I see marriage as a traditional legal binding that can alter your life significantly depending on your state and country.
You might see it differently. What does marriage mean to you?
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A big set of financial legal guarantees that protect both parties.
And also an agreement to make it harder to leave during conflict. Which is something both parties agree to when not in a very emotional state.
Making it harder to leave is controversial, since it in practice goes against consent and the wishes of either party during conflict. Since sex can’t be forced in marriage anymore (luckily), marriage is an acceptable practice, in my opinion.
Force through the use of financial pressure from one party to stay together is in no way acceptable though. Both parties should be willingly in the relationship long term. Financials will however always be a factor, since it is cheaper and more beneficial to be two.
Love my wife to bits but I only see marriage as a legal contract. Insurance is easier, travel is easier, everything is so much easier. It’s what turned me to equal marriage opportunity activist - there’s no reason why this privilege should remain only for 2 different gendered people, that’s just incredibly cruel. Ideally this privilege shouldn’t exist at all.
Wait a minute why is insurance and travel and everything so much easier when married? I’m single and insurance is cheap and travel is quick and easy, everything else is maddeningly lonely and sometimes I need three hands but I only have two, but other than that what do you mean being married is so much easier?
I meant mostly relative to just being a couple not single.
You can add co-dependents to all types of insurance (health, travel etc.) which is easier and cheaper for married people than it is for a couple. As for travel itself - visa and all travel bureaucracy is always easier for married people. My wife is Thai and much of the world is super racist against Thai passports so we just piggyback of my EU passport in most countries and of her Thai passport in ASEAN countries - it’s a real game changer. Not to mention how differently you are being treated by all bureaucratic and security checks. Being married is like living in the fast lane when it comes to bureaucracy.
Interesting how you feel things are much easier for you than for others, your life actually sounds rather complicated 🤭
Sadly the world is still quite complicated for cosmopolitan couples but it’s getting much better!
You consider yourself cosmopolitan. We call you “Passport Bros.”
Does attacking people like this make you feel better about yourself or something?
Prerequisite for divorce.
Marriage is a state-sanctioned merger of assets and rights. It provides a legal authorization for decision making related to your spouse, shared property ownership rights, rights regarding power of attorney in an emergency, and tax benefits.
Everything else is religious/social ceremony and can be achieved without the need for marriage certification.
I know several people who didn’t “believe in marriage” until their SO was in the hospital and they weren’t allowed to visit or make decisions for them. Pretty horrible watching the estranged parent or second cousin making decisions about the health of your 10+ year partner, against your wishes, with no recourse.
I mean you can also give your partner a letter of authorization to make medical decisions for you in case you aren’t able to make decisions yourself. You dont really need marriage for that
This is a big reason my spouse and I married after already being together for 25 years. She is estranged from her family as well. She was in a car accident, she was unhurt but the car was totaled. So we got married in April.
As a guy currently going through a divorce, I see it very differently to how I did before she left. Previously I saw it as a public commitment and celebration of love, and making vows to each other. Now I see it as a bullshit waste of time and money. I was cynical before (not religious, didnt see muxh point) but went through with it because it was something she wanted.
I was cynical before (not religious, didnt see muxh point) but went through with it because it was something she wanted.
not to throw salt in your wound, but perhaps this was your first mistake?
Marriage is something for the wealthy. If you live on welfare in my country and you get married or share a household, you get less money. Also, if you want to marry a foreigner, you need to earn a minimum amount of money, which is unobtainable for a lot of people. This is on purpose to make sure we get less “poor foreigners” here. So marriage is not and never will be for me.
Its a commitment. Pure and simple. You and another are going to live together and figure things out together come what may.
The commitment really comes earlier, the wedding is formally announcing that commitment to the world.
not really. before actually deciding its just sorta a vibe. At least for me and my wife. I mean if you decide to stay together forever its like when exactly did you make the decision and did you make it together? The marriage pretty much was that. We like each other and would be cool keeping it going but marriage was the culmination of a discussion that we are committing to doing this thing.
Having a small barrier (divorce) is not a meaningful form of comitment and if anything I’d wager it does more actual societal harm than good.
commitment is an individual thing. it could all be ceremony and it would not mattter. It sounds like your asking what the legal definition of marriage is for a particular country.
No i just dont think it’s a good metric for comitment and doesn’t encapsulate the spirit of committed relationship. It might actually distract from achieving real meaningful comitment as people do the predefine ceremony which is not very meaningful compared to a more personal ritual and bonding.
not a metric. not the spirit of a relationship. its a specific action a couple takes to fromalize the idea that they are sticking together. no one has to do it (ideally. check with your society to verify) necessarily. Now you get into the legal aspects which is mentioned a bit in the post. In the us you can add your spouse to your insurance and children but generally not others. Its one reason I kinda hated that they passed gay marriage as many states and businesses and insurers where allowing for broader ability to add people you live with. It eases inheritance stuff and there are some others for the us anyway. other countries may have other things. I mean my wife and I decided to not have kids. If we did we would not have without the legal cert around it.
I’m really enjoying mine. My wife and I are a team. We divide the labor of the home according to our abilities and temperament. 10 years in and the sex has only gotten better as we’ve learned each other’s wants and needs. We’re having a house built.
This is my second marriage. The first was a goddamn nightmare and I’m glad it ended quickly.
Yeah, I really like the view that my wife is my partner. We have a shared stake in the other’s success, but can act independently.
I had intended to not.
Then, after a turn at living together with my partner in an Islamic country — where we were not allowed to officially cohabit — we realized that our rights to watch each other’s backs were made way simpler by being married.
So we got married.
Had we always lived in a country that recognized cohabitation or common-law relationships, we might have not. Had our next sojourn not been in a predominantly Catholic country, we might have not. Had we more role models who didn’t, we might have not. Had we moved home earlier, we might have not.
But we did. It was 12 years ago.
Bottom line, we don’t find it burdensome; or that we are locked in a prison together. We care for one another. We drive one another crazy. We have the same fights over and over. We support each other and keep track of each other’s families, friends, medical conditions, and car keys. It’s nice. It’s mundane. It’s comfortable. It’s practical.
Getting out would be a giant pain in the everything. And expensive.
We don’t wield our rings against one another. We don’t demand “rights” from one another because we’re married. We don’t have extraordinary unspoken expectations of one another. We accept, value, and console one another. We’re a unit in this fucked up place.
People are crazy. I’m crazy. She’s the crazy I’m used to and can interact with.
I’m too old for new crazy.
Granted, she’s certainly gaining more by being married to me than I am being married to her. But, we don’t keep score either.
TL;DR — comments in bold.
What does she gain by being married to you vs you being married to her?
First and foremost, she gains cleaning. Everything except bathrooms.
Half the cooking. She has dietary restrictions, I don’t. We don’t eat outside of home often. Except phở bò.
Every form of maintenance. Cars, computers, all machines and objects with moving parts.
Weekends away with friends. I never question and I never say no.
Few hard feelings when she’s temperamental.
What do I gain?
I’ll probably live longer because she makes me go to the doctor, the dentist, physiotherapy, and reduces my cheese and bacon intake. But not salt. She loves salt.
I gain perspective. I don’t occupy i high tower where I know everything and remain academically distant and untouched by the world. I gain knowledge of all the books I don’t (and wouldn’t) read. I gain access to emotional and psychological non-fiction content.
Finally, I gain the companionship of someone who lets me do my wierd. Nothing kinky or malicious or wasteful or destructive — just unreasonably high standards and unreasonably low output. No blame for it as long as bills are paid and food is in the fridge.
She’d like to see me try to shoot the moon, and I love her for it. We’ll see. I can’t even put together a string of Lemmy posts worthy of acclaim.
What it means to me is different from what it did for me.
I didn’t marry my ex, we had kids so were a family regardless and I didn’t want to be a wife just a mom. I am glad we never married.
My now husband REALLY wanted to get married, like a wedding and the whole thing, he had already kids too, from an ex-wife (both their bio kids and his stepkids, court gave him custody of all of them and he adopted the ones he could). I caved and told him ask in 2 years, he did.
What it did was like some old timey upper class marriage shit, combined families & created a dynasty. I liked it because “stepmom/stepdad” can do things like school pickup that “mom’s boyfriend” can’t. And my kids & his kids got this amazing network of siblings, they all like each other. And I got a great MIL & FIL, and together my husband & I make kind of a lot of money when before we were each supporting a family alone, and struggling.
So basically because we already had families, getting married made us one big family. Which now makes me think of it like that, when before all I saw was the man-owns-woman shit and wanted no part of that.
A relationship that is serious enough that you can be bothered to do paperwork for it.
A social/government formality that i did only because my wife wanted a wedding. When my wife and i first said we loved each other, that was when we had each others back and were tied to each other 100%. Years later after getting married, it was just a bit of paper (we kept our own names, got wills to protect what we earnt ourselves etc), but our love never changed - but DAM they are expensive!
Marriage means I’ve made it. Not like “my life is now complete,” but more like a sign that I’ve accomplished the impossible. That I really can make my dreams come true, as cliché as that sounds.
I’m in a long-distance relationship with my girlfriend (well, fiancee now 😝). Several years passed before we finally got to meet in person. Having been stuck for so long, unable to do anything or make any decisions for myself, it felt unreal. Ever since we met in person, I realised that this is the person I want to spend my life with… The problem is, she lives in a different country. How were we supposed to take the next step when we’re thousands of miles away from each other?
Well, the quickest way to a visa is through marriage. Considering the current political climate and that:
- It’s a queer relationship
- I’m transgender
- We’re young
- She’s not white
- She lives in a country most people haven’t even heard of
… I was pretty much expecting this to be near impossible. But somehow, despite literally everything being against us, my petition for the visa got approved on the first submission???
Point is, for me, marriage is a means to achieving something I genuinely thought would never happen.
I’ve always joked that marriage is a lot like sharing your house with someone… so you should choose that person wisely.
But in a lot of ways it can be that simple. It’s making an effort to understand the commitments and courtesies that your partner needs to share a life with you that separates a marriage from a love affair. It’s an intentional commingling of your lives with the intent of mutual benefit, sharing affection, and having the grace to allow one another small mistakes in the process.
If the people in question have an understanding, then I don’t think that legal status, civil or religious ceremonies, permanent cohabitation, or even monogamy are essential, as you’ll find relationships that remain stable despite lacking one or more of these things from time to time. But, entering into and honoring that commitment to each other is.
To me, it’s my promise that I love the other person, plan on doing so forever, and I want to spend the rest of our lives together. I wouldn’t have gotten married unless wanted to support them in all of their goals, help them through all of their troubles, and enjoy all the moments in between.
The legal stuff is all secondary in my view.
You can love your partner without having to entangle your tax paperwork.
Well sure, but I wouldn’t want to entangle my tax paperwork if I didn’t love him
My last bank wouldn’t even accept my own tax returns.
That was 12 years ago.
