No Fault Divorce, Marriage's True Enemy

http://www.mercatornet.com/articles/view/rescuing_marriage_from_no_fault_divorce

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2012/01/the-logical-fallacy-gay-marriage-opponents-depend-upon/251486/

http://www.lifesitenews.com/news/archive/ldn/2010/sep/10092104

http://blogs.fayobserver.com/myronpitts/April-2012

It’s a common position of social conservatives, especially in the media, that gay marriage is a threat to marriage and will destroy the family and society as we know it vicariously. But no-fault divorce, established in America as early as the 70s and finalized in all states in 1985, has had more demonstrable and probably correlative and causative effects on marriage and divorce rates in the last few “generations” than gay marriage has in the last 10 years since it was first legalized in the Netherlands. The most obvious reason why it has infested and corrupted marriage and the family is because people don’t have the basic restrictions on divorce law that existed prior: where you had to find some fault with the partner in order to separate. When people don’t take marriage seriously and can legally marry someone and then separate in less than 24 hours for a mere caprice, it’s no surprise fewer people give the institution the respect it deserves and are basically lying through their teeth at their vows or don’t realize that marriage is more than just shared property and some tax breaks, it’s a commitment for a lifetime that should not be taken lightly. There are at least two perspectives from which divorce is criticized, though not always to the same extent. But no-fault divorce goes too far and I think both sides that could find fault with divorce to one extent or another would see this law as repugnant even to the mere secular purpose of marriage: maintaining kinship and intimacy between family and couple respectively and encouraging the values of fidelity and monogamy for all those in and planning for marriage.

Religiously, divorce is only permitted in a few circumstances, if we consider the Christian perspective, which is fairly common in America. If a spouse is unfaithful and caught in the act, dies, or willingly leaves the spouse because they do not believe in God anymore, then the divorce is considered valid and justified, roughly speaking. And the only time someone can remarry is if their spouse dies. There are issues in Jewish divorce law, since it appears traditionally a woman can’t initiate a divorce and a man can refuse to out of spite. In Islam, divorce is permitted by both men and women with waiting periods or court proceedings respectively, though it is considered the most hateful thing that is also lawful, for similar reasons that Jews would try to maintain civil harmony in their marriage, even if they don’t think they can maintain it for personal reasons of one form or another. There’s always the admonition from Jesus in the gospels, particularly Matthew 19:6, “So they are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate." The Catholic Church takes it so seriously than even an annulment, which makes the man and woman not obligated to live together, does not separate them in the eyes of God. As mentioned before, the only way remarriage is acceptable by Catholic standards in particular is if one of the spouses dies. Infidelity does not break the bond of marriage, though it is grounds for separation. Many other Christian denominations will permit divorce, though they could consider it problematic to remarry. A lot of it depends on interpretations of both Jesus and Paul’s thoughts on marriage, since Paul is noted to have said that it is better not to be married unless you cannot resist temptations of the flesh and the like. Being bound to a woman is almost seen as a distraction from worshipping God. But the positions tend to range on a spectrum of condemnation of divorce in itself, condemnation not of divorce in the sense of annulment, but of divorce and remarriage and then permission of divorce and remarriage within limited constraints of infidelity or if an unbelieving spouse calls for separation and then permission of it under more general grounds and remarriage as well.

The more secular perspective on divorce is a bit limited, since the legal standards for it have changed. The original law in the U.S. appears to have been the form that required finding culpable fault in one of the partners, which was more than merely emotional distance or the like. Physical abuse, adultery, abandonment or other felonies fell under this standard. The legal opposition to this divorce law was on the grounds that there shouldn’t have to be such obfuscating or otherwise ad hoc justifications made to determine divorce proceedings. There is disagreement in that this just involves the government more in determining how marriages can end, but that’s not as pertinent to the topic at hand. There are alleged problems with no-fault divorce that come down to property and such. One partner can be left high and dry when the other leaves them because of prior arrangements, though a lot of this may be preventable by making more equitable contracts beforehand. The biggest issue that can be brought up for no-fault divorce being counterintuitive to marriage without invoking a bond made by God through a sacrament would be that this can create a habit of detachment that leads to separations that do not encourage communication between spouses. If one side decides to leave and doesn’t even have to prove fault, then the divorce leaves bad feelings behind because the other side may have wanted to go into marriage counseling. If you can’t resolve your feelings together, then the notion of commitment and loyalty to one another in the marital state seems to fall apart in society’s perspective at large. I would hope people deciding to get married have thought long and hard about it, gotten counseling or practice in some beforehand perhaps even cohabitated with limitations to see how they interact together. If that’s done, no fault divorce can be avoided from the start by encouraging good marriage habits.

In either case, no-fault divorce is either taking marriage to a level where commitment to the sacred nature of it is lost or even adhering to basic standards of marriage as something that binds people together for a lifetime is lacking. When you don’t have to even find fault with your spouse, but get tired of them, and the legal system supports you in that decision, society has gotten to a point where jokes about Britney Spears or Kim Kardashian being married for less than a week and getting divorced in at least one case within 24 hours aren’t funny anymore. Quite the contrary: in hindsight, they reflect badly on popular culture. Marriage isn’t even a commitment anymore to people; it’s an excuse to have sex in the eyes of one’s religious taboos against premarital relations. Beyond that, if you don’t want to be married anymore, if you just don’t feel it, you don’t need to communicate, you just have to get a divorce, no questions asked. I hate to sound like a ranting family values sort of right wing pundit, but this sort of thing is far more damaging in the ideas about marriage it establishes. Children aren’t even a concern here, families aren’t relevant. No one matters but whichever spouse decides they don’t want to be married anymore and goes through with the process. If that’s what love is perceived as by the next generation, I fear for society much more than if 5% of our population that happen to be attracted to the same sex are permitted to be called married and actually encourages monogamy or other values of marriage that can be discerned by observing couples in varying stages of wedded “bliss”. The real destruction to marriage comes not so much in changing the definition, but in making it obsolete. Until next time, Namaste and aloha.

Deepening Divorce In The Deep South

http://www.cnn.com/2011/LIVING/08/25/divorce.bible.belt/index.html

http://pewsocialtrends.org/2009/10/15/marriages-and-divorce-a-50-state-tour/

You hear about divorces on occasion in any area of the country, but a new study by the U.S. Census Bureau suggests that the South may have a higher rate of divorces than many other areas, especially the Northeast. A few factors seem to be strong indicators of why this is the case. The first is the predominance of fundamentalist or conservative Christian values concerning premarital sex. The other is minimal or lacking education on dating and sex.

In terms of people’s disapproval towards premarital sex, the South is notorious. I myself can vouch for this position that you should abstain until you get married, since we had the “True Love Waits” group featured at the church I went to up until college. I don’t think we had people come to our school, but there were instances of teenage pregnancy, which was excused on the grounds that the students were either taking responsibility or giving the child up for adoption. This idea of social conformity is a subset of the moralistic pressure from Christian parents and community members. I chose not to have sex before a certain point, but I don’t think I ever completely bought into the notion that you should wait until you’re married to have sex. Even back then I was thinking, “What if the two people are responsible and willing to take whatever the results of their intercourse may be? If they’re willing to raise the child and get married eventually, isn’t it still better for the child?” Part of the problem with this line of thought, though, is thinking that marriage will somehow make you happy over the period of time you’re married. People rush into marriage because of unexpected pregnancies; the so called “shotgun weddings” stereotyped in the South so much. Virginity is valued in the South only to the extent that you’re already put into some clique. If you happen to lose your virginity, it’s almost just not talked about unless the intercourse leads to pregnancy, in which case, fervent pro lifers will push the child into marriage or adoption without letting them even contemplate other options. The pressuring into marriage seems self destructive, especially if the parents presume that just because you have sex with someone that you also must love them enough to marry them. It seems like the focus is more on keeping up appearances and not looking as if your child is flawed in any sense. But children make mistakes and just because they own up to them doesn’t mean they need to feel like they must get married or their child won’t be worth as much as a child born in wedlock. People spread that kind of garbage of a bastard child being somehow cursed or otherwise some sort of trouble to the parent. A child of rape is one thing, but a child of consensual sex that resulted in an unexpected pregnancy is hardly on the same level and any person who says otherwise is missing the forest for the trees big time. Marriage shouldn’t be about social propriety, it should be about mutual love and respect between two people, regardless of if the parents approve of the person in question or not. As long as the couple is happy, shouldn’t you give them your blessing?

Education is a more contentious subject, since one can bring up plenty of decent people that didn’t get beyond high school education, for instance. But education doesn’t always have to be limited to academics. Just having basic education about how you should date and choose your future partner is something that is, again, on the parent’s shoulders to an extent they commonly want to defer to the child or other sources. I can understand if you want your child to learn things the hard way, but if you’re morally opposed to divorce, it’s obligatory that you educate your children as parents do within particular contexts. In being a parent, educating your child at an appropriate age about dating and how they should approach it, is key if you want some modicum of security with your future in-laws and grandchildren. Dating a few different people, perhaps even cohabitating when you are old enough; these are things that can solidify your standards for what you look for in a mate. If you just marry the first person you’re infatuated with, 9 times out of 10 you’ll be miserable after 5 years or so.

Sex education is pertinent here as well, since parents who leave it up to the school to educate children about things of that nature entirely will be sorely disappointed as well, since teenagers are rarely so self controlled or disciplined that, when left to their own devices, they will behave with restraint in the area of sex (especially with hormones at their highest levels, practically). Many in the South tend to view sex-ed as either just right in the basic idea of “scaring” kids into abstinence with threats of STDs and pregnancy (through the use of simulation dolls to demonstrate childcare) or too excessive in teaching kids about the use of protection. I wasn’t taught that myself, so in that sense I found my sex education lacking. The tendency appears to be either kids getting married early, not knowing better about dating options or discernment of a partner in order to have sex without condemnation or they have sex prior to marriage and are forced into it afterwards due to accidental pregnancy. It boils down to both a lack of education and, too often, a willingness to cow to one’s community instead of making your own decisions.

Both of these problems could be solved by education of one form or another. Educating children about being individuals, but also part of the human community would be one thing. I’m not suggesting we tell kids to always rebel against their parents, even though they’ll probably do it anyway. It’s just that kids shouldn’t be told they have to conform and maintain some status quo to keep their parents’ reputation or even their community’s in good standing. If they make a mistake, they should take responsibility for it, but how they do it should not be stratified into the best choice and then every other choice being selfish or immoral. Teens and young adults should also be advised strongly about dating and how it should progress into marriage. There shouldn’t be this desire to marry the first person you feel like you’re in love with, not only because that’s commonly infatuation and not genuine affection, but that in youth you are more prone to impulsive and emotion based decisions, not thinking ahead at all. This may be the strongest factor in the South with people marrying earlier and thinking they can handle it and either getting incredibly lucky with their first choice or suffering after a decade and eventually crumbling to the choice of divorce because they’ve grown apart from their spouse. The worst part is that children are often involved, so the separation can affect them in one way or another. And proper sex education is a solution to the issues of pregnancy leading to shotgun weddings due to suggesting children born out of wedlock are worth less and premarital sex as a social taboo that negatively reinforces the idea that you cannot ever have sex before you’re married. If children learned both how to have safe sex and also be responsible in general with their sexual behavior, the problems wouldn’t occur nearly as much. I’m not saying they’d disappear, but with education, there could be a conceivably higher incidence of marriages lasting instead of breaking apart after hasty decisions. Until next time, Namaste and aloha.

Conservative Versus Classical Christianity

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2011/06/21/my-take-bible-condemns-a-lot-so-why-focus-on-homosexuality/

There’s always a chance in the news to criticize Christianity on its generally conservative political positions on GLBT issues, but this time, we have a criticism from a recent graduate of Yale Divinity School who observes that the modern church has shifted away from what could be said to be the more classical Christianity of its early history. This runs the gamut from the primacy of marriage in theological terms to issues of when conception begins.

There’s little doubt that the authors of the Bible found homosexual relations immoral, probably most commonly manifest in ritual practices of other deities or the practice of rape in ancient times to demean the enemy. But even the consensual form that manifest in pederasty from ancient Greek times and into Roman times was condemned as unnatural by the apostle Paul. It’s difficult to contest this even by the language, but people will. If we assume it was considered unnatural, though, it’s also pertinent to consider that Paul said that nature implied that men having long hair was degrading, while women having long hair was a blessing. So I guess my female friends who have short hair are degrading themselves? To be fair, Paul was a product of his times and probably also a staunch conservative, moreso than many conservatives of this age in comparison, but that goes without saying with a gap of over a thousand years.

But there are other issues many Christians are not as opposed to or are opposed to on grounds not agreed upon until later in history. The most interesting one is that of marriage being superior to celibacy. Many Christians historically argued that marriage was inferior to celibacy, probably going along with Paul himself who also voiced this opinion, saying that if you had self control, it was better to be married to God than to be married to a human, pulling your attention away from God by association. But Paul did say that marriage was good for those without such restraint upon their pleasure seeking. So it’s ambivalent in the sense of a complete condemnation of either, but celibacy was preferred on the grounds that you are focused on God and not on humanity. But marriage is definitely emphasized as a sacrament in the church or at least ordained by God in creation; there’s no doubt God blessed marriage in the Christian context, what with Adam and Eve’s pairing. And there’s the whole procreation aspect, but I won’t get into the whole anti gay marriage issue that I talked about in “Gay Marriage Does Not Equal Anarchy” Overall, the notion of family’s importance in modern times with conservatives could be said to have overshadowed the historical tendency in early Christianity to value the individual before God and focus on the interpersonal relationship that is blessed by God, but is also understood to not be for everyone.

On the issue of abortion, it’s always said by so many Christians that it is tradition that life begins at conception, but many Christians, including Augustine and Aquinas, thought that life, or ensoulment for a more particular term, began at quickening, which was around 20 weeks or so, more generally around the 5th month of pregnancy, which, ironically lines up with more scientific consensus on the nature of viability of the embryo/fetus, which indeed starts around that time, though medical technology is still in the early stages for enabling such premature births to survive. In this sense, the Christian attempt to use a minority scientific and gynecological perspective to justify illegalizing abortion is actually not backed up by early Christian thought, especially since they were considering ensoulment as opposed to when life began strictly speaking. The notion that a clump of DNA has a soul in any significant way hardly makes sense even in a Christian perspective, since a soul makes sense only for something conscious, so it would only be at the point of sentience where an embryo could even be argued to have a soul in that sense of personhood and humanity as a creation of God instead of mere potentiality in the form of a multiplying blastocyst or a zygote attached to the uterine wall. In this way, Christians seem to focus too much on the issue of life as opposed to when we gain a soul and use that to illegalize abortion entirely.

The most contentious issue, however, is the seeming hypocrisy of Christians who speak against homosexuality and their getting the right to marry, yet they also permit divorce against the general tone of disapproval of divorce in the bible with a minor exception for unfaithfulness. Apparently, Christians are more than willing to permit divorce due to problems besides adultery, which seems to suggest a flexibility they don’t have about homosexual behavior being immoral, since it could be said to be moral in a monogamous relationship, even if it’s not procreative. Some Christians are stricter about it, but the majority of Christians are oddly silent about it, speaking about it as if it’s just an unpleasant but acceptable part of life, like cancer. The only problem is that it doesn’t really seem to sync up with what the Bible teaches about it, particularly Jesus himself. He noted, to paraphrase, that a man and woman become one flesh and no one should separate them.

In general, it appears that conformity to the Bible is a matter of convenience more than actual conviction to the message. When it comes to the explicit evidence about some issues, people can still ignore it on ethical grounds, particularly homosexuality. Abortion and divorce could also be said to have changed in terms of the focus on ethical priorities. However, this seems inconsistent; if you’re for marriage, why wouldn’t you be against divorce for convenience when you’re more likely to oppose abortion for convenience? And on homosexuality, it seems like you’re more insecure about equality of sexual preferences between committed adults than actually concerned about whether it’s morally permissible to have a particular kind of sex at all. With these issues, the change of culture seems to be where the change in opinion results from, not to mention the prominence of individualism from Protestantism where people are their own priests of sorts, Jesus and the Holy Spirit as the median to God, not another human. When people cease to follow actual tradition or defenses from the bible as a whole, they can cherry pick it and follow general norms of the age, which goes against Christianity’s claim to follow an eternal law. It’s one thing to say you’re conservative, but to say you’re Christian along with that and ignore the contrasting history seems disingenuous. Being consistent on culture and convictions is something we ought to strive for, instead of conforming to culture to create our convictions. Yes, I like alliterations, did you notice? Until next time, Namaste and aloha.