First of all let me say that I am a romantic at heart and the idea of a forever after with your true love sounds wonderful, and I might even go "awwww". But then reality dawns on me of the dirty business of getting married. I say "dirty" because of the involvement of the state in terms of issuing marriage licenses. Um, can I ask WHY in the world is this the business of the state?? It seems ridiculous to me that the government has monopolized this industry of marriages. Not to mention their tax breaks and other benefits of marriage, which certainty create incentives for us to get married. And why exactly should I pay less in taxes if I am married? Or more in taxes if I am not married? I also say "dirty" because I ask myself "what is the point of marriage?" and it is nothing but setting a contract with another person that you will be there for them in x, y and z situations, and establishing a power-of-attorney-type-exchange. In which case, WHY WHY WHY is this something that the state needs to be involved in?
Perhaps at one time in the distant past, people believed that marriages, in this type of contract form, would ensure that they creates a stable family.. but really does this even exist anymore? With the insanely high divorce rates and prenuptial agreements to get ready for divorce before getting married.. it is difficult to argue that marriages create a stable family.
Please enlighten me with your positive views towards marriage so that I can be less cynical about it. :)
Friday, October 16, 2009
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
Btw here was the piece of news that set me off to write out this rant.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2009/10/15/us/AP-US-Interracial-Rebuff.html
I don't know if this is a more positive outlook or not :) but here is my response to a specific comment. I would say that marriages do provide for more stable families because there is social pressure not to break a marriage. The divorce rates should always be lower than the relationship breaking up rates -- meaning that marriage keeps people together.
ReplyDeleteYes divorse rates should always be lower than the relationship breaking up rates... BUT, this is not a fair comparison. The commitment level when people get married vs get into relationships is very different. I'm not sure I believe that there is any significant difference between married vs. non-married relationship where the commitment level is the same on average.
ReplyDeleteEven if there was some slight difference in the rate of staying together.. why should the govt get involved? Rug had a great idea on why this is, which I hope she will post here sooon! :)
ReplyDeleteOn the surface, it might appear as though the State's authority to approve a marriage is required because of its needed involvement when things go south in a bad marriage. Legal separation, custody battles, the traditionally-required alimony become the State's problem when two not-so-happy-ever-after-the-wedding parties decide to break up a marriage. So we can try to conclude right here that a State needs to authorize a union just so it can "fairly" unauthorize it.
ReplyDelete"But aha", cry Apos and Trisco (they both actually and separately did, when I presented this argument to them), "why can't marriage then be just like another business contract? A contract that can be drawn up between two separate parties, albeit with a notary present, and doesn't require a license , State's approval, definitely no tax breaks and can still be a legal basis for fairness when the parties break the contract!"
That's a great point. So why can't a marriage just be a business contract? Lets dig deeper.
A marriage is a legal union of two individuals. The State has to be in the dirty business of this union because it has put itself in the dirty business of approving of who is legally an individual! The State is in one's life to begin with (that's right ...at the moment when you were born and had no idea of what's right and what's wrong - in the hospital...right after you blink your pretty little eyes at your loving mom). Must to Realism's outrage and Nihilism's delight, you don't really exist as an individual until the State grants you an existence license in the form of a birth certificate. And in fact, it's even consistent in handing out a nice tax break, albeit to your parents, for your recent appearance in this world. The State is there to begin with - without this birth certificate, you cannot get a drivers license, a passport or hell, even a marriage license. Since we all have implicitly accepted this power of the State to authorize the existence of an individual, by extension we have to accept (damn, logically, for rationality's sake, we have to demand !) the State's power to grant the union of two individuals as a single entity (and again by extension, demand a tax break for the same).
You cannot drink, travel, drive, earn, move, own, marry, and in fact, exist, without the State's consent.
Realism squirms and Nihilism shrugs as we walk away with our driver's license secure in our pockets.
ps: As a side note, it is very interesting how the tax breaks encourage the traditional role of a female as a home-keeper. The tax breaks, when filing as a couple, help only those whose incomes are very lopsided (maximized when only person earns). In fact, if you have a spouse who makes the same amount (albeit extremely low), you are better off filing separately. Being single, why do I know this? Coz,I am suspicious of Govts. trying to nudge the masses. With nudge comes power (and we all know with great power comes current squared times resistance :P). And marriage is a classic instance of this.
This is a pretty bleak (and unfair) asessment.
ReplyDeleteAlso, just because the state insists on documenting (not granting!) births, does not mean they necessarily need to document marriages. A marriage does not need to be considered the "birth" of a new entity. It's just a set of if-then conditions. If you wanted to, I bet you actually could hire a lawyer and sign a legal agreement with similar intentions.
It's not that marriage can't be a legal contract among lovers (how romantic...), or even just a pact. But historically, it hasn't been. It was already a highly regulated and institutionalized affair when Judaism showed up on the scene. Perhaps the authority shifted to the state recently (the last several hundred years) because religion is weakening. (In fact, I think it began to shift around the protestant reformation).
On a related note, neither side of the gay marriage debate is saying do away with government involvement. I only hear this government involvement frustration among libertarian arguments.
My point with the last remark is that marriage as a contract among individuals (with no authority of any kind involved) is just a new idea with no real precedent. It can exist, it just hasn't yet, and it's not really being rooted for by any vocal group.
ReplyDelete