Marriage

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Shadon Xarian

The Frozen Mist of Xaria
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Marriage is something I never quite understood, probably because of my own experience with Marriage.
Let's take my parents for example. Non-married, together for 17 or so years (much longer than allot of "Happily married" people), and they didn't separate the best of ways (They're fine now, but still) If they were married, then that break up would have been MUCH worse, and several times more stressful. Now I saw the build up, I knew both sides of the story, so I was prepared for it and knew it was gonna happen so it didn't effect me too much.

Now lets go with someone I know. They were married for quite a bit of years, nearly a perfect couple. Something happened to where the guy just quit loving her, and broke up in the most scummy ways you can imagine (I'm not even going to go into detail) So there was the stress of that, the divorce was a MISERABLE process (Like this guy must have had a buddy in the law system, he was winning things he shouldn't be winning DX. Eventually he went too far and his buddy couldn't protect him or something because FINALLY he got his ass busted) But they didn't tell their children anything so they were mentally wrecked (Which is why I think the child should know about whats up, they're apart of the family too >.<) But if they weren't married, then he would have just left, and she could have just ignored his bullshit. But no, the marriage FORCED her to deal with his bullshit and abuse.

And someone else I know was forced to be married with some girl for like 30 years because she refused to do the divorce papers unless he payed her allot of money, meaning he wasn't able to get married to anyone else. (I'm sure there's a way around that, but that person found it less stressful/better to just not deal with it and stay married even know they lived in different states and didn't communicate) Not to mention apparently the person can get half your stuff if there's a divorce. (Which is why there's allot of what I call marriage traps, where someone marries someone else just to get a divorce later and get their money/stuff)

Also, the marriage its self cost money, money that COULD be spent to go towards a trip to Paris or something, and why do we need a judge/priest to tell me if I love someone or not, and then have that asshole father stand up and be like "I object! They are not a good couple!" Crowd-*Gasp!* Me- You son of a bitch! DX" Her- Daddy D: Why?
Priest- Well you all heard it folks, the father does not approve.
(You would think that's exaggerated, but that's under-exaggerating from a few stories I've heard)

So the point I'm getting at is, what exactly is the point of marriage? The divorce is miserable and overly complex, you spend allot of money for something that adds more stress than its worth for like a week of feeling super happy, and it turns an already bad breakup into an un-recoverable friendship. While if you're not married, then if you both break up, then you both just sorta go your separate ways. No legal bullshit, nothing holding you two "Together" when you don't want to be (Unless you have a child, but even then it's more or less minor as long as you're not trying to dick over the other person)



So why? I hear about tax benefits, but in the end, It just adds stress, it adds hoops and loops to the simplest of things, it just seems like a MUCH bigger hassle than it should be. So what exactly are the benefits? Why do married people have this elitist attitude towards non-married people with children? (Whenever people see my mothers last name as different from mine they always get this odd look like "Uggg, his parents aren't married, such a peasant child. He's probably a trouble maker and gets abused")

So why why and why XD Because I REALLY don't understand it (Fully anyway unless it's truly just a "Hey, marriage is apart of our culture, lets get married since its the thing to do and if we don't get married, then CLEARLY there's no love between us D:" (In other words, a guilt trip)
 
People love each other and often want to be the only one in their spouse's life. Marriageusually solves that issue. Then there are things like insurance policies, inheritance, last name on the kids, medical benefits, taxes, bonuses from banks/credit cards, property, etc.

People think they'll be together forever and in some cases, that is true. Society has also instilled marriage into our heads since we were born and before that. Little girls dream up the perfect wedding, men think about settling down with the one. In some cultures, having many wives is a sign of wealth (although I heard there is one tribe where a woman can have many husbands) as they pay a hefty dowry and therefore make the woman property. In monarchy, marriage is a tool to form alliances which can gain them resources, armies, land and more.

Some people even marry for religious reasons because that is their way. Not every marriage is grand and will last forever. Honestly, it takes a lot more work then people are willing to do but there are those that inspire greatness. Celebrity weddings are an awful example of marriage goals.
 
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Marriage is one of the basic building blocks of any healthy society, unfortunately in modern times there is little incentive to get married and have children due to the fact that the risks far outweigh any rewards. Marriage in the traditional sense is an economic and social tool used for the benefits of both genders. For men, it focuses their libido for an attractive mate into productivity and produces wealth for themselves and the state. No woman wants to be to be financially tied down to a bum loser who can not support children. So men must work and create wealth and in return demands vows of faithfulness and chastity from his spouse. Women get financial stability and a safe environment to raise children.

If you've ever wondered what the religious right are talking about when they say that Gays getting married will destroy marriage, this is close to their line of thought. Same sex marriage has the potential to fuck up the marriage contract that has been established for millenniums. However, what they fail to take into consideration is that homosexuals are a genetic abnormality and so make up around 1% of the population (using U.S statistic) and so prevents it from becoming an actual problem. And the more pressing problem is that the rise of divorce and the increasing financial risks that marriage poses for men (not even counting the very real possibility that their children will be taken from them).

Simply put, men do not want to get married and to be perfectly frank, they shouldn't. Ever. Until laws are radically changed that forces family courts to stop favoring women and putting their former spouses in financial slavery (hint: they won't, there is too much money involved). At this point, the few decent options left are to hoard their wealth for themselves and when they get older, fuck women 20 years their junior. With declining marriages children will most likely be born to single mothers, which produces a disaster of problems (just read all the negative statistics on children raised by single mothers).

And the best part is that no one calls the problem out for what it is: greed and parasitical behavior by women who take advantage of the system to screw over men who swore a vow to provide for them. And if you do address the problem, you just get called a bitter misogynist who can't handle a free, independent woman. Who is so independent that she uses the Government as a glorified mob enforcer to steal money from a man who earned it.

But the icing on the cake are articles like this:

http://www.clutchmagonline.com/2015/04/70-of-men-aged-20-34-are-not-married/

Where men are shamed into getting married to fit in with society and if they don't they are basically man children who don't live up to their privilege of becoming emotionally destroyed by toxic marriage contracts.
 
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Marriage is a contract that is suppose to give you mental and financial security. (Mental as in "this person is MY person" and Financial as in insurance, paperwork, and accountability, etc)

Anything else someone says about marriage is what our current culture has created. And you can buy in to it or MAKE IT YOUR OWN. You should never judge what a marriage is or should be based on other people's marriages. You don't reeaaaally know what's going on there. Some people fuck their shit up with marriage, and other people are happy.


In MY case, getting married represented the next step of our relationship. O_O We had been living together for several years, and deep down I KNEW this was my person for the looooong haaaaaul. We lived through so much together, I knew it was going to be us forever. We just fit. Getting married represented the promise of our commitment to each other. That we're gonna work it out together if something shitty happens.
 
Oh man. This topic. Thank everything ever considered sacred in this world it isn't a debate. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Marriage is, besides obvious tax benefits, a ceremony. It's a way to solidify an idea. People remember single events better than a course of them over an extended period of time. It's how our memory works. You know, like putting a lot of emphasis on how you met, your first kiss, etcetera. Technically they aren't all that special, but it's about the meaning that is attributed to the event. That's marriage. You could swear to love each other forever and exchange rings a drunk night in Vegas, but a planned marriage generally creates more investment and therefore emotional value. A lot of people I know who don't want to get married, often still plan some sort of ceremony or party in honour of their relationship.

Me? I plan to go skydiving.

I guess what it strips down to is just the way we remember things and that we have a need for emotional landmarks. Our species isn't rational, man, we decide far more commonly based on how we feel.
 
Tax breaks


Taaaax breaaaaks
 
No woman wants to be to be financially tied down to a bum loser who can not support children. So men must work and create wealth and in return demands vows of faithfulness and chastity from his spouse.

Women get financial stability and a safe environment to raise children.

With declining marriages children will most likely be born to single mothers, which produces a disaster of problems (just read all the negative statistics on children raised by single mothers).
These are some of the few things I don't understand. How does not being married suddenly make the guy a bum who can't support anyone? How does not being married suddenly make the woman not in a safe environment? How are people not getting married suddenly make a child be raised by a single parent? (I'm pretty sure that's not what you said, but that is what other people say, that's why those specific words of yours caught my attention XD)

Like me for example. IF my parents were married, they would have divorced anyway. So marriage doesn't magically cancel that out. My parents were never married, yet after one of my classes talked about their parents, I was like the only one who had a normal childhood with both my parents, and I was the only one who didn't have married parents. (Admittedly my parents not being married is what probably made me be like "Marriage is pointless" but that's why I wanna understand it more)

Like people talk about marriage as this magical force that makes all perfect, makes the family perfect, while from what I have seen, it makes everything worse, at least when it comes to separating.


@Cosmos
People love each other and often want to be the only one in their spouse's life. Marriage usually solves that issue.
No wonder why I can't fully understand it XD That sounds terrible to me personally.

Then there are things like insurance policies, inheritance, last name on the kids, medical benefits, taxes, bonuses from banks/credit cards, property, etc.

What exactly are these "benefits"? Nobody seems to actually explain them, just say"Lots o benefits ^^ But I'm not gonna say any of them" (And what does "last name on kids" mean? XD As far as i'm aware, being married or not doesn't mean anything when it comes to the childs name. In fact, it adds one more option to the child's name for not being married like "Which last name sounds better?" Or "Which one of our family names are smaller than the other" etc etc. Unless of course something changed o.o

@Diana
Marriage is a contract that is suppose to give you mental and financial security.
Should being with someone else be a contract? Like if you're bound to a contract to not be with someone else, doesn't that seem like a trust issue? (Thinking about it, given the time marriage was created... That's probably the mindset of the time o.o)

And you can buy in to it or MAKE IT YOUR OWN. You should never judge what a marriage is or should be based on other people's marriages
What does that mean exactly? Marriage seems to be pretty straight forward in terms of what it's suppose to mean with the paperwork and each culture seems to have the exact same idea of marriage because it's just that set in stone. So what room is there to "make it your own" when you sign contracts and make agreements that kinda seem to limit the possibility of "making it your own" I think I know what you mean, I'm just trying to connect that "make it your own"

Oh man. This topic. Thank everything ever considered sacred in this world it isn't a debate. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Marriage is, besides obvious tax benefits, a ceremony. It's a way to solidify an idea. People remember single events better than a course of them over an extended period of time. It's how our memory works. You know, like putting a lot of emphasis on how you met, your first kiss, etcetera. Technically they aren't all that special, but it's about the meaning that is attributed to the event. That's marriage. You could swear to love each other forever and exchange rings a drunk night in Vegas, but a planned marriage generally creates more investment and therefore emotional value. A lot of people I know who don't want to get married, often still plan some sort of ceremony or party in honour of their relationship.

Me? I plan to go skydiving.

I guess what it strips down to is just the way we remember things and that we have a need for emotional landmarks. Our species isn't rational, man, we decide far more commonly based on how we feel.
Not quite sure how such a topic COULD be a debate XD You people are quick to jump on that bandwagon of expecting a fight at a place that from my experience, doesn't have fights XD

I think you're 100% right about that. Thing is though, I've always known that XD Like yes, it's exciting to think about, and the moment is super exciting. But like allot of things, it looses it's meaning over time, does it not?

I think the problem I'm having is i'm thinking super long term. I know WHY people decide to get married (I think) I just can't quite see it as a good idea considering what can, and does happen quite a bit later on in life.






Still though, skydiving is quite the alternative o.o Imagine if to get married, you had to go skydiving and pull the shoot at the very last moment (I watched this program about dragons where their version of marriage was basically grabbing eachother and diving down from a very high mark and not letting go till the very last moment before hitting the ground, pushing off of eachother, and rerouting their momentum to the side instead of crashing, one mistake will make them both splatter, that's suppose to be a dragons true test of trust XD Personally I like to think they'll survive and either be like "WHAT THE FUCK?!" Or be like "Huh, guess we aren't a good couple" But I have a bias for dragon's and probably over-estimate their power)


I know the positives (Emotionally anyway) and I think I understand them. What i'm trying to understand though, are mainly about the positive aspects about it. I know plenty about the negatives, but not much about the positives.

To this day, I only know 1 long lasting marriage, and it's my grandparents... Well my grandfather and my step-grandmother. and it's not exactly a very happy one. I personally think they are only together BECAUSE of that contract thing. Both are super unhappy, but both feel like they need to power through it (Just to get a bit of understanding, one is a hardcore extremist Christian, and the other is a hardcore extremist atheist. I don't know HOW the two got together, and both are nearing the end of their lives by now i'm pretty sure. But the two are miserable, depressed, and from what I can tell, it's because of each-other. But they are too bound by that contract aspect that they don't separate. It truly makes me sad, because he deserves better (I may be exaggerating a bit, but from what I gathered, he is one of the reasons why internet and computers are so powerful as of today, he worked with computers all his life, making programs, and allot of other things I'm too dumb to name XD. Quite frankly, I'm heavily considering going down there, wrecking their marriage, getting my grandfather out of his depression, get him pumped to finish his project that HAS buyers, but he's too depressed to finish, get him rich, and make him live the rest of his life super happy and stuff. Why do I need to cut her out? Well she's the most heartless person I have ever met, and that's REALLY saying something. I'm not saying her being super religious relates to her being a shitty person, BUUUUUUUUTTTTTTTT her actions and heartlessness ALL seems to be related (And she admits it too, so that's hardly up for debate)) >.<

So yeah, all I see in marriages are negativity. Sure they CAN work out amazing, but it hardly seems any different than not being married other than these benefits, but even then, just in case things go south, seems worth it to loose out on the benefits, and try to stay friends later on if it does go south. (Like I said in that one sentence, I think I know WHY people get married, I just wonder if it's actually a good idea, I think that's what I'm truly asking)

"TAX BREAKS!!!!!!!!!!!"
Are those worth it in the end? Like if the marriage goes down hill, are those tax breaks worth it all the added stress and stuff? (In other words, IF the negates are too happen, are the positives still worth it? That question that I was looking for took way too long to form in my head DX)
 
Tax breaks


Taaaax breaaaaks
This right here is why you get married. Because marriage is as much a legal document as it is anything else--affirming to the government that you have, in fact, created a family unit. Because families are one of the most important parts of how the species continues, naturally, they get tax breaks. (There's other shit but it's less consistent than tax breaks and typically less important, because if you have two people generating income and both receive tax breaks, that's huge.)

Now, let me introduce you to a magical word that you should remember forever. Especially if you are a male.

Prenup.

Now, in the event of a divorce--aside from the emotional stresses involved--you have a legal document that says "hey, I exist just in case everything goes to shit and this is exactly how everything shall be split and dealt with." My parents divorced without one and that was a nightmare. So... Yeah. Prenup. Remember that shit. It is an overriding legal document that is considered before pretty much anything else save possibly spousal abuse--and we'd have to be talking some pretty hardcore abuse at that. Think "hospitalization" levels abuse.

"But a prenup shows he might not love me!" Sister/brother/agendered entity/toaster oven, that argument can apply right onto getting married in the first place (aside from the tax breaks) and you know it. "Why do I need a legal document to show how much I love you?" Marriage has existed since, like, the time of the ancient Egyptians and Chinese. It used to be a political tool as much as it was anything romantic or spiritual. Please don't buy into that hallmark card nonsense that marriage is the ultimate expression of love, because just like sex, it's a vanity that you want, and not much else.

Except, you know, this particular vanity can involve tax breaks. So. It's not completely useless. There is a logical point to it all. So long as you don't marry someone who gets offended by the idea of you making sure your own ass is protected in case the "for" part gets divorced from "ever."
 
Marriage is one of the basic building blocks of any healthy society, unfortunately in modern times there is little incentive to get married and have children due to the fact that the risks far outweigh any rewards. Marriage in the traditional sense is an economic and social tool used for the benefits of both genders. For men, it focuses their libido for an attractive mate into productivity and produces wealth for themselves and the state. No woman wants to be to be financially tied down to a bum loser who can not support children. So men must work and create wealth and in return demands vows of faithfulness and chastity from his spouse. Women get financial stability and a safe environment to raise children.

If you've ever wondered what the religious right are talking about when they say that Gays getting married will destroy marriage, this is close to their line of thought. Same sex marriage has the potential to fuck up the marriage contract that has been established for millenniums. However, what they fail to take into consideration is that homosexuals are a genetic abnormality and so make up around 1% of the population (using U.S statistic) and so prevents it from becoming an actual problem. And the more pressing problem is that the rise of divorce and the increasing financial risks that marriage poses for men (not even counting the very real possibility that their children will be taken from them).

Simply put, men do not want to get married and to be perfectly frank, they shouldn't. Ever. Until laws are radically changed that forces family courts to stop favoring women and putting their former spouses in financial slavery (hint: they won't, there is too much money involved). At this point, the few decent options left are to hoard their wealth for themselves and when they get older, fuck women 20 years their junior. With declining marriages children will most likely be born to single mothers, which produces a disaster of problems (just read all the negative statistics on children raised by single mothers).

And the best part is that no one calls the problem out for what it is: greed and parasitical behavior by women who take advantage of the system to screw over men who swore a vow to provide for them. And if you do address the problem, you just get called a bitter misogynist who can't handle a free, independent woman. Who is so independent that she uses the Government as a glorified mob enforcer to steal money from a man who earned it.

But the icing on the cake are articles like this:

http://www.clutchmagonline.com/2015/04/70-of-men-aged-20-34-are-not-married/

Where men are shamed into getting married to fit in with society and if they don't they are basically man children who don't live up to their privilege of becoming emotionally destroyed by toxic marriage contracts.

Men and women do the same nonsense to each other. Men nor women do not always marry an attractive partner and sometimes it is the woman who is the financial support. Sometimes a woman will marry a "bum" because she's in "love." Sometimes a guy only marries a woman for her money and will still run around screwing everything within reach. It is not always on a female. It goes both ways and to think otherwise is not being realistic.



Medical benefits as in health insurance or like say if a husband has fallen I'll and unable to make medical decisions on his own then the wife (or husband ) would make the decisions rather then the a family member or some girl/boyfriend. Pretty sure there's other stuff but I ain't married soo....:'D
 
I am "Catholic" and my family is Catholic and military. For us not only is marriage a legal contract but it's a contract with God and that is a big deal. It harkens back to what @Brovo was talking about with establishing that "this is my family unit and I will take care of it". My family is very traditional and I want to respect that. I also want to continue that part of my religious experience as it is one of the sacrements (baptism, confession, communion, confirmation, marriage/priesthood/holy orders, last rites). I want someone to be with for the rest of my life and to ensure that my children will be raised in a household that can care for them. I want someone stable for my child.

For me, marriage also represents a sort-of checklist for choosing a life partner. Can I trust them to raise my spa- children? Can they balance out what I'm deficient in? Will they be there to provide for my mental health in the form of being able to hear me bitch about the same story on a different day? I am Catholic, there is no divorce (though noises are being made for this to shift, but not change just yet). This is a contract with my spouse before my God that we are going to see each other through thick and thin and all that good stuff.

Then there's the obvious thing that it helps with documents with benefits and insurance. If you've ever had to do a tax document when you start a new job, there's a load of questions that have to do with spouces and dependents. Getting married can save some cash money dollars. The ceremony/tradition can cost cash money dollars, but that may also help show that the couple is stable enough to stick together. Yes I know divorce is high, but no system is perfect.

My family is also military. In order to live with someone on base you have to be a dependent of an active duty service member. This means you are their child or their spouse. I'm not even going to get into how in the US military soldiers/airmen/sailors/etc can be court martialed for infidelity. Breaking their vows to their spouse shows a lack of morals that could be a sign that this member would break his/her vows concerning protecting their country.

Marriage doesn't just mean "I've claimed this person as mine and no one else can have them ever". It means so much that a lot of people just don't understand when they get involved. There's also the fact that sometimes shit happens and it's unpleasant and no one likes it and people go their separate ways. Again, Brovo hits the nail on the head with prenups. I don't know what it's like to witness a divorce. My entire family, including the vast majority of my extended family, has stayed together with their spouses. That's the way I was raised to look at marriage. It's forever and it's important not only for the legality, but for my immortal soul. If you subscribe to that.

EDIT: There's also the growth of writing your own vows. Marriage is a very personal. individual things. It can mean whatever it is you want it to in order to make it fit for you and your spouse-to-be. Doesn't have to be thick and thin in rich and in want and such. For a couple that had been together for years before I knew them, marriage was going to mean the fellow remembering to pick up his laundry off the bathroom floor because he knew it made his partner worried that bugs would get in them. It meant the lady would put remember to park her car on the left of the driveway because her fellow liked not only sleeping on the right side of the bed, but keeping his car in the right side of the drive. It's the little things.
 
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I want to get married someday, because I want to find someone that I have a strong enough love with that we both want to gather everyone we care about and insomany words say
"Hey, this is them. This is the one person I want to spend the rest of my life with, it's definitely them, they feel the same, and we're going to build our lives together; isn't that great? Isn't it awesome? Celebrate with us!"

Thats me though. I think people want to get married or not get married for their own reasons, and just because you can't understand or empathize with someone's reasons does not make them invalid or stupid.
 
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