RBOMusings on divorce, marriage, and religion

nicoleandmaggie

May 4

Neither of us is getting divorced any time soon (to our knowledge).
I refuse to feel sorry for people getting divorced. Divorce is not a problem. Divorce is a solution. I do feel sorry for women who are not in a position economically to care of themselves or their children and are trapped in bad marriages, and I think we should have more economic support for women in those situations who need to get on their feet (I have friends whose mothers were briefly on welfare while getting degrees after a divorce-- we could probably do better there). But the marriage was the problem, not the divorce.
I also don't think divorce is a sign of failure. People grow and change. Marriage itself is just a contract that makes some things easier (ex. seeing a loved one in a hospital). Relationships end for all sorts of reasons, and whether or not a contract was entered into is irrelevant.
Part of not seeing divorce as a sign of failure is not seeing marriage as a sign of success. Marriage is completely not necessary (just like children are not necessary and buying a home is not necessary). These so-called milestones aren't really milestones at all. They're choices! Hobbies! There's a lot to be said for freedom. People make their own cost-benefit analyses about these choices and just because someone has a different utility function doesn't mean it's wrong. I know so many people who are happy being single or partnered but not married or married or divorced but not remarried or remarried or... Marriage is a thing you do when you love one person enough to be legally attached to them and also want that contract that makes some things easier. It's not a box to tick off. It's certainly not something to be proud of or to feel ashamed about!
You have value just by being you.
I say congratulations to people who get married because it's a choice that has made them happier and I like to celebrate people's happiness. But that's their utility functions. It's not like I would want to be married to either of them myself! But I'm happy that they are happy with each other. And not that they checked off said box.
Having seen many people go through messy divorces (and some folks go through easy ones!), the process itself is painful. But the aftermath is always so much better than the marriage before the divorce was.
Economically, we only look at incomes. And for women with kids, about half get remarried to higher earning partners and end up much better off monetarily, and half stay single and have lower household incomes than they did before the divorce. Putting these together is a wash. But money isn't the only measure of quality of life.
Religions that use marriage as a way to trap women into subservient roles are pretty awful. I reject them. I reject the way they force women to stay in bad relationships. I reject the way they discourage women's earning potential by telling them they're bad mothers if they don't stay at home with their children (they're not). I reject the way they demonize divorce.
I would much rather be married to someone who wanted to be married to me and who could escape at any time he wanted than to someone who is forced to be married to me because of some paper he signed decades ago. I can't understand men who just want unpaid servants.
I really like David Willis who draws dumbingofage.
I had a super religious friend in college who got married to a guy she didn't like as much as I liked my (not yet) husband because they really wanted to have sex (I actually knew two super-religious people in this situation... oddly both math majors, but the guy wasn't my friend and he got married as a freshman whereas she got married as a junior... I had a history class with him where he kept telling the professor the professor was wrong because the bible says earth is only a few thousand years old or something). When she would complain about her fiance I'd ask if she was sure she wanted to get married (people who complain about their fiances never like it when you ask that, btw, sample size N=2). I was also getting married that summer (right after graduation rather than a year before), and she'd say how was it different me getting married at 22 and her getting married at 21. And I was like, well, if it doesn't work out for me, I can just get divorced. You've said you can't! If my only option was to be trapped in a marriage forever with no possibility of escape, I probably would have lived in sin instead. Though also I am a strong strong believer that sex before marriage is an 1000X better idea than getting married as a freshman (that marriage did NOT work out well, though I don't know what happened to them in the end... I think he was still married as a senior and I don't know why I remember that he did his thesis on the Poisson distributions of pot shards, but I think maybe his wife dropped out? Have not thought about him in 20+ years and cannot remember his name.).
One of my friends got divorced and then got remarried to the same guy again several years later after he did some really intensive therapy on his own during the interim years when they were literally half a world apart.
I love my husband huge amounts. But if he divorced me, I would survive. And not just for the sake of the children. There would be a lot of changes and I would miss him terribly, but it wouldn't be the same level of devastation as if he suddenly died (heaven forbid).
Divorce is one of those things that if you decide to do it, it was the right choice.
So, to everybody who has been through a divorce or who is going through one now, Congratulations! And best wishes for a brighter future.