I have been patiently reading the back and forth on this thread for a few days. I notice that many of those defending marriage here are actually defending aspects of any generic happy relationship - marriage or not - the closeness, the intimacy, cooking etc. “I love my wife more than ever”. That’s very sweet, and I respect that.
But none of it has anything to do with getting married.
I’m sure we all know some couples who have never married but love each other deeply. We probably know a lot more couples who have been married to each other for years - and can’t stand each other!
But ...100% of all divorced couples were married. They all went through the same processes, took the same vows, signed the same papers. Virtually none of them expected to get divorced. And yet they did anyway. And it will happen to 40% or more of marriages!
Talk to any divorced person and it is clear that at its core - after all the romantic trappings are stripped away- marriage is really a legal contract, with certain financial, tax, and legal implications. Some of the implications are good, some bad, all depending on the specific circumstances.
As Mr Tightwad and dvalley have shown, with facts and statistics, is that these implications can carry a lot of risks, especially for men, who are forced to pay the vast majority of alimony despite initiating the minority of divorces. Sure maybe he can mitigate the risks somewhat with a prenup - although these can be and are regularly challenged. Or maybe the divorce will be one of the less than 5% where the ex wife pays more. But these are rare circumstances.
The only way to avoid this sort of catastrophe in the first place is to avoid marriage completely. Which is what more and more men are deciding to do apparently.
Given how common and potentially devastating divorce is, why is it still so taboo to discuss it?