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My grandparents were together "til death do us part" but they were very unhappy. My grandmother, in particular, was very miserable. She married him to escape an abusive home life, and didn't realize until after the wedding that she had married an emotionally damaged man. It was out of the frying pan... and into the fire.
My other set of grandparents . . . stayed together because they were Catholic. This grandfather was an abusive alcoholic who tried to kill my grandmother twice.
I think you have an overly romantic notion of how things used to be. He did not want to have sex with her before marriage? Do you honestly believe that?
In fact, I think you have it backwards. Today the relationships that last seem to be much healthier. They're based on true loving friendships and partnerships more than inter-dependency.
He may have wanted to if he was sexually attracted to her, but he was not going to until she was legally his. Men had a conscience back then. They probably saw women in that time who had found themselves in a "passed around" setting and he loved his woman too much to be a party to that.
Today's relationships healthier? (sounds like a little denial or self-justification to me) I see power struggles, men and women playing games with each other, men running from commitment and women who in their hurt and anger are ambivalent about the whole idea of committing to a man, because they've met one too many men who did not treat them the way they deserved to be treated. What our grandparents had was true, because people today are always either looking for the better deal or the side exit if the their dream girl or dream man becomes inadequate or somehow damaged to them.
Location: RI, MA, VT, WI, IL, CA, IN (that one sucked), KY
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Quote:
Originally Posted by laorbust61
He may have wanted to if he was sexually attracted to her, but he was not going to until she was legally his. Men had a conscience back then. They probably saw women in that time who had found themselves in a "passed around" setting and he loved his woman too much to be a party to that.
There was plenty of sex happening back in the day. Lets not kid ourselves. I notices you used the term "legally his", very telling of the mindset.
Quote:
Originally Posted by laorbust61
Today's relationships healthier? (sounds like a little denial or self-justification to me) I see power struggles, men and women playing games with each other, men running from commitment and women who in their hurt and anger are ambivalent about the whole idea of committing to a man, because they've met one too many men who did not treat them the way they deserved to be treated. What our grandparents had was true, because people today are always either looking for the better deal or the side exit if the their dream girl or dream man becomes inadequate or somehow damaged to them.
Nothing wrong with being ambivalent about committing to a man, or a man to a woman. It is perfectly fine to be single and self sufficient if you don't meet the right person. That is a huge improvement or what used to happen. People aren't getting married (as often) because they're expected to or they need someone to take care of them, or, just to have someone to have sex with. The world is a better place when both genders have higher standards, expect more, and will only marry when they've found an equal partner... and if they don't, so be it, they have their community/tribe and can enjoy life. Far better than staying in a lousy relationship with an adulterer or an alcoholic, or a loveless marriage because of expectations or lack of options.
I highly doubt it was the men holding back since pre-marital sex had very few consequences for them. They didn't risk pregnancy or the stigma of not being a virgin on their wedding night. Before the computer age, Social Security numbers, and DNA testing a dude could literally hit it and run out of town. If the woman he left behind got pregnant who was going to be able to find him or definitively prove the child was his anyway? Also, even if they could prove he did the deed, aside from a shot gun wedding (if he didn't move fast enough) what else was going to happen to him? Even if he did have to get married he could still run out of town and with false paper documents easily start a new life someplace else. I think people look back and think people were somehow more noble than the people living today. I call B.S on that...humans have always been human.
Quote:
Originally Posted by laorbust61
He may have wanted to if he was sexually attracted to her, but he was not going to until she was legally his. Men had a conscience back then. They probably saw women in that time who had found themselves in a "passed around" setting and he loved his woman too much to be a party to that.
Today's relationships healthier? (sounds like a little denial or self-justification to me) I see power struggles, men and women playing games with each other, men running from commitment and women who in their hurt and anger are ambivalent about the whole idea of committing to a man, because they've met one too many men who did not treat them the way they deserved to be treated. What our grandparents had was true, because people today are always either looking for the better deal or the side exit if the their dream girl or dream man becomes inadequate or somehow damaged to them.
...because people today are always either looking for the better deal or the side exit if the their dream girl or dream man becomes inadequate or somehow damaged to them.
Today there is both more opportunity, and more imperative, to keep optimizing... where to live, what to study, where to work, how to invest, with whom to intertwine one's life, what car to drive and what toilet paper to use. We have vastly more choices, and, it would seem, more compulsion to keep going through those choices until arriving at some optimum, as if suboptimal solutions were disingenuous and stupid.
Making a broad generalization, today the worst marriages, the abusive marriages, are fairly straightforward to end, whereas earlier they would have continued because the parties involved (mostly the wife) had no alternatives. So the modern version is a good thing. And today the very best marriages are probably indeed better than comparables generations ago. Again, that's a good thing. But what about the vast swath of marriages in the middle - neither outright abusive nor particularly fulfilling? Those, one gathers, would never have been terminated in the past, but today are unstable and liable to end in divorce. It's with that vast middle, I think, that we've lost more than we gained.
Today there is both more opportunity, and more imperative, to keep optimizing... where to live, what to study, where to work, how to invest, with whom to intertwine one's life, what car to drive and what toilet paper to use. We have vastly more choices, and, it would seem, more compulsion to keep going through those choices until arriving at some optimum, as if suboptimal solutions were disingenuous and stupid.
Making a broad generalization, today the worst marriages, the abusive marriages, are fairly straightforward to end, whereas earlier they would have continued because the parties involved (mostly the wife) had no alternatives. So the modern version is a good thing. And today the very best marriages are probably indeed better than comparables generations ago. Again, that's a good thing. But what about the vast swath of marriages in the middle - neither outright abusive nor particularly fulfilling? Those, one gathers, would never have been terminated in the past, but today are unstable and liable to end in divorce. It's with that vast middle, I think, that we've lost more than we gained.
Not sure how would anyone quantify or define what is the standard for a good or bad marriage, and those in the middle. Marriage and humans are very complex to be pigeon-hole them in 3 categories: good, bad, and in-the-middle. Add here the subjectivity -- what you may call good, it may bad for someone else, including your spouse.
Furthermore, how would one try to categorize our grandfather's marriages, which happened 50 or more years ago, and we don't even know many things.
Actually after divorce reform around the 1930's when women didn't work outside the home and divorce did happen alimony was a awarded always to the woman because she was basically a life long dependent of her husband. These days alimony can be awarded to either spouse and is based on need. Since most women work now assets and debts begin with a 50/50 split instead of having the home and kids automatically go to the wife. So actually, now days men get a better deal in divorce. Oh, unless you are referring to the time before divorce reform when women were practically chattel and just kicked out in the street upon divorce because laws prevented them from being able to earn and income and any other contribution to the marriage was ignored.
Would you really want to go back to the time when men had to take 100% financial responsibility for a wife till death do they part? I would think it a blessing that your partner is able to share that financial burden and be self supporting if you divorced.
What? my maternal grandparents lived to be 92 and 104, paternal grandparents 75 and 84. That's plenty of time to divorce if they had needed to.
Alimony is based on need in SOME states, but in Colorado alimony is a formulaic entitlement based on years of marriage and relative incomes. There is no requirement that the alimony recipient even attempt to become self-supporting. They run numbers through a formula, and award what pops out of the other side. This means a wife who makes $80K as a nurse who is married to a teacher who makes $40K will be required to pay $12,000 a year in alimony to her ex-husband, for life if the marriage is over 20 years. He could screw the neighbors (both of them) in HER bed while she is at work, and he will still get alimony - all divorce is no fault. If he happened to be unemployed, he would get $32,000 a year!
The Democrats and a feminist group came up with this idea, and if the Democrats have their way, this is the way ALL states will determine alimony in the future.
My grandparents were together "til death do us part" but they were very unhappy. My grandmother, in particular, was very miserable. She married him to escape an abusive home life, and didn't realize until after the wedding that she had married an emotionally damaged man. It was out of the frying pan... and into the fire.
My other set of grandparents . . . stayed together because they were Catholic. This grandfather was an abusive alcoholic who tried to kill my grandmother twice.
Ah, yes, the good ol' days.
I took a Sociology class in college and one the the projects was to disprove that things were actually better in the " Good ol' days". Almost every generation had major issues that were much more unpalatable compared with what we have today. Give me a time period and I can give you many examples of why they were worse off than we are.
Many yearn for a time more ideological and simple ("back in our day", "when things were different", "there's no hope for young kids these days" etc etc..). I think that's a bit chimerical, we've had problems for years they're just simply more accessible with the advent of the internet.
Moral of these stories: the one holding all the cards gets to mess around without consequence. If women back in those days had anyone on the side, the husband could demand a divorce, and move on, along with his money.
Ruth, you probably didn’t intend for the following negative interpretation of your post, but still, this implication is a bit troubling: if in the grand-old-days the wife’s having “somebody on the side” meant that the husband could file for divorce and financially ruin his wife, keeping all of the family money for himself…. But in the present, with no-fault divorce the husband’s filing means a 50/50 split… how is this progress?
Personally I think that in those cases where there is clear fault (the two most glaring cases being abuse and infidelity), the guilty party should be punished. This should apply to philandering husbands, as much as to wayward wives.
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