The Disappearing Marriage
Marriage today. Obsolete?While weddings continue to be a billion dollar industry, society, it would seem, is not marriage friendly. Or is it?On one hand, it would seem that society perpetuates it, guilting poor young couples into it, with views such as "so, when are you going to make an honest woman out of her?" For those that hold the traditional view, it is imperative, it is a major goal that all should be working towards.On the other hand, there is a whole new generation that thinks it may be the stupidest thing ever, outmoded at best. Why sign a legal contract obligating the hell out of each other, when you simply don't have to? It is no longer taboo to live together, or to have kids out of wedlock.

Nobody even cares anymore. People can even pass it off as 'common law' marriage, whatever that is. Apparently, it's the "we have been shacking up and having sex so long, society is going to half-ass obligate us anyway" and then we are also off the hook for the real thing. The idea of wanting to get married so we can have sex is laughable too, since sex these days is free and easy. Neither does anyone wait until marriage to have sex. Even if they intend to, it just doesn't happen much.Then we see the results of marriages around us. Explosive divorces. Financial ruin. Legal battles, with children caught in the crossfire. And for those still married, they got the wife hopped up on Prozac and burning up credit cards and banging the milkman , the husband addicted to booze and porn, kids on Ritalin and having sex at age 12, and everyone is so stressed, they practically forget each other. And they drive ugly cars a lot too.

Single folks look at all that, and cringe.Why, oh WHY, would anyone want that?Then we see terrible discontent in marriage. Not just the trainwrecks above, but both spouses feeling like they got ripped off, they give but don't receive, they feel stuck somewhere they no longer want to be, and the promise they made a decade ago barely applies to what life looks like now. So they cheat, or leave, or both. Why enter a contract that will almost surely fail?And we get folks that say that LOVE itself is a farce, an illusion, that never lasts. They say that people just aren't genetically programmed to be married, it's just not natural for us to have only one sex partner. And nobody takes the time to figure out how to succeed in marriage, how to preserve it. And then if you get married, and pour yourself out unselfishly, you get taken for granted, or taken to the cleaners, or neglected, and then society can laugh at you and call you a chump for believing in love and marriage, almost like you were waiting for the great pumpkin that will never come.Nobody wants to be accountable or told what to do. Nobody wants to feel controlled or suffocated. Nobody wants to get screwed over. Nobody wants to have the life drained out of them, and every divorced person here knows exactly what I am talking about. And we are sold an image of glamour, of fun night life, exciting sexual escapades, freedom.People avoid love and commitment now like the plague, and not just men. Women see what their girlfriends go through, and rarely find men that really qualify, either because they won't fulfill their Disney dreams very well, or otherwise are all screwed up.

Why get married?Is there something beautiful and special about this sacred covenant, or have we become so jaded we already lost that dream? It would seem to me that the only folks left that would even bother to marry do it for religious / faith reasons, trying to do things the 'right' way. And faith often calls for self-denial, a concept that nobody wants to embrace. Why deny ourselves what we simply do not have to? And, we can reason, that a piece of paper does not equal love, or change anything anyway. And we know that people often get married for the wrong reasons, like having a housekeeper - babysitter, a meal ticket, etc. Or even for social acceptance, or for the kids. Yikes.I personally think I would like to be married , in spite of all this, but I can't help being a little gun-shy about it. There are no guarantees, and the stakes are so high. Love can overcome a lot, but can I really afford what it costs? And how to find someone you can trust this way?Is marriage a dying institution?