Why do so many marriages fail today?
- Thread starter SillyBear
- Start date
A lot of the reasons that people used to marry don't apply as much anymore. There's no linking of families, no marrying off of daughters because women need husbands to be able to eat, and no high infant mortality requiring that a woman have 7 or 8 babies in her life because only 2 will survive to adulthood. A lot of what pushed people to enter into the marriages they did for thousands of years are no longer an issue. I think a lot of these marriages that don't last are built on the mindset of some of these older reasons, and when they don't hold up, the marriages based on them also don't hold up.
Don't forget, romantic love as a basis for marriage is only a few hundred years old, and in the last hundred years, the world population has tripled. Add in the ease of travel and interconnectivity, and we have a thousand times as many potential mates to choose from as our grandparents did. Romance has gotten a lot more complicated...
Don't forget, romantic love as a basis for marriage is only a few hundred years old, and in the last hundred years, the world population has tripled. Add in the ease of travel and interconnectivity, and we have a thousand times as many potential mates to choose from as our grandparents did. Romance has gotten a lot more complicated...
1. Society encourages women to divorce in certain situations now.
2. Women are challenging the traditional male role of financially supporting the family.
It's really those two things. We're just in a society where women can be as successful as men, and consequently, there is little reason to stay married, especially if it's not a loving relationship. And somehow, people make out higher divorce rates to be a bad thing.
2. Women are challenging the traditional male role of financially supporting the family.
It's really those two things. We're just in a society where women can be as successful as men, and consequently, there is little reason to stay married, especially if it's not a loving relationship. And somehow, people make out higher divorce rates to be a bad thing.
Because beeing a divorcee isnt as much a social death sentence it used to be. Also i think some people rush into it. 90% marry,60% divorce(old statistic from a few years ago, Take with a grain of salt) I think there is a lot of pressure to marry so some may rush from pressure.
Just quoted you to get your attention, since in this next part I will be addressing your question.SillyBear said:
You're making a lot of assumptions and hasty connections. Women being COMPLETELY unable to support themselves hasn't been an issue in most societies since about the late 1800s. The reason so many families popped out so many babies isn't so much the infant mortality rate, but rather to get as many sons as they could to inherit and carry on the family name. Not to mention extra kids meant extra hands helping out with housework and making money, which was very important, especially to families that had farms. This dismal divorce rate didn't start up til about the 1980s and 1990s, as I recall. Most of those things you said were non-issues long before then.Paschendale said:
Furthermore, I have never in my life heard of anyone, male or female, stuck on the notion that they need a spouse in order to support themself or to have enough babies to support their household and carry on their legacy. So I think to say people are "stuck on these old notions" is completely ridiculous.
I think it's the new notions that are getting them, quite frankly. Marriages in the past, for the most part, were made for future benefits. Wealth, safety, and the like. But I think the problem today is so many couples are focused on the "now." They're in love "now," and that is good enough for them. They don't think about where they want to be 20 or 30 years down the line, and they don't think about if they want to be with that person that entire time. In a sense, they've forgotten marriage is intended to be a permanent deal. Either that, or "permanent" has simply lost all meaning to them, with how easy it is to change things these days.
Also, there are many more children being born out of wedlock (due to sex out of wedlock) and many couples feel that when having a baby, the logical thing to do is get married. They assume that is the solution. Again, they don't think about it as a lifetime commitment. They see it as the way to handle the current problem of the baby.
Which brings me to another point: people are mixing up the "natural" (or "traditional," if you prefer) steps of a relationship, which I think is taking a toll. They are having sex long before they have a significant understanding of each others character, they are living together before committing to the long haul, and when they aren't mixing up or skipping the other steps they are rushing through them far too quickly. I think all of this causes the relationship to be built in the wrong order, and significant parts skipped, resulting in gaps in the understanding they have of each other.
Lastly, I think couples these days just give up too easily, specifically when it comes to arguments. They get married without truly knowing if they can have an argument and recover from it. Because the fact is, every couple is going to fight, married or not. Many, many times. What makes the difference is if the two can cool down, and come back to civilly work out the problem. They need to give as well as take for it to work--compromise. And they need to know not to let the little things get to them.
The couples get so hung up on the lovey-dovey end of the relationship, they fail to consider the nitty-gritty things like character flaws, idealistic differences, pet peeves, and overall temperament.
So there is my theory on why so many marriages fail these days. Relationships that are made too quickly, for the wrong reasons, and the switching around or entirely skipping natural steps. You might say that the notions of "marriage before sex" and "not living together until marriage" are outdated and silly, but numbers don't lie. As the numbers for premarital sex and premarital cohabitation have gone up, the divorce rate has climbed along with them. Maybe there's a little something to those old ways, after all?
Oh, one more thing: I do believe the main reasons for the population boom are attributed to modern technology, modern infrastructure, modern hygiene, and modern medical science. Apart from that, your previous argument contradicts this: You made the point of saying most families now do not need to pop out 7-8 kids every generation to ensure someone inherits. So if your point was couples are generally having fewer babies these days, how does that support what you are saying about the world population?
Two major things IMO:
1) Love is mistaken as a feeling and not an act.
2) Couples (from some of the ones I've known) tend to think that marriage is a destination and not a journey.
I know there are other things as well, but these are the two most prominent things that I've seen in failing marriages.
1) Love is mistaken as a feeling and not an act.
2) Couples (from some of the ones I've known) tend to think that marriage is a destination and not a journey.
I know there are other things as well, but these are the two most prominent things that I've seen in failing marriages.
They get married just to do it. Or they get knocked up and thinking getting married is the right thing to do... Or, since this is jesusland and it happens a lot, they get married so they can have sex without it being "bad".
Simply because it's now MUCH easier for marriages to dissolve after couples want nothing to do with each other. It used to be harder to get a marriage terminated, so there were many loveless marriages. Also, sticking together for the kids was considered a vastly better alternative than single parenthood. Marriages of convenience also used to be pretty big, whereas now romance-founded marriages are more common than ever. There's a ton more, but it's late and my Wikipedia gland is a bit sore from overuse.
I like this one sillybear, god I like it.SillyBear said:
I think it's because we put so much effort into weddings, but the minute things get bad, all vows are dropped. People also don't want to keep working on it. People don't know how hard it is to keep things going. My girlfriend lives 100 miles away, yet I keep her in my heart. I'll be going out with her 2 years this august, and we've had tons of stuff against us, her mother doesn't even know ( and she'd kill me if she foud out). I think that if people realized that divorce is a huge lie
" do you swear to honor eachother in sickness and health until death do you part?" Do they realize that they lied when they said that? Or do people simply feel as though this is just something thatthey feel as though they can give up on?
It's more complicated, but the ease of divorce has a lot to do with it (and that's a good thing). Before divorce you had abandonment. Back in ye olde days, a man could just pick up and leave his kids and wife behind. Or you know, beat them into acting how he wanted.SillyBear said:
Plenty of failed marriages don't end in divorce. One of my friends in highschool's parents were "stayed together for the kids".
I also think, and my fiancee occasionally falls into this pit, way too much do we see happy weddings and think that wedding is what the marriage will be like,that the wedding makes the marriage. Those that hold this illusion are usually in for a big disappointment when the magic wears off, i.e. first kid or first mortgage payment.
I've been thinking on a smaller scale recently; it seems that even just relationships aren't even working anymore. Everyone I know seems to be breaking up, even the people that have been together for years. What's the deal? Kind of makes things seem a little bleak, and my pursuit for companionship a little fruitless in the end.
It's probably money and the fact that no one is ever anything but tired anymore.
It's probably money and the fact that no one is ever anything but tired anymore.
Someone may have already said this, but I think one big part of it is that it seems like people don't really take the time to get to know each other anymore before jumping into marriage.
Most of the married couples I know that have been married for a long time knew each other for a long time before getting married. Whether they just dated for a long time or were childhood friends or whatever the case.
My moms best friends son recently got married to a woman he'd only known for a few weeks. Everyone I know was like "Oh, good for him. He's married now. They're gonna be so happy" and I'm just like "...No...They're probably gonna get divorced because they barely freakin' know each other"
Maybe I'm totally off, but that to me seems like it's a pretty big factor as to why 50% of marriages end in divorce these days.
Most of the married couples I know that have been married for a long time knew each other for a long time before getting married. Whether they just dated for a long time or were childhood friends or whatever the case.
My moms best friends son recently got married to a woman he'd only known for a few weeks. Everyone I know was like "Oh, good for him. He's married now. They're gonna be so happy" and I'm just like "...No...They're probably gonna get divorced because they barely freakin' know each other"
Maybe I'm totally off, but that to me seems like it's a pretty big factor as to why 50% of marriages end in divorce these days.
Divorce is more acceptable and the society is just as private as it ever was. I'm pretty sure a HUGE part of why ANY relationship ends is a lack of communication. Just talking to the other person about problems you have with each other and solutions to said problems does a WORLD of help. There are some problems with which the only solution is a breaking of ties, but SO often people let little things annoy them to the breaking point when they didn't have to.
EDIT: To live with someone for the majority of your day, every day, for the rest of your life, you have to be able to talk about ANYTHING and EVERYTHING with them. Anything you CAN'T talk about has the potential to become a relationship time bomb the MOMENT you two aren't on the same page.
EDIT: To live with someone for the majority of your day, every day, for the rest of your life, you have to be able to talk about ANYTHING and EVERYTHING with them. Anything you CAN'T talk about has the potential to become a relationship time bomb the MOMENT you two aren't on the same page.
i think its just that abck in the day if you were unhappy or even being abused a divorce was far far worse especially for a women to be unmarried with children. but now if you dont want to be married there isnt so much pressure to stay married and being divorced wont get you shunned.
also men and women both have more income so one isnt relying on the other as much.
also men and women both have more income so one isnt relying on the other as much.
I genuinely believe that before there simply was no "out" before. At the same time people may be quick to leave a marriage at the first sign of trouble where before they may stick it out to avoid the social stigma.
I don't see this as a problem tbh. As the child of a divorced couple I can say there are far worse things. I moved across an ocean because of it so it wasn't consequence free for me but it probably worked out the best as both my parents are very happy with their new partners.
I don't see this as a problem tbh. As the child of a divorced couple I can say there are far worse things. I moved across an ocean because of it so it wasn't consequence free for me but it probably worked out the best as both my parents are very happy with their new partners.