. We are on the same page.
July 24th, 2007 at 10:11 pm
bombbombbombbomb,
As much as I understand that men risk everything to step in and help women and children, I know that they still do. ut then they may not a second time.
Infact I am aware that men can’t even step into help other men without being arrested.
It is all very sad. My eldest son stepped into help a female being harmed (mind you she was also arrested herself because she was also a perpertrator) and my son was arrested threatening the male. The whole thing is a mess and I tell my sons to ignore women if they are being hurt. It is far too much work going through the Court system. 6 months later and days off work and parking fees and lawyer fees is just too much of a cost to bear.
July 24th, 2007 at 9:46 pm
I hope you don’t mind, but i am going to have a little bitch and since this site is far away from the one I use, I think it is safe. And then I will get back to Amfortas.
I held a meeting that I put alot of effort into for men’s rights in my area. Turns out that behind my back the blog owner of my site is mates with the men I am challenging. Infact everything i say goes back to them. Why, because of business and intellectuals all sticking together whether men or women. How many men’s rights activists are actually part of the problem? I guess everyone thinks they have the answer. lol
Some people are so 2 faced it is not funny. You can’t trust the women nor the men. but of course that is generalising something that I shouldn’t. do. There are heaps of good decent men and to me there are still good women out there. OK finished.
Amfortas,
Women ARE going to do something about the problem feminism has brought upon us. We just don’t have the power YET. All our pleas are falling on deaf ears just like yours. Something you may not be aware is that even old school feminists and feminists that are middle age (around 40-50) are also angry at the behaviour of the younger women.
Our women’s groups such as refuges and support places cannot deal with female anger because we too are victims to feminists using DV as a way to get power.
I have myself had alot of pain from a relationship being my marriage and I am very angry that men are not given the same tools and resources. And I am not the only female working in society that feels the same way. Feminists ARE challenging the leaders. But they don’t want to hear it and ignore us. But don’t worry, we also have the chance to share and listen to each other because of the Internet. Once we band, we will not be silent. It just takes time to find the leaders. Our problems are similar to the men’s movement.
July 24th, 2007 at 8:15 pm
Julie, your question should be, ‘When are woman going to get together to undo the damage that their sistas have visited upon our society and men”. Do men always have to follow after women repairing their damage and picking up after them?
The answer of course is blowing in the hurricane that is just off the coast but heading your way.
July 24th, 2007 at 8:15 pm
anyone interested in a few of the most popular mens rights books…
Warren farrel..”The myth of male power”
Richard doyle..”Save the males”
July 24th, 2007 at 8:07 pm
“Men are not going to attack me nor my sisters. And they are not going to inflict pain on us”
More so, many men will not help or intervene if you were attacked or otherwise in trouble. Not because they are not nice guys, but their fed up being portrayed as the bad man.
Because of child abuse accusations this has also been the case for children in trouble as well. Do you help or risk a child abuse charge?
The feminists are useful idiots (search for that article here) and government should be bigger concern.
July 24th, 2007 at 6:39 pm
So it seems I have alot more learning to do. lol
I am aware that older women are disgusted in the women of today. So am I.
July 24th, 2007 at 6:26 pm
Julie wrote:
“All I can hope for is that the men’s movement is ready for what is coming.”
I’m curious, exactly what do you think the future holds for the men’s movement?
“Chivalry is NOT dead”
Oh, I think it very much is. The virtures of mercy, courage, valor, fairness, protection of the weak and poor? Kinda dead. Faithful to God? Mostly dead, especially in Europe. Duties to women and the requisite feminine reciprocals of gentleness and graciousness? All dead. As Miracle Max would say, the only thing that is left is to go through Chivalry’s pockets and look for loose change.
I don’t think women want true chivalry, not because of the duties is ascribes to men, but of the duties and requirements is lays upon women. As you so keenly observed, things weren’t so great a long time ago from a women’s rights standpoint. Western civ’s chivalry hangover had a lot to do with that.
“Men are not going to attack me nor my sisters. And they are not going to inflict pain on us”
Most won’t. But I think some will, maybe the ones who, as a product of a matriarchal society, are unattached to families and uninvested / disenfranchised in the wider society.
We are already seeing some of this already…areas with the largest proportion of unattached males are the ones with the highest rates of crime and highest propensity to violence and even terrorism. Just last week, the Economist magazine observed exactly this phenomenon in the former East Germany.
Gonzo wrote:
“If I had my way, I’d abolish secular marriage. It serves no useful purpose. “
Marriage as it should be does serve a useful purpose. Putting religion, faith, and procreation aside, this purpose is to give men a reason to invest in a society. When marriage breaks down, and with it their attachment to their children, this process of investment breaks down as well.
Secular marriage, in its current incarnation, works against this purpose, and pushes many men to the margins of the family. Men are rightly wary of marriage, and women have proven reluctant to partner with guys who are “less” than they are.
I wish women would realize just how dangerous of a road they are taking our society down by undermining or even outright attacking the marriage institution as they do.
July 24th, 2007 at 5:32 pm
Oh not so Julie, spiritual people, women, hurt others all the time, and are embraced by their peers for doing so. Collectively backs are turned on the assumed evil man while the actual perpetrator is coddled and comforted.
There is enough anger here and among those elsewhere who “know” something, that to imagine a few crazies escaping the reservation is not beyond possible
July 24th, 2007 at 5:29 pm
Julie, no worries….. you certainly were not “winding me up”.
But I do take exception to your comment that feminists and masculists are fighting for the same thing.
Masculists, or men’s rights activists if you prefer are fighting for equal rights.
Feminists are fighting for special privileges, entitlements, and the oppression of men and boys (not to mention the destruction of the family!).
I’m simplifying of course…. but you ought to start your education by understanding that feminists and masculists are certainly NOT “fighting for the same thing” at all.
July 24th, 2007 at 5:29 pm
julie..”I have heard how women would be better off the way things were and so I asked the older women up to and including 100 years of age. They wish they had the rights women do today”.
I spoke with an 80 yr. old women the other day that was disgusted at what the new gender fem-nazi is doing to men/families/children….In fact she is a contributor to mens rights organizations??
July 24th, 2007 at 4:36 pm
Julie – And they are not going to inflict pain on us. Poeple who know pain well, don’t inflict it on others. They become spiritual and spiritual people don’t attack others.
Unfortunately that’s not always true. In fact, most people who know pain very well only seek to inflict more pain on whomever they deem responsible. They escalate, rather than find a solution.
What does it sound like when a man wants to inflict more pain, at the expense of his soul, his heart, and his mind?
Why is it our job to fix an institution we don’t participate in, and don’t value? Because *YOU* do, and you are trying to create a false sense of shame in us for leaving a poor victimized girl to fend for herself?
If I had my way, I’d abolish secular marriage. It serves no useful purpose.
When a man speaks like that, it’s often because he got divorced, and heartbroken, and then angry. But rather than re-evaluate his contribution and his understanding, he assumes, given his pain, that marriage has no purpose.
It does! It always has…
Unfortunately, peoples’ questions about the purpose of marriage only prove that old adage, “For those who understand, no explanation is needed. But for those who don’t, no explanation will ever suffice.”
July 24th, 2007 at 4:01 pm
Please don’t let me get you wound up. I think about this sort of thing alot and I look to see where things are at. IMO, every one that should know does know what is going on but … they don’t know what to do. That is why it just keeps on getting worse.
Your country and mine as well as others send qualified, educated Phd men and women to big seminars in whichever country is holding it and come away still unable to solve it.
So sad, too bad that it gets worse. But I say that when infact it does hurt me that things get worse.
Can you solve the problems? I think not. Can the feminists solve the problems? I think not. No matter how smart you are, I am afraid it is impossible for you to solve thngs the way we are. Every which way you turn they has to be pain inflicted to a mass group.
Were things better along time ago? No they weren’t. I have heard how women would be better off the way things were and so I asked the older women up to and including 100 years of age. They wish they had the rights women do today. So to think that we should go back in time is not the answer.
Do men act like the are providers and protectors? They sure do and they are so misunderstood by women these days that it is not funny. But I don’t need to tell you that for you know what men are. I do not.
Personally I think each side has to talk and LISTEN to the other side. Unitl then both masculinists and feminists will fight one another. Strangely, they both want the same damn thing. But these are just my thoughts at the moment. When I have been involved for another year, I most likely will have another opinion to share.
I am hungry to learn and at the same time I am frustruted to learn. And the more men’s stories I hear from the men on the streets, the more angry I get.
All I can hope for is that the men’s movement is ready for what is coming. Should I be afraid? I think not. Chivalry is NOT dead. Men are not going to attack me nor my sisters. And they are not going to inflict pain on us. Poeple who know pain well, don’t inflict it on others. They become spiritual and spiritual people don’t attack others.
July 24th, 2007 at 2:41 pm
emarel..AMEN brother!!
July 24th, 2007 at 12:55 pm
Julie, the Gonzman is (unsurprisingly!) spot-on with his comments about the current nature of marriage.
Men being pressured, cajoled, threatened, or enticed into marriage are not gaining anything but risk through marriage.
There are ZERO benefits for men through marriage that are not already available to those men WITHOUT marriage. None. Nada. Zip. Zilch.
But as mentioned, marriage DOES provide plenty of risks for men: financial, social, emotional, civil, and even criminal risks.
And greater numbers of men are making rational decisions to avoid marriage altogether (excessive risk-takers, delusional optimists and pussy-whipped men notwithstanding).
Yet you believe that men “will get it together” in “time to come”?
In fact greater numbers of men ARE “getting it together” – the first phase during which men start to say “no” to the unnecessary and unwarranted risks for inherent to marriage….. at least marriage in the U.S. and most Western nations.
Avoiding marriage like the plague is only one phase (and one which feminists are trying to spin as resulting from women’s decisions to not marry…. ignoring the obvious: that women are increasingly not being given much choice in the matter!).
The politicians and the courts have turned marriage into a zero-sum game, favoring women. Those politicians and courts have done so largely at the behest of feminazis – feminazis who claim to speak on YOUR behalf, Julie.
So when your daughter, or your friends’ and relatives’ daughters are waiting for MEN to “fix” marriage for them……. you might keep in mind Emarel’s last sentence (not to mention the Gonzman’s insights.
July 24th, 2007 at 12:48 pm
Gonzman,
Your opinion sounds great to me. Why should anyone give a shit.
Oh, yea, here it comes. It is to laugh.
July 24th, 2007 at 12:34 pm
“What is strange is that the men on the likes of this site and many others are not part of the solution. Gosh, I wish you were.
But then you can. How sad, too bad. Maybe in time to come you will get it together.”
Julie, when we men do finally get it together, the result may be something that you would never have wished for or imagined.
July 24th, 2007 at 12:30 pm
conservativation, I resonate to your comments concerning the failure of many churches to preach the whole counsel of God…I’m tired of all the self-deprecating humor that comes from men behind the pulpit. I’m tired of sermons hammering the men being delivered by the senior pastor, while the sermons reminding women of their responsibilities are punted off to the junior pastor or youth minister. I’m tired of the same sermons and adult Sunday School series on marriage that simply regurgitate the same old passages without really grappling with the reality of man-woman relations and marriage today. After another series on marriage (which I didn’t attend), I told one of the pastors that until the church really deals head-on with the impact of both feminism and weak men in the church, all the family ministries in the world won’t slow the disintegration of families within the church.
As a Christian father, I resent having to tell my teenaged hormone-driven sons that many women today are crazy, that marriage today is a crap shoot and stacked against them, and is better avoided, while at the same time not knowing how to teach them to deal with legitimate sexual expression…and believe me, they ask…
DW2G, scripturallysingle.blogspot.com is another good resource for what’s going on in the church, specifically the forces within that tell men that they are somehow living in sin if they are still single by 25 or remain single.
July 24th, 2007 at 7:29 am
Julie I’m unclear what you mean by us being sad and needing to get it together. For the most part what you will see here is somewhat intellectual discourse with an occasional deviation into bitter tirades. Compared to what passes for discourse on the “you go girl” sites, I’d say we have it together pretty well around here.
Imagine you buy a car and get bored with it and try to simply toss it back. Will the seller take it? Why? Well, there was a contract and there are consequences. Now imagine you even asked that the seller pay you monthly for another car in addition to accepting the return.
That’s the marriage contract and men are cars.
July 24th, 2007 at 6:46 am
DW2G your answer is below.
Steve Farrell my intention is not sarcasm, but at least for me I really don’t care if marriage is, was always, or will forever be encoded in civil law. My tiny corner of the universe is all about how those professing a vow before the God that they claim to serve should have an additional contract, one far more serious to break. I’ve met a few pastors who indeed agree and have churches that follow the Biblical model for church “discipline” where a handful go to the offender and as you know it escalates from there. In fact there is an interesting controversy right now in Dallas about a church leader and an affair and the churches involvement in same. I cannot remember which church but I found it googling around about churches and divorce.
DW2G, I’ve written a lot here about this. One may say I’m a sort of one trick pony. To really understand it would be tough without some exposure to conservative church culture. If you enjoy reading about some of the insidious tangents of feminism try “The Church Feminized” and “Why Men Hate To Go To Church”. They lay the groundwork for why this divorce epidemic is rampant in church and especially with female initiation.
DW2G there is a website called “DivorceCare” that could be interesting. It is a much feminized support system that churches sort of buy a canned program and offer it to those members suffering divorce. In reality it has the effect of offering women, even one in a new city with no friends and family, a built in “you go girl” chorus that enables her to file no fault divorce. I do not claim that is its intention. But unquestionably that is the impact.
The preachers are largely useful in the whole scheme when the worship moms on Mothers Day and admonish Dads on Fathers day. Regardless if they speak truths, the contrast after years and years has an effect. They also NEVER have jokes with women as the punch line, just like in secular life, and finally, they offer sermons on marriage that describe the Biblical prescription for men and women and you can imagine how out of skew that gets.
It adds up. But most alarming is that the average man in church will laugh at the jokes, cry about his bad ole self on Fathers Day, and lavish praise on wife and mother during those other times. Again, maybe all that would be ok in a balanced environment but it utterly removes responsibility from women according to how they here the Bible interpreted every week. I asked a pastor why. He said his wife was in the audience and chuckled. And he was a casual friend, so he was honest.
That was an attempt at brevity. But religious or not, it should alarm folks that the church is coming apart with a sort of evangelical feminism.
July 24th, 2007 at 12:13 am
Yes marriage is a sacrament, but it is also a civil contract and has been recognized as such since the beginning of this republic. Chief Justice John Marshal (and this was later echoed by Chief Justice Story) in the courts 1819 case of Dartmouth College vs. Woodward, understood marriage as “the most fundamental contract in society” he was looking back to Blackstone in that perspective, and as such, under the Contract Clause of the Constitution, he contemplated that the federal government had the power to enforce the contract clause against the states if ever the day came about when they created easy out divorces, especially those where one spouse could get out without the consent of the other:
“The general correctness of these observations cannot be controverted. That the framers of the Constitution did not intend to restrain the States in the regulation of their civil institutions, adopted for internal government, and that the instrument they have given us is not to be so construed, may be admitted. The provision of the Constitution never has been understood to embrace other contracts than those which respect property, or some object of value, and confer rights which may be asserted in a court of justice. It never has been understood to restrict the general right of the legislature to legislate on the subject of divorces.* Those acts enable some tribunals not to impair a marriage contract, but to liberate one of the parties, because it has been broken by the other. When any State legislature shall pass an act annulling all marriage contracts, or allowing either party to annul it, without the consent of the other, it will be time enough to inquire, whether such an act be constitutional.”
In 1856, the Supreme Court in Reynolds v. United States declared: “Marriage, while from its very nature a sacred obligation, is nevertheless, in most civilized nations, a civil contract, and usually regulated by law. Upon it society may be said to be built, and out of its fruits spring social relations and social obligations and duties with which government is necessarily required to deal.”
Let’s go back to 1654, in Puritan New England, and also Connecticut. From George Bancroft’s classic History of the United States we read:
“On every subject but religion the mildness of Puritan legislation corresponded to the popular character of Puritan doctrines. Hardly a nation of Europe has as yet made its criminal law so humane as that of early New England. A crowd of offences was at one sweep brushed from the catalogue of capital crimes. The idea was never received that the forfeiture of life may he demanded for the protection of property; the punishment for theft, for burglary, and highway robbery was far more mild than the penalties imposed even by modern American legislation. The habits of the young promoted real chastity. The sexes lived in social intimacy, and were more pure than the recluse. Marriage was a civil contract; and under the old charter of Massachusetts all controversies respecting it were determined by the court of assistants which decreed divorces especially for adultery or desertion. The rule in Connecticut was not different. Separation from bed and board without the dissolution of the marriage, an anomaly which may punish the innocent more than the guilty, was abhorrent to every thought of that day. The sanctity of the nuptial vow was protected by the penalty of death. If in this respect the laws were more severe, in another they were more lenient than modern manners approve. The girl whom youth and affection and the promise of marriage betrayed into weakness was censured, pitied, and forgiven; the law compelled the seducer of innocence to marry the person who had imposed every obligation by the concession of every right. The law implies an extremely pure community; in no other could it have found a place in the statute-book.
For North Carolina from 1669 thru 1775:
The authentic record of the legislative history of North Carolina begins with the autumn of 1669, when the representatives of Albemarle, ignorant of the scheme which Locke and Shaftesbury were maturing, gave a five years’ security to the emigrant debtor against any cause of action arising out of the country; made marriage a civil contract, requiring only the consent of parties before a magistrate; exempted new settlers from taxation for a year; prohibited strangers from trading with the neighboring Indians, and granted land to every adventurer who joined the colony, but withholding a perfect title till after a residence of two years. The members of this early legislature probably received no compensation; to meet the expenses of the governor and council, a fee of thirty pounds of tobacco was exacted in every lawsuit. The laws were sufficient, were confirmed by the proprietaries, were reenacted in 1715, and were valid in North Carolina for more than half a century.
Virginia 1662:
Though “Virginia suffered no marriage to be celebrated but according to the rubric in the Book of Common Prayer,” nevertheless we read: “The reformation had diminished the power of the clergy by declaring marriage a civil contract, not a sacrament.”
Pennsylvania law dating to 1688:
The word, the contract, or the testimony of a man, required no confirmation by oath. The spirit of speculation was checked by a system of strict accountability, applied to factors and agents. Every resident who paid scot and lot to the governor possessed the right of suffrage; and, without regard to sect, every Christian was eligible to office. No tax or custom could be levied but by law. The pleasures of the senses, masks, revels, and stage-plays, not less than bull-baits and cock-fights, were prohibited. Murder was the only crime punishable by death. Marriage was esteemed a civil contract; adultery, a felony.
John Locke, Second Treatise on Government: Chapter 7: Of Political or Civil Society:
Section 83
For all the ends of marriage being to be obtained under politic government, as well as in the state of nature, the civil magistrate cloth not abridge the right or power of either naturally necessary to those ends, viz. procreation and mutual support and assistance whilst they are together; but only decides any controversy that may arise between man and wife about them. If it were otherwise, and that absolute sovereignty and power of life and death naturally belonged to the husband, and were necessary to the society between man and wife, there could be no matrimony in any of those countries where the husband is allowed no such absolute authority. But the ends of matrimony requiring no such power in the husband, the condition of conjugal society put it not in him, it being not at all necessary to that state. Conjugal society could subsist and attain its ends without it; nay, community of goods, and the power over them, mutual assistance and maintenance, and other things belonging to conjugal society, might be varied and regulated by that contract which unites man and wife in that society, as far as may consist with procreation and the bringing up of children till they could shift for themselves; nothing being necessary to any society, that is not necessary to the ends for which it is made.
etc.
Now, Marriage is in fact, ALL throughout our history, and before that in the colonies, and before that in England been recognized as a civil contract, so says Bancroft, back to the Reformation itself; but it also is a church sacrament, and for instance, we see instances occasionally where the state grants a divorce, and yet the Church hasn’t – by way of example. The state may have an easy, one party asks for the divorce and gets it set up; whereas the Church doesn’t accept that. So I know of a number of individuals who were granted the former and not the latter, because the latter requires mutual consent, and still might urge against the divorce depending on the case.
Other Supreme Court cases site among other reasons the state has an interest in preserving this contract, the enormous expense both in services and other fallout the state and the taxpayers pick up as a result. Also listed in these more modern cases and the state interest in a faithful contract, and a legitimate right to interfere in making sure the contract is being faithfully obeyed is in the case of abuse, especially, child abuse.
If we would go all the way back to Blackstone in the 1700’s, he would point out that the state doesn’t have a right to be involved in the home at all … regardless of the imperfections in that home … except when those imperfections go to the point of hurting others, than it has every right to intervene, and so a civil contract gives them the right to come in and intervene in what otherwise is not their territory. The state then is not understood to have the right to cause happy marriages, or to detail all that a happy marriage is, but certainly when parents fail to walk up their obligations to provide for their children, or where there is abuse to spouse or child, then the state has jurisdiction.
Of course there is danger in Parens Patria, etc. But there all government involves danger. Washington compared government to fire, and warned of it being a fearful master, and yet he was no anarchist. It is up to us to be smart enough and vigilant enough to draw lines of where and where not the state may go. A blanket, no exceptions, keep the state out of the bedroom or off of my property is ridiculous.
And saying that marriage is not a civil contract is not accurate. It has been for a LONG time.
July 23rd, 2007 at 9:43 pm
Mr. Bambenek, you are wrong when you say that marriage is not an enforceable contract. If there is any doubt in your mind, just ask the men in prison right now who have failed to make their child support payments. The problem isn’t that the contract is unenforceable but, instead, the problem is that the contract is biased against the man. Make no mistake, when a man get married he is very clearly signing on to a significant obligation.
Everyone (especially the man) should understand that they are signing on to a legal obligation when they get married and, as such, they *MUST* get a lawyer involved and have some input into the contract they are signing. People (and it is often the man) will whine that it is unromantic to work out a contract but they are just being stupid. They *ARE* signing a legal contract and it is *NOT* to their advantage.
As has often been stated on this web site, women initiated 70% of the divorces. When they do divorce, sometimes it is because the man is having an affair, sometimes it is because he is physically abusing her, sometimes it is because he is an alcholic and can’t hold a job… but these are actually the exception. The number one reason women divorce their men is because… they are unhappy. The man has done nothing wrong but fail to keep his wife sufficiently happy.
Actually, to be more precise… the wife has decided that she is not as happy as she envisions she will be when she walks away with the house, the car, and the kids and receives a fat, monthly child support check.
And to be even more precise… she doesn’t walk but, instead, she kicks her husband out of the home he dedicated his life to building.
Men… wise up. Negotiate the contracts you sign. Specify the rules of the union and the consequense, for both parties, for violating the rules. Either party should be allowed to leave the marriage without cause (unhappiness is not a valid cause) but, if they do so, they walk away with nothing. No kids, no house, no alimony (but they do have to pay child support).
July 23rd, 2007 at 8:41 pm
Gonzman,
Your opinion sounds great to me. Why should anyone give a shit.
July 23rd, 2007 at 8:23 pm
Why is it our job to fix an institution we don’t participate in, asnd don’t vale? Because *YOU* do, and yoiu are trying to create a false sense of shame in us for leaving a poor victimized girl to fend for herself?
If I had my way, I’d abolish secular marriage. It serves no useful purpose.
July 23rd, 2007 at 8:04 pm
You know what is funny (I guess there is no funny side when you are hurting but when you come out of it I think looking at the funny side is about sanity)
What is strange is that the men on the likes of this site and many others are not part of the solution. Gosh, I wish you were.
But then you can. How sad, too bad. Maybe in time to come you will get it together.
July 23rd, 2007 at 7:51 pm
conservativation — “Sure marriage began as a religious commitment. For some of us we still take that very seriously. But as is often the case, some kind of societal pressure, in this case I submit it comes directly from the wives of church leaders and from women who are leaders, comes to the fore in the form of spreading fear of abused women being trapped and stigmatized for wanting to escape. Soon, this miniscule percentage of women is ruling the day, and their beliefs become the mainstream drivers in the church, as they are in society in general.”
This is very interesting and new territory for me…. as a non-church-going individual.
Would you please write more about the gender politics of the “faithful?”
Especially, how is this increasing dominance of females affecting church membership, men’s alienation from their faiths, and young people’s sense of a future in their organized religious paths/affiliations?
All of this is totally foreign to me — I am not religious.
What role are ministers and priests playing in the cultural gender wars?
Any insight you might provide is appreciated…
July 23rd, 2007 at 7:24 pm
John, I want this article, as simply stated as it is, to appear weekly in every newspaper in this country. Variations of this appear daily in the discourse here on MND. The contrast with the gat marriage debate is common also here in comments, and welcome in your article.
I wonder myself if the debate about gay marriage would even exist if marriage was an enforceable contract. Forgive me, but I see gays, especially gay men, marrying as a kind of token piece of memorabilia, a license that can be collected and reflected back on as a “nice relationship” in the past, like an accumulation of tokens or gifts in a box maybe under the bed to reflect upon and recount in memories. If it was binding and problematic to then move on, or if there was a cost, they may behave as heterosexual men do now, avoiding that danger expeditiously.
Sure marriage began as a religious commitment. For some of us we still take that very seriously. But as is often the case, some kind of societal pressure, in this case I submit it comes directly from the wives of church leaders and from women who are leaders, comes to the fore in the form of spreading fear of abused women being trapped and stigmatized for wanting to escape. Soon, this miniscule percentage of women is ruling the day, and their beliefs become the mainstream drivers in the church, as they are in society in general. In fact I say the church has, in the interest of not being judgmental and wanting to be compassionate, become supportive of those choosing unilateral divorce without intending to do so. But when confronted with this reality the church will use all kinds of twisted scripture about kindness and being gentile to justify what amounts to not ruffling the feathers of the gals.
The symptoms of this are in your face, if you are in a church and have the eyes to see. Most man anyway can admit that it is the case in secular life, but the men of the church maintain the position that men are bastards, abusing women and cheating on them, and no wonder the women are leaving.
I am happy to see this statement made in such a plainspoken way. Some may find it a keen observation of the obvious. I find it refreshing and much needed. Thank you John.
I may disagree that any of this was the intention of the majority, but the minority has carried the ball beyond downfield.
July 23rd, 2007 at 5:48 pm
In its contemporary modality, marriage is an institution culturally, psychologically, and legally designed to emasculate men, steal their constitutional rights, prepare them for wage-slavery and eventual financial harvest, and then (through bourgeois romantic mythology) ensure that the next generation of young men will repeat the same chivalrous mistakes.
Marriage today is like a bad three-card monty game with an excellent con-man on 42nd Avenue in Manhattan.
All the allure of a lucky score, and all the certainty of tragic exploitation.
Recommended only for the truly dedicated suckers and masochists who are addicted to optimism and suffering…