4 ms·

> but you exaggerate a little this is why it will never get fixed. every story, no matter how bad, is met with disbelief. i, for one, am never getting marrie

> but you exaggerate a little this is why it will never get fixed. every story, no matter how bad, is met with disbelief. i, for one, am never getting married, precisely because i DO believe all these stories, and in fact i extrapolate there to be many more, far worse stories, that never get told. people don't like recounting these experiences, even anonymously. this isn't a judgment on marriage; it's a judgment on me. i couldn't deal with a divorce and having my assets stripped from me. thank you OP for joining the growing chorus of voices speaking out against how truly awful this entire racket is.

accountface 10y ago
so you take a false assumption and turn it into additional assumptions?
- flat6turbo 10y ago
  yeah, sure. my entire world view is based on my assumptions, many of which you probably disagree with. what do you want me to do? be you instead of me?
tzakrajs 10y ago
#mgtow will always agree with your sentiments.
- flat6turbo 10y ago
  i specifically said marriage, not relationships or children. also, tongue in cheek "did you just assume my gender?" http://nymag.com/news/features/gay-divorce-2013-3/index1.html http://nymag.com/news/features/gay-divorce-2013-3/index1.htm...
  - tzakrajs 10y ago
    For clarity, I did not assume your gender. Women, non-binary and others can espouse MGTOW views.
shortstuffsushi 10y ago
Err... You just took this to the opposite extreme. Not recognizing that men have to face problems related to divorce doesn't mean you should throw the institution of marriage out the window as a racket.
- flat6turbo 10y ago
  well. there's only two positions in this spectrum: get married, or not. this is sort of like pregnancy. you either are, or you aren't.
- patja 10y ago
  It is admirable to take the consequences and responsibilities of committing to a marriage seriously. Divorce casts a huge emotional, financial, and societal wake that many (including the children) never recover from. More people should hesitate before entering into it.
- rrggrr 10y ago
  Its not marriage. It is legislation around marriage and children that reflects the disproportionate number of voters and political doners who either don't care, are misinformed, or benefit from the system.
- gozur88 10y ago
  Marriage is a racket for men. All the advantages have been leached out over the years, leaving only responsibilities and liabilities. There's a lot of social inertia supporting the institution, but younger men are starting to view the situation more pragmatically.
  - paulddraper 10y ago
    You might be right about marriage, but having kids has always been all responsibility and liability. People keep having them though.
erik998 10y ago
I don't think marriage is bad per se, but the courts are being used to criminalize people for not paying debts which I don't agree with. Maybe posting some deposit reflecting the average cost of a divorce prior to getting a marriage license would be sufficient to prove their commitment... Maybe return such a deposit after 10 years of marriage... If they get divorced before the refund is issued use those funds to pay for divorce... I don't think it's right to encourage people to get married and apply a low bar for such a commitment. However when they want a divorce it's not as easy. Child support is a different matter though. Criminalizing people for not paying does no one any good. It pushes people to work for cash paying jobs and just hides the problem. Criminalizing it just forces everyone in the situation into a poverty trap. It causes the parent being pursued for child support to resent the other parent or child. http://www.postandcourier.com/archives/cost-is-high-to-jail-parents-for-missed-child-support/article_8814a61c-2a35-58bd-92f8-f6f526feaa05.html http://www.postandcourier.com/archives/cost-is-high-to-jail-... https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/why-people-get-sentenced-to-weekend-jail-828 https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/why-people-get-sentenced-...
parasubvert 10y ago
What needs to be fixed? Terrible divorce settlements really are about poor planning and communication of expectations than something inherent in marriage or common law relationships. I don't think most people should get married or move in before age 30 - too easy to focus on the short term and get taken advantage of, unless you're really willing to make a leap of faith in the other person. But otherwise divorce isn't as big of a deal when no children are involved and both partners work at reasonably equal jobs. Maybe there is a split in the house equity and bank accounts, with one party possibly giving a lump sum to the other, and you're done - mostly a clean break with no ongoing payments. I've seen this multiple times among friends. It's when your partner is stay at home, marrying them (or in many jurisdictions, merely entering into common law relationship) also sets an entitlement of lifestyle and income. Basically if your partner doesn't work, you need to be okay with supporting them to various degrees for the rest of your life, unless you can enter into a pre-nuptial agreement that says otherwise. Now, add children into the mix and it's much more complicated and has nothing to do with marriage. Child support is technically the child's money, and the state enforces its payment on the grounds that your child is entitled to your earnings based on some kind of income-equity formula. So for me, there never was any despair about finding a partner, it was more about understanding what I wanted: - we split what assets we put into the marriage if it fails, what we brought in is mostly hands off so that the one with more property can't be milked. I say mostly because capital gains etc. may happen on past assets that your partner should be entitled to. - we put each other into our wills otherwise and ensure we have life insurance for the other - we both hold jobs, even if one of us makes more, alimony and child support wouldn't be absurdly high - a partner that isn't afraid to talk about what their expectations are for lifestyle, income during and/or after the marriage if it doesn't work out Being afraid of having your assets stripped implies you don't think you could hire a strong lawyer to defend your interests and also implies you wouldn't have the ability to define stuff before the marriage. But it's totally doable. As with any life commitment there needs to be trust in another human being... but some safeguards if they turn out to be very different people than you had thought.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- 10y ago
dang 10y ago
Please don't post rhetorical rants to HN. They're incompatible with intellectual curiosity, which is what this site is for. We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13791488 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13791488 and marked it off-topic.

accountface 10y ago

so you take a false assumption and turn it into additional assumptions?

flat6turbo 10y ago
yeah, sure. my entire world view is based on my assumptions, many of which you probably disagree with. what do you want me to do? be you instead of me?

tzakrajs 10y ago

#mgtow will always agree with your sentiments.

flat6turbo 10y ago
i specifically said marriage, not relationships or children. also, tongue in cheek "did you just assume my gender?" http://nymag.com/news/features/gay-divorce-2013-3/index1.html http://nymag.com/news/features/gay-divorce-2013-3/index1.htm...
- tzakrajs 10y ago
  For clarity, I did not assume your gender. Women, non-binary and others can espouse MGTOW views.

shortstuffsushi 10y ago

Err... You just took this to the opposite extreme. Not recognizing that men have to face problems related to divorce doesn't mean you should throw the institution of marriage out the window as a racket.

flat6turbo 10y ago
well. there's only two positions in this spectrum: get married, or not. this is sort of like pregnancy. you either are, or you aren't.
patja 10y ago
It is admirable to take the consequences and responsibilities of committing to a marriage seriously. Divorce casts a huge emotional, financial, and societal wake that many (including the children) never recover from. More people should hesitate before entering into it.
rrggrr 10y ago
Its not marriage. It is legislation around marriage and children that reflects the disproportionate number of voters and political doners who either don't care, are misinformed, or benefit from the system.
gozur88 10y ago
Marriage is a racket for men. All the advantages have been leached out over the years, leaving only responsibilities and liabilities. There's a lot of social inertia supporting the institution, but younger men are starting to view the situation more pragmatically.
- paulddraper 10y ago
  You might be right about marriage, but having kids has always been all responsibility and liability. People keep having them though.

erik998 10y ago

I don't think marriage is bad per se, but the courts are being used to criminalize people for not paying debts which I don't agree with. Maybe posting some deposit reflecting the average cost of a divorce prior to getting a marriage license would be sufficient to prove their commitment... Maybe return such a deposit after 10 years of marriage... If they get divorced before the refund is issued use those funds to pay for divorce... I don't think it's right to encourage people to get married and apply a low bar for such a commitment. However when they want a divorce it's not as easy. Child support is a different matter though. Criminalizing people for not paying does no one any good. It pushes people to work for cash paying jobs and just hides the problem. Criminalizing it just forces everyone in the situation into a poverty trap. It causes the parent being pursued for child support to resent the other parent or child. http://www.postandcourier.com/archives/cost-is-high-to-jail-parents-for-missed-child-support/article_8814a61c-2a35-58bd-92f8-f6f526feaa05.html http://www.postandcourier.com/archives/cost-is-high-to-jail-... https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/why-people-get-sentenced-to-weekend-jail-828 https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/why-people-get-sentenced-...

parasubvert 10y ago

What needs to be fixed? Terrible divorce settlements really are about poor planning and communication of expectations than something inherent in marriage or common law relationships. I don't think most people should get married or move in before age 30 - too easy to focus on the short term and get taken advantage of, unless you're really willing to make a leap of faith in the other person. But otherwise divorce isn't as big of a deal when no children are involved and both partners work at reasonably equal jobs. Maybe there is a split in the house equity and bank accounts, with one party possibly giving a lump sum to the other, and you're done - mostly a clean break with no ongoing payments. I've seen this multiple times among friends. It's when your partner is stay at home, marrying them (or in many jurisdictions, merely entering into common law relationship) also sets an entitlement of lifestyle and income. Basically if your partner doesn't work, you need to be okay with supporting them to various degrees for the rest of your life, unless you can enter into a pre-nuptial agreement that says otherwise. Now, add children into the mix and it's much more complicated and has nothing to do with marriage. Child support is technically the child's money, and the state enforces its payment on the grounds that your child is entitled to your earnings based on some kind of income-equity formula. So for me, there never was any despair about finding a partner, it was more about understanding what I wanted: - we split what assets we put into the marriage if it fails, what we brought in is mostly hands off so that the one with more property can't be milked. I say mostly because capital gains etc. may happen on past assets that your partner should be entitled to. - we put each other into our wills otherwise and ensure we have life insurance for the other - we both hold jobs, even if one of us makes more, alimony and child support wouldn't be absurdly high - a partner that isn't afraid to talk about what their expectations are for lifestyle, income during and/or after the marriage if it doesn't work out Being afraid of having your assets stripped implies you don't think you could hire a strong lawyer to defend your interests and also implies you wouldn't have the ability to define stuff before the marriage. But it's totally doable. As with any life commitment there needs to be trust in another human being... but some safeguards if they turn out to be very different people than you had thought.

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
10y ago

dang 10y ago

Please don't post rhetorical rants to HN. They're incompatible with intellectual curiosity, which is what this site is for. We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13791488 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13791488 and marked it off-topic.