7 ms·

What are some characteristics of a healthy end to a marriage?

da_big_ghey 6y ago
Marriages aren't supposed to end except in death. It's right there in the vows. They are a serious commitment, and I think many take them lightly without realizing that they are intended to be lifelong.
- xref 6y ago
  As nwienert said better elsewhere in the thread: “You’re emotionally tying yourself to Christian theology and claiming it as universal.”
  - da_big_ghey 6y ago
    No, marriage in America is based on Christian theology and by extension so is the legal framework around it, which is why divorce is so difficult. That's factual, not emotional.
    - staticman2 6y ago
      Marriage is based on whatever the humans in the marriage want it to be based on. The legal system is constantly evolving in 50 stages. Your understanding of the legal system lacks nuance, probably because you are repeating something you heard a partisan say.
      - da_big_ghey 6y ago
        I'm referring to marriage as a legal contract, and legal stuff changes slowly. It was certainly founded on religious principles, which is why homosexuals couldn't marry until recently. I'm not advocating for that state of affairs, nor repeating what some partisan said. Were we to green-field re-do marriage today, divorce would be a whole lot easier and possibly more of an expectation.
        throwawayboise 6y ago
        Or perhaps, marriage would be harder? If divorce is easy, what's the point of marriage?
        Brian_K_White 6y ago
        Many administrivia reasons. It would be useful for me that I have some way to assign certain rights relating to me, to someone else. I am not married, but I have been living with someone for 12 years, and neither of us has plans to change. But legally, I don't know what happens when one of us meets a misfortune and the other needs to speak for us. Luckily in our case, we both have plenty of other blood relatives all alive and reachable and all on good terms with each other. So, if say I am incapacitated, and some functionary at a hospital won't accept my partners decision about what to do, both my partner and the functionary can reach several other generally accepted proxies in the form of my mother, my brother, and even more cousins. My partner will be able to say what to do only slightly indirectly if not directly. And we both have our own jobs with insurance and retirement savings so neither of us really needs to be legally acknowledged to receive benefits like military death benefits or retirements etc. So for us we can pretty much get away with having NOT addressed these issues. But they are real issues that generally should be addressed. A legal document on the books would provide a clean path to resolve a lot of potentially messy situations. What if our families didn't all like or respect each other? What if one or both of us had no known and/or reachable bood relatives? What if one of us actually needed to be recognized as a claimant on the others insurance or retirement or property like a house? Probably a lot of such things could just as well be handled with legal documents other than marriages. Like if I take a job that has spouse insurance benefits, that could just as well be whoever I want to write on that form, rather than having it be determined by my marriage document. But it would still be useful to have a catch-all document that expresses my wishes in any situation not handled elsewhere.
        robertlagrant 6y ago
        > It was certainly founded on religious principles, which is why homosexuals couldn't marry until recently Simple counterexample: the USSR's views on gay marriage.
- superhuzza 6y ago
  >Marriages aren't supposed to end except in death. Says who? Every country I've lived in has provisions for ending marriages, so clearly it's not the only path. >It's right there in the vows. What vows? Nobody in my family is religious, none of us made any claims about being together until death. And even then, lots of religions allow for divorce, even some sects of Christianity...
  - chrisseaton 6y ago
    > What vows? In many cultures people make wedding vows about staying married until one of you dies.
  - garbagetime 6y ago
    I don't think being religious is so relevant. Plenty of atheists view marriage as a life-long commitment.
    - XorNot 6y ago
      And plenty do not, what's your point?
      - garbagetime 6y ago
        That the > Nobody in my family is religious point is out of place (because whether the family is religious seems to have little relevance)
      - eggbert12 6y ago
        Do civil unions have the same “benefits” of marriage? If not there should be. I think the distinction should be socio-cultural: if you don’t accept that this civil union is “till death do us part”, then by definition it shouldn’t be marriage - it’s a civil union. All the same benefits of marriage with none of the cultural components.
        XorNot 6y ago
        Why would this be any business of the state? Why is it any business of yours how someone else defines the commitment of their long term relationship? It's not my responsibility to advertise my belief system to you.
- samsa 6y ago
  Marriage is one of a very few things in life humans undertake where they are asked to commit to do something “for life” that they have never done before. And their closest vantage point is likely their parents’ marriage. I think it’s not so much people take it lightly, as that they have no idea of what they are getting into and what kind of work a modern marriage involves.
  - spiralx 6y ago
    More than that - when my now fiancee proposed to me I was completely surprised by it, and literally couldn't process the question for a good couple of minutes. Thankfully she decided to leave me to it for that time and by the time she got back I accepted, but it occurred to me that a proposal is itself the only time you're asked to make a life-changing decision by surprise, and answer it there and then without being able to spend any time considering what the correct decision is.
  - throwawayboise 6y ago
    Yes, the value of pre-marital counseling is vastly underappreciated IMO.
    - lotsofpulp 6y ago
      It is amazing to me that people can consider entering into a lifelong contract with a partner and not have discussed 5, 10, 20 year goals. Seems like a common sense due diligence thing to do.
    - robertlagrant 6y ago
      And regular counsel during marriage. Your car shouldn't get a checkup more often than your marriage.
- odshoifsdhfs 6y ago
  Are you religious per chance? Not denigrating, but civil marriages (not sure if right name) don't have any of these vows, for health and sick whatnot. I am divorced, and got married in my country outside the church. Wether we like it or not, it was literally a contract. An officer of the court was there, read the 'contract' which states our data, the legal parts of it (prenup, how assets were after marriage, etc), and the legal responsibilities. There was nothing there about 'until the end' or the likes. I'm not sure how it is in other countries, and I am from a very catholic country, but most people don't realize that marriage is the contract that is governed by the government's law and not any vows or whatever the priest says in church. It is a contract and parties to that contract are allowed to change their mind and divorce (break contract).
- LexGray 6y ago
  Fixed term marriages are becoming popular in Australia and other places and have historical precedents. It is likely a lifelong term of marriage may be unrealistic with our comparative ease of survival.
  - lostlogin 6y ago
    This is amazing. The proposal (pun intended) is literally for 5 years, 10 years or life. It sounds horribly complicated. How do assets and dependents get treated? How does a will work? An inheritance? Eg You marry for 5 years, and at 4.9 a relative leaves an inheritance. The executors get to work at 5.1 years. Where does the money go? Maybe I’m overthinking it. https://topnews.in/how-about-fixedterm-marital-contract-renewable-every-510-years-2156469 https://topnews.in/how-about-fixedterm-marital-contract-rene...
    - paulryanrogers 6y ago
      Married people can have separate bank accounts.
      - robertlagrant 6y ago
        Whoosh.
  - eggbert12 6y ago
    I’d be careful to suggest it has so much to do with “real factors” like relative safety to ease of survival and more with cultural effects. We see this observationally as subsets of the US have lifelong marriage rates in the 90%s, specifically religious communities. I don’t recall the exact numbers but even just considering how many sexual partners people have can drastically change average likelihood of eventually divorce - with virgin couples above 80% AFAIK (some overlap with religious communities likely). Even a few decades ago when survival was still pretty easy marriage had higher success rates. The culture probably has a lot more to do with the rate of successful marriages than our safety or lifespan
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]

Marriages aren't supposed to end except in death. It's right there in the vows. They are a serious commitment, and I think many take them lightly without realizing that they are intended to be lifelong.

xref 6y ago
As nwienert said better elsewhere in the thread: “You’re emotionally tying yourself to Christian theology and claiming it as universal.”
- da_big_ghey 6y ago
  No, marriage in America is based on Christian theology and by extension so is the legal framework around it, which is why divorce is so difficult. That's factual, not emotional.
  - staticman2 6y ago
    Marriage is based on whatever the humans in the marriage want it to be based on. The legal system is constantly evolving in 50 stages. Your understanding of the legal system lacks nuance, probably because you are repeating something you heard a partisan say.
    - da_big_ghey 6y ago
      I'm referring to marriage as a legal contract, and legal stuff changes slowly. It was certainly founded on religious principles, which is why homosexuals couldn't marry until recently. I'm not advocating for that state of affairs, nor repeating what some partisan said. Were we to green-field re-do marriage today, divorce would be a whole lot easier and possibly more of an expectation.
      - throwawayboise 6y ago
        Or perhaps, marriage would be harder? If divorce is easy, what's the point of marriage?
        Brian_K_White 6y ago
        Many administrivia reasons. It would be useful for me that I have some way to assign certain rights relating to me, to someone else. I am not married, but I have been living with someone for 12 years, and neither of us has plans to change. But legally, I don't know what happens when one of us meets a misfortune and the other needs to speak for us. Luckily in our case, we both have plenty of other blood relatives all alive and reachable and all on good terms with each other. So, if say I am incapacitated, and some functionary at a hospital won't accept my partners decision about what to do, both my partner and the functionary can reach several other generally accepted proxies in the form of my mother, my brother, and even more cousins. My partner will be able to say what to do only slightly indirectly if not directly. And we both have our own jobs with insurance and retirement savings so neither of us really needs to be legally acknowledged to receive benefits like military death benefits or retirements etc. So for us we can pretty much get away with having NOT addressed these issues. But they are real issues that generally should be addressed. A legal document on the books would provide a clean path to resolve a lot of potentially messy situations. What if our families didn't all like or respect each other? What if one or both of us had no known and/or reachable bood relatives? What if one of us actually needed to be recognized as a claimant on the others insurance or retirement or property like a house? Probably a lot of such things could just as well be handled with legal documents other than marriages. Like if I take a job that has spouse insurance benefits, that could just as well be whoever I want to write on that form, rather than having it be determined by my marriage document. But it would still be useful to have a catch-all document that expresses my wishes in any situation not handled elsewhere.
      - robertlagrant 6y ago
        > It was certainly founded on religious principles, which is why homosexuals couldn't marry until recently Simple counterexample: the USSR's views on gay marriage.
superhuzza 6y ago
>Marriages aren't supposed to end except in death. Says who? Every country I've lived in has provisions for ending marriages, so clearly it's not the only path. >It's right there in the vows. What vows? Nobody in my family is religious, none of us made any claims about being together until death. And even then, lots of religions allow for divorce, even some sects of Christianity...
- chrisseaton 6y ago
  > What vows? In many cultures people make wedding vows about staying married until one of you dies.
- garbagetime 6y ago
  I don't think being religious is so relevant. Plenty of atheists view marriage as a life-long commitment.
  - XorNot 6y ago
    And plenty do not, what's your point?
    - garbagetime 6y ago
      That the > Nobody in my family is religious point is out of place (because whether the family is religious seems to have little relevance)
    - eggbert12 6y ago
      Do civil unions have the same “benefits” of marriage? If not there should be. I think the distinction should be socio-cultural: if you don’t accept that this civil union is “till death do us part”, then by definition it shouldn’t be marriage - it’s a civil union. All the same benefits of marriage with none of the cultural components.
      - XorNot 6y ago
        Why would this be any business of the state? Why is it any business of yours how someone else defines the commitment of their long term relationship? It's not my responsibility to advertise my belief system to you.
samsa 6y ago
Marriage is one of a very few things in life humans undertake where they are asked to commit to do something “for life” that they have never done before. And their closest vantage point is likely their parents’ marriage. I think it’s not so much people take it lightly, as that they have no idea of what they are getting into and what kind of work a modern marriage involves.
- spiralx 6y ago
  More than that - when my now fiancee proposed to me I was completely surprised by it, and literally couldn't process the question for a good couple of minutes. Thankfully she decided to leave me to it for that time and by the time she got back I accepted, but it occurred to me that a proposal is itself the only time you're asked to make a life-changing decision by surprise, and answer it there and then without being able to spend any time considering what the correct decision is.
- throwawayboise 6y ago
  Yes, the value of pre-marital counseling is vastly underappreciated IMO.
  - lotsofpulp 6y ago
    It is amazing to me that people can consider entering into a lifelong contract with a partner and not have discussed 5, 10, 20 year goals. Seems like a common sense due diligence thing to do.
  - robertlagrant 6y ago
    And regular counsel during marriage. Your car shouldn't get a checkup more often than your marriage.
odshoifsdhfs 6y ago
Are you religious per chance? Not denigrating, but civil marriages (not sure if right name) don't have any of these vows, for health and sick whatnot. I am divorced, and got married in my country outside the church. Wether we like it or not, it was literally a contract. An officer of the court was there, read the 'contract' which states our data, the legal parts of it (prenup, how assets were after marriage, etc), and the legal responsibilities. There was nothing there about 'until the end' or the likes. I'm not sure how it is in other countries, and I am from a very catholic country, but most people don't realize that marriage is the contract that is governed by the government's law and not any vows or whatever the priest says in church. It is a contract and parties to that contract are allowed to change their mind and divorce (break contract).
LexGray 6y ago
Fixed term marriages are becoming popular in Australia and other places and have historical precedents. It is likely a lifelong term of marriage may be unrealistic with our comparative ease of survival.
- lostlogin 6y ago
  This is amazing. The proposal (pun intended) is literally for 5 years, 10 years or life. It sounds horribly complicated. How do assets and dependents get treated? How does a will work? An inheritance? Eg You marry for 5 years, and at 4.9 a relative leaves an inheritance. The executors get to work at 5.1 years. Where does the money go? Maybe I’m overthinking it. https://topnews.in/how-about-fixedterm-marital-contract-renewable-every-510-years-2156469 https://topnews.in/how-about-fixedterm-marital-contract-rene...
  - paulryanrogers 6y ago
    Married people can have separate bank accounts.
    - robertlagrant 6y ago
      Whoosh.
- eggbert12 6y ago
  I’d be careful to suggest it has so much to do with “real factors” like relative safety to ease of survival and more with cultural effects. We see this observationally as subsets of the US have lifelong marriage rates in the 90%s, specifically religious communities. I don’t recall the exact numbers but even just considering how many sexual partners people have can drastically change average likelihood of eventually divorce - with virgin couples above 80% AFAIK (some overlap with religious communities likely). Even a few decades ago when survival was still pretty easy marriage had higher success rates. The culture probably has a lot more to do with the rate of successful marriages than our safety or lifespan
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]