Divorce

[Nurvingiel]

Oh yeah. Never mind.

[Lief Erikson]

Originally Posted by brownjenkins

Being a "form" of breakdown doesn't make something a "cause" of breakdown.

The relationship break-down, in vast majority of cases, does not have to happen. I have already shown with a number of citations that relationships can near always be repaired if both members of the couple genuinely want to repair it. Therefore the responsibility is on the couple, and the divorce is the problem.

The causes that get them to that point are also problems, but they're solvable, and the divorce itself is the final step that finalizes something negative for society that doesn't have to be finalized. Therefore it is a cause of the social problems in Britain.

[brownjenkins]

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

I have already shown with a number of citations that relationships can near always be repaired if both members of the couple genuinely want to repair it.

The problem is not that divorce exists, it's that some people do not want to repair their relationship for a variety of reasons, mostly revolving around getting married too young or too quickly.

Are you suggesting that we make divorce illegal? Do that and relationships will still break apart from time to time. I know former couples who don't even live in the same state as one another, but have never bothered to get divorced.

The simple answer to making marriages more likely to last is to make it much harder to get married. The easier you make it to get married, the more people will make bad decisions.

Saying that divorce causes breakdown is like saying that the freedom for any college student to drop out of school causes him to be a bad student.

[The Gaffer]

It probably is true that less people would split up if they weren't allowed to divorce. Some of them might even go on to patch things up.

However, that's not the point. People shouldn't be forced to stay in a relationship which is making them miserable.

I agree with you, BJ, in that if you wanted to lessen the divorce rate a far more effective and fair process would be to make it harder to marry in the first place, so that people don't go into it so lightly.

Here in the UK, the divorce laws require a two-year "separation with consent" period before the divorce is granted. How about the same thing for marriage? "Two years cohabitation" before the licence will be issued?

[Lief Erikson]

Originally Posted by brownjenkins

The problem is not that divorce exists, it's that some people do not want to repair their relationship for a variety of reasons, mostly revolving around getting married too young or too quickly.

The problem is not that divorce laws exist, but that divorce exists. If people didn't see divorce as an option and saw repairing their relationships as essential, they would be able to do so and part of society's problem would disappear. The mentality that takes divorce as an option in a relationship is the problem.

My essential argument is that, based upon the various sources I have cited, divorces are almost always unnecessary, and when they occur, they have a negative impact on society. Therefore divorces are a problem. My argument is not that the existence of divorce laws is a problem.

Gaffer, I agree with you that society would probably be better off if divorce laws were made tougher.

Originally Posted by brownjenkins

Are you suggesting that we make divorce illegal? Do that and relationships will still break apart from time to time.

I know. Especially in our modern society, that's true.

I'll have to think more about the issue, before saying whether or not I think divorce should be illegal. Divorce is a problem- that is the point I was making. I wasn't trying to say that divorce laws were a problem.

Originally Posted by brownjenkins

The simple answer to making marriages more likely to last is to make it much harder to get married. The easier you make it to get married, the more people will make bad decisions.

I certainly favor long engagements, because of the way they test relationships. Perhaps having somewhat lengthy engagements legally required would be a good idea. That and tougher divorce laws.

Sex outside of marriage is pointed to as a bigger problem than divorce, though, and this doesn't cover that.

Originally Posted by The Gaffer

Here in the UK, the divorce laws require a two-year "separation with consent" period before the divorce is granted. How about the same thing for marriage? "Two years cohabitation" before the licence will be issued?

Sexual contact creates a completely new bond of intimacy between a couple that didn't exist beforehand. It changes the relationship radically, and can cause a great deal of pain in one or both partner when they separate. I've seen that in the lives of some of the people I know, and it also just makes logical sense.

So if the two were to just try to cohabitate for a while, and decided they didn't meld, and so split, the result would be some of the same problems that divorce produces.

[brownjenkins]

Originally Posted by The Gaffer

Here in the UK, the divorce laws require a two-year "separation with consent" period before the divorce is granted. How about the same thing for marriage? "Two years cohabitation" before the licence will be issued?

Excellent idea, but the conservatives would never put up with it. It'd go over about as well as using contraception to prevent abortions does.

The problem in my mind Lief is that you are just being to idealistic. Humans are not perfect, and never will be. Whether divorce existed or not, the base-level problem continues: that some people commit to one another only later to find that they don't particularly love that person as much as they thought they did, or maybe that they just aren't the kind that really wants a life partner. Some people do enjoy just staying single. This is even true of many people who have children.

And, per my personal example earlier in the thread, sometimes the best way to "repair a relationship" is to get divorced. My wife has a better social relationship with her ex-husband than she ever did when they were married, and she says that he also puts a lot more attention towards the son they had together than he ever did when they were together.

It's all about being content. While you must live up to your responsibilities (i.e. kids), you can't force yourself to stay in love with another person. And if you aren't happy with yourself and your own situation, that negativity will spill over into other parts of your life.

[sisterandcousinandaunt]

Some people have really good reasons to get divorced. "Really good", in this case meaning "not all about happiness, but also about staying alive."

Most IPV incidents are not reported to the police. About 20% of IPV rapes or sexual assaults, 25% of physical assaults, and 50% of stalkings directed toward women are reported. Even fewer IPV incidents against men are reported (Tjaden and Thoennes 2000a). Thus, it is believed that available data greatly underestimate the true magnitude of the problem. While not an exhaustive list, here are some statistics on the occurrence of IPV. In many cases, the severity of the IPV behaviors is unknown.
Nearly 5.3 million incidents of IPV occur each year among U.S. women ages 18 and older, and 3.2 million occur among men. Most assaults are relatively minor and consist of pushing, grabbing, shoving, slapping, and hitting (Tjaden and Thoennes 2000a).
>In the United States every year, about 1.5 million women and more than 800,000 men are raped or physically assaulted by an intimate partner. This translates into about 47 IPV assaults per 1,000 women and 32 assaults per 1,000 men (Tjaden and Thoennes 2000a).
IPV results in nearly 2 million injuries and 1,300 deaths nationwide every year (CDC 2003).
Estimates indicate more than 1 million women and 371,000 men are stalked by intimate partners each year (Tjaden and Thoennes 2000a).
IPV accounted for 20% of nonfatal violence against women in 2001 and 3% against men (Rennison 2003).
From 1976 to 2002, about 11% of homicide victims were killed by an intimate partner (Fox and Zawitz 2004).
In 2002, 76% of IPV homicide victims were female; 24% were male (Fox and Zawitz 2004).
The number of intimate partner homicides decreased 14% overall for men and women in the span of about 20 years, with a 67% decrease for men (from 1,357 to 388) vs. 25% for women (from 1,600 to 1,202; Fox and Zawitz 2004). >
One study found that 44% of women murdered by their intimate partner had visited an emergency department within 2 years of the homicide. Of these women, 93% had at least one injury visit (Crandall et al. 2004).
Previous literature suggests that women who have separated from their abusive partners often remain at risk of violence (Campbell et al. 2003; Fleury, Sullivan and Bybee 2000).
Firearms were the major weapon type used in intimate partner homicides from 1981 to 1998 (Paulozzi et al. 2001).
A national study found that 29% of women and 22% of men had experienced physical, sexual, or psychological IPV during their lifetime (Coker et al. 2002).
Between 4% and 8% of pregnant women are abused at least once during the pregnancy (Gazmararian et al. 2000).

http://www.cdc.gov/ncipc/factsheets/ipvfacts.htm

It's hard for me to believe making it more difficult for these people, at least, to divorce or separate, is in the public good.

[sisterandcousinandaunt]

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

Sexual contact creates a completely new bond of intimacy between a couple that didn't exist beforehand.

No, it doesn't. I wish it did, I think it ought, but it doesn't always. Some people have sex more neutrally than brushing their teeth.

[Arien the Maia]

Yes I know several divorced people. My parents, my aunt and uncle, my husband's cousin, several of my mom's cousins etc etc etc. Sadly it's more of a way of life anymore. I don't necessarily think that divorce in and of itself is a bad thing. Some people just cannot live together peacefully (i.e. my parents). I do however think that remarriage is where most of the hurt comes from. I don't think I would have a huge problem with it if one of my parents had died and the other chose to remarry. But since both are alive it did cause a big problem for me. I was constantly put in the middle. My parents divorced when I was 14 (talk about raging hormones! ) and my mom remarried about a year and a half later to a man who was 17 years younger than her (and only 13 years older than me). I hated him and I hated her for choosing him over my brother and myself. (I should add here that my parents chose to put my brother and myself in the center of attention their whole marriage instead of putting their marriage first so that's why I felt so abandoned) Things are alot better now and I dont' hate or resent him anymore but I can honestly say that if they were to divorce now I wouldn't feel sad or anything...I would actually feel a bit happier (how bad does THAT sound?!)

luckily I dont' have any step siblings or half siblings so I've never had to deal with that. And I have NO idea what will happen when my mom dies( 17 years older than him so more than likely she will go first). I doubt I'll maintain much contact with my step dad.

I've sworn up and down that I would NEVER do that to my kids. Plus the church would more likely than not NEVER grant an annulment to me...there aren't any valid reasons. So even if I did get divorced civily I would never remarry. Heck I think that if my husband were to die before me that I wouldn't remarry. I hate dating!

[Lotesse]

Ciao you guys, awesome post Arien et alia, sorry didn't mean to interrupt but I just happened to notice this, and had to say something...

Originally Posted by Lief

Sexual contact creates a completely new bond of intimacy between a couple that didn't exist beforehand.

So, how do you know this, babe, exactly? You've been there, done that, have you? This sexual contact creates a bond thing, I can assure you, it is just completely not true. It will intensify and electrify an already in-love relationship, thereby increasing an intimacy of spirit that already had existed because of being in love, (a rare but real phenomenon in itself), but sex, regular sex, between even loving (yet not in love) partners does not create some "new bond" of intimacy. Intimacy is mental and emotional and chemical, sex is just - sex. You'll see what I mean someday, Lief, then you'll understand what I'm Tolkien about.

[Jonathan]

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

Sexual contact creates a completely new bond of intimacy between a couple that didn't exist beforehand.

Originally Posted by Lotesse

It will intensify and electrify an already in-love relationship, thereby increasing an intimacy of spirit that already had existed because of being in love ...

A new bond or an intensified bond. I don't think there's that much of a difference between the two, really . The fact still remains that sex leads to intimacy.

[Lief Erikson]

Originally Posted by sisterandcousinandaunt

Some people have really good reasons to get divorced. "Really good", in this case meaning "not all about happiness, but also about staying alive."

I agree.

Originally Posted by Jonathan

A new bond or an intensified bond. I don't think there's that much of a difference between the two, really . The fact still remains that sex leads to intimacy.

Well said.

Originally Posted by brownjenkins

The problem in my mind Lief is that you are just being to idealistic. Humans are not perfect, and never will be. Whether divorce existed or not, the base-level problem continues: that some people commit to one another only later to find that they don't particularly love that person as much as they thought they did, or maybe that they just aren't the kind that really wants a life partner. Some people do enjoy just staying single. This is even true of many people who have children.

The parts of your post that I bolded, the base-level problem you cite, is one that I've already shown, based on multiple marriage counseling sites, is invalid. For those people can repair their relationships if they want to.

The real problem is that people take sexual relationships more lightly now than they did in the past. They view divorce and breaking up as an option now, where such behavior was far less common in past generations. That cultural perspective is the key problem in modern society.

[Gwaimir Windgem]

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

The real problem is that people take sexual relationships more lightly now than they did in the past. They view divorce and breaking up as an option now, where such behavior was far less common in past generations. That cultural perspective is the key problem in modern society.

I'm not really sure if that is true. They do take marriage more lightly, certainly, but sexual relationships, I really think, haven't altered that radically.

[brownjenkins]

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

The parts of your post that I bolded, the base-level problem you cite, is one that I've already shown, based on multiple marriage counseling sites, is invalid. For those people can repair their relationships if they want to.

The studies didn't show that at all. As I pointed out, they were mearly interpreting the data in a way that supported their arguments, but the results could have been interpreted in countless other ways.

Can you imagine marriage counselors publishing a study that said, "actually, we just figured out that counseling doesn't work."

[brownjenkins]

Originally Posted by Lotesse

So, how do you know this, babe, exactly? You've been there, done that, have you? This sexual contact creates a bond thing, I can assure you, it is just completely not true. It will intensify and electrify an already in-love relationship, thereby increasing an intimacy of spirit that already had existed because of being in love, (a rare but real phenomenon in itself), but sex, regular sex, between even loving (yet not in love) partners does not create some "new bond" of intimacy. Intimacy is mental and emotional and chemical, sex is just - sex. You'll see what I mean someday, Lief, then you'll understand what I'm Tolkien about.

I agree completely. When I was in my teens and twenties, I believed the sex/love relationship to be true as I went through many relationships, some of a few years, some much shorter. Sex was always of primary importance in my relations. If it was good, I assumed the relationship was. If it was not, or changed in some way, I assumed something was wrong with the larger relationship.

But now, after living with the same person for ten years and taking care of our children together, I realize how insignificant the sexual side of the relationship is when it comes to our feelings about one another. Don't get me wrong, it's still a beautiful thing, but it doesn't doesn't effect in any way how I feel about the person I've choosen to live with.

[Lief Erikson]

Originally Posted by brownjenkins

The studies didn't show that at all. As I pointed out, they were mearly interpreting the data in a way that supported their arguments, but the results could have been interpreted in countless other ways.

You've said that, but that's just you saying you disagree with the data interpretations of the psychologists and mathematicians who constructed all these studies, and arguing further that the studies seem to be pretty much useless anyway, since anyone can interpret anything any way one wants. That's a wholly invalid argument, IMO, because it's just disagreeing with professionals without any evidence aside from your personal experience of divorce to back it up.

Originally Posted by brownjenkins

Can you imagine marriage counselors publishing a study that said, "actually, we just figured out that counseling doesn't work."

There are enough of these organizations, and they're big enough, that they can be believed. Plus, their methods are confirmed by psychologists. I already mentioned one I'd read from who spoke independently of the organizations, who said the same thing they said, from his personal experience. I've presented a lot of evidence on this subject, but have received none (except a study from Gaffer on a different subject from that which you and I are now discussing) that refutes it.

[sisterandcousinandaunt]

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

I've presented a lot of evidence on this subject, but have received none (except a study from Gaffer on a different subject from that which you and I are now discussing) that refutes it.

And Lief, that's partially because, at this point, people have been invited to testify from their own experience. That is a valid thing to do. It's different from googling summaries of studies you haven't read.

You may choose not to respect that, but you can't realistically forbid it as part of the conversation, kwim? A different thing is happening, here. How about joining in on more of a peer basis? You don't have to, of course, but consider it as one of your options. *need a supportive smiley, here*

[Lief Erikson]

I have no authority or interest in banning anything from the conversation.

Personal experience is fine, and I know people who have been divorced, and others whose parents are divorced. Personal experience, whether it be mine with them or brownjenkins' with his family, certainly is a form of evidence. It's pretty limited in the scope it can offer, though, so I generally prefer studies.

[The Gaffer]

Well, I don't think there's any doubt that marriage guidance counselling CAN work. It's entirely plausible that a couple might be having a tough time and intervention by a third party can help them to get things back on the rails.

Let me also say that, having experienced it, it can also work by helping you to split up. I helped me to come to terms with the reality of the situation, and I think it helped to neutralise some of the angst that can get in the way of clear communication.

Both outcomes are success stories as far as I am concerned.

Arien, I am sorry to read that you were affected by your parents' split. I think the timing was particularly unfortunate; 14 is not a good age to have to go through that. I was "lucky" in that my son was only 2, so he wasn't caught in the middle so much. However, I think it's usually inevitable that children of divorced parents will be affected by it to some extent, e.g. by geographical distance.

By now he's 13, and although there are still challenges for all of us, he has three (half-) brothers that he adores (and the feeling's mutual), another one on the way, about 20 cousins and step-cousins, with whom he has a riot, and FOUR sets of grandparents to spoil him rotten. He has also formed close friendships with lots of my and his mum's friends. That's a wonderful diversity of humanity.

* Puts About a Boy on the DVD *

[brownjenkins]

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

I have no authority or interest in banning anything from the conversation.

Personal experience is fine, and I know people who have been divorced, and others whose parents are divorced. Personal experience, whether it be mine with them or brownjenkins' with his family, certainly is a form of evidence. It's pretty limited in the scope it can offer, though, so I generally prefer studies.

Are you willing to admit that at least sometimes, even if it is only one in one hundred, that divorce can lead to a better life for everyone involved, or is that simply impossible given your worldview?