Fred Reed
ValueDad
and see if you can spot someone you know...instead of Where's Waldo...it's
Where's Wacko, ;-)
http://www.3works.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=393&sid=596ab4c9f670f3089fc7bf
77f7254263
Against Marriage
Cutting and Running, and Why Taipei Is Better
by Fred Reed
Mostly when I hear one of these radical feminist ladies squawking and clucking
about whatever is disturbing her system at the moment, I don't listen a whole
lot, because most of them have the insight of flatworms and run on pure bile.
But I have to agree with them about marriage. It's probably a bad idea.
For a guy, I mean. (If you're a woman, listen to the feminists. They'll tell
you why marriage is a bad idea for women: Men are rapists. All of us. We batter
women like cannibal tempura chefs. We don't have feelings. We're no damn good.
Stay away from us.)
But let me tell you why marriage is bad for guys. If you're a young fellow
thinking about tying the awful knot, read this carefully.
Guys marry for bad reasons. When it comes to women, we have less judgment than
bugs in a moonshine bottle. Guys marry charm. They marry a sweet smile, a perky
toss of the chin. They marry clear skin and bright eyes, soft lips, warm hands.
They marry curves in a pretty print dress and silken hair that smells like warm
milk and new-mown grass. (Maybe that's straining the language. Steinbeck or
somebody said it.) Men marry necking on back roads with crickets creaking in
the woods and warm breezes and Sally is just so unspeakably wonderful they
can't do without her.
Men marry illusion. Sally marries a pre-med.
We males have an infinite capacity for deluding ourselves. The charm of women
doesn't last, any more than flowers in a mountain meadow. A requirement for a
marriage license should be that the guy spend fifteen minutes thinking of Sally
as twenty pounds heavier with crow's feet and PMS and no further incentive to
control it. In five years she won't want to party. Little Richard will give way
to easy listening. In a decade she won't even slightly resemble the lissome
damsel he married. She won't like his friends unless they're boring. The fun
and excitement will fade and life will be just life.
Charm has a short shelf-life. A fellow should ask himself: Is her mind such
that he wants to spend forty years talking to her?
Maybe so. Some women are great that way. One was reported in San Francisco a
few years ago, and I know of one in Canada. (Actually a fair number of gals are
seriously bright. But Willy Bill probably won't marry one. Anyway, ask yourself
the question.)
However, the overarching aspect of marriage, the one that ought to be part of
the dictionary definition, is that Sally will get the children. She'll get the
house too, but the world is full of houses. The kids are the killer.
Women have a mysterious power to fog men's minds. I hear Willy Bill saying,
"Divorce? Impossible. Sally's adorable. Even if it happened, we'd still be
friends." There was a case of this reported too. In central China.
Pre-Confucius. Scholars debate its authenticity.
Willy Bill very likely will get divorced, which will very likely be Sally's
idea, and she will get the kids with virtual certainty. Further (and he won't
believe it in the full flood of hormonal misjudgment) she will in all
likelihood use them against him. Even if not, she'll remarry and move to the
other end of the country, and he will be lucky if he sees the kids a week at
Christmas. Willy Bill now faces fifteen years of child support for children he
will barely know. At best Sally will be heartless about it, at worst vengeful.
The courts will support her every step of the way.
If you think this doesn't happen, regularly, think again. Think several times.
The way to avoid the morass is simply not to marry. Thanks to the Sexual
Revolution, guys don't have to. Find one you like and live with her. If you get
along, keep on living together. Maybe you will have a long, happy life
together. It happens. However, most women give the marry-me-or-leave ultimatum
in about two years max, which means that you'll have to find another. This is
unpleasant, but then the variety is nice. Serial monagamy isn't too bad. (I
personally prefer parallel monogamy, but it isn't real practical.)
Once you tie the knot, your house is toast. But the for-keeps breakpoint, the
one that really hurts, is children. Dead serious, guys, watch this one. Here,
Sally holds all the high cards. I talk to a lot of men who are going crazy
because the ex just remarried and went to Oregon with the kids. They do this.
All the time.
Remember that after the divorce, Sally is going to hate you. The divorce will
have been your fault. You will have failed her in every way. You won't have met
her expectations. That's the opening hand.
She will want to remarry. Fine. If you're crazy, maybe you will want to
remarry. How much do you think she's going to want you around, after she has
re-daddied your children? Is she going to tell New Daddy he can't take that
promotion in Oregon because of your rights to see your kids?
As a rule, she won't concede that you have a right to see your sprats, or that
they have any stake in seeing their father. Her rationale will be the
passive-aggressive formulation, "Well, he's so insensitive I just can't believe
he really wants to see them, blah blah blah."
This is Sally, remember, with the perky smile and soft lips.
Don't do it, guys. At least, don't do it unless you have a bomb-proof pre-nup
saying that when the divorce comes, either party who leaves the region has to
leave the kids with the other.*
It's a hell of a way to begin a marriage. But do it. Do it because you can
count on one thing: The courts will be absolutely on her side.
Better yet, if you want kids, go to Asia and marry. The women are feminine
(consult your dictionary), beautiful, agreeable (consult your dictionary), and
don't have cellulite.
Don't marry, guys. Stay single. The feminists are right on this one. And when
you get married anyway and lose the house and kids, remember that weird
columnist who said it would happen, and he was right.