Two perspectives on marriage

I was on a business trip last week, travelling with two colleagues, a man and a woman, both married, both in their early 50’s. I had a couple marriage related conversations I’d like to tell you about to illustrate four points:

1. The significant financial and emotional risk of being married.
2. The common dogmatic assumption that everyone should want to be married, just because that’s the way it is.
3. The fallacy that not wanting to be married means you are afraid of commitment.
4. The fallacy that being married is required to have kids.

My first conversation was with the man, and illustrates point #1:

Infidelity is a one way street

The good news is that we’re finally talking rationally about infidelity.

More and more couples are choosing open marriages-- that is, marriages in which they spouses agree that being sexual with someone outside the marriage is okay.

The bad news is that no one seems to want to talk about the obvious: male infidelity is different than female infidelity. I hate to let the cat out of the bag, but men and women are different. Not only are their sexual appetites different, but when they do want sex, they want it for different reasons.

I’ve written previously about the fundamental mismatch in sexual appetites between men and women. The natural corollary is that no one should be surprised by male infidelity. Frankly, I don’t think anyone really is surprised when it happens. So why does our society continue to be shocked and appalled when men are unfaithful (if that's what you want to call it)?

Ask Men dating survey results

As I mentioned earlier, Ask Men has partnered with Cosmo to put together a great survey on the dating habits and tastes of men and women. Check them out if you have the chance. For now, I'll summarize the best results relating to the topics of this blog:

On marriage:

• To the question of whether or not they believe in marriage, 85% of women say “Yes, definitely!”, while only 66% of men say they plan to participate. Hmm, I wonder if that is a reflection of who is favored by the rules of engagement.
• How important is a prenup? 32% of men say somewhat or very important, versus only 26% of women.  Do you see a trend here?
• When asked which sex gets screwed in divorce courts, 79% of men and 41% of women say men get screwed. 1% of men and 18% of women think women get screwed. So both sexes agree. Men get screwed. Can we update these laws now? Waddya say we make things a little more fair?

On infidelity, sex, and attraction:

Sex drive and marriage

One problem with marriage, or any lifetime monogamous relationship for that matter, is that men’s and women’s sex drives just don’t match up long term.

The male sexual appetite is stronger, stays high for longer, and is focused primarily on a physical attractiveness, which tends to decay with time in women (in both sexes to be fair, but less dramatically in men).

On the other hand, the female sex drive is weaker, peaks during “child bearing” years, falling off dramatically over the age of forty, and tends to be more about non-physical qualities, many of which, such as power and success, increase in men as they age.

To illustrate this imbalance, I complied some data from several different sources to develop the following chart. It plots the male and female sex hormones with age, relative to their respective peak production:

Larry David on marriage

Again, it takes a comedian to speak the truth. This time from Larry David's Rolling Stone interview:

David says he's unlikely to ever get married again. "It would be a silly thing to do," he says. "Why would I do it? Why would I want that contract? I already have kids. The best situation is being a single parent. The best part about is that you get time off, too, because the kids are with their mom, so it's the best of both worlds. There's a lot to be said for it. You get married, you have kids – you should plan this from the beginning. We're going to have these kids, then we'll get divorced when they're four. All right, six."

Sounds like a good plan to me. Just make sure you have a solid prenup. And make sure it covers child support.

This week in...

...child support

• Who knew failing to pay child support could get you shot in the back by a police officer as you try to run away.
• I said it before, and I’ll say it again. See this film if you have the opportunity.
• A man pays child support for 16 years for a child that isn’t his.
  

...women

• For some reason, women just like to worry... and complain.
• We watch female sports if and when the athletes are hot, not for any other reason.

...dating, mating, and baboons

• It turns out, it’s pretty good to be No. 2.

You just can’t fight nature

Gender roles are based on nature, not societal pressure, customs, or whatever feminists would like to believe. They developed out of men and women’s innate differences. Men are better and some things, and women are better at others, on average. So the fact that your wife won’t respect you if you’re a stay at home dad is no surprise to me.

Don’t get married

Although it’s written by a comedian, Dean Obeidallah, this piece has a lot of truth to it (Isn’t that what makes the best comedy). It echoes many of my problems with marriage. First, that it’s a vestigial institution without much relevancy today:

Just because you have the legal right to wed, this doesn't mean it's a good idea. Marriage is as outdated as a Sony Discman and MySpace... The concept of marriage was created thousands of years ago and has not been updated since.

Second, the fallacy of one reason people often sight for marriage -- security and commitment:

9 more reasons (links)

1. If you don’t get married, you can still have a wonderful relationship with one of the world’s most beautiful people, raise a bunch of kids, and in general have a great life. Just ask Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie. Still not married.
2. You'll also be much less likely to have a woman cut your penis off, either figuratively or literally.
3. Nor will you be the victim of domestic violence at the hands of a raging psychopath like this woman who attacked the judge at her divorce hearing.
4. Christie Brinkley can tell you that marriage is ridiculous. Add her to the list of successful women who agree with me.
5. Those with experience think prostitution is just a form of dating. Actually, it's the other way around. Dating is a form of prostitution. And so is marriage!
6. You may have heard about the new trend of celebrating a divorce, but the truth is, there’s no such thing as an amicable divorce.
7. Why take yourself off the market when dating technology is advancing so rapidly? OkCupid is adding a location-based feature to its mobile app.
8. If you’re woman is going to manipulate you into proposing, what makes you think she won’t be manipulating you for the rest of your life?
9. We know child support isn't about the child, but this woman didn't get the memo. She's suing for child support 34 years later.

10 more reasons not to get married

1. If you don't get married, you'll never have to stand next to your wife and look like this chump while she gushes over her uncontrollable spending habits.
2. If you don't get married, your wife can never claim she has a right to your music catalog.
3. If you get married, your spouse might attempt to electrocute you after you tell them you want a divorce.
4. If you don't propose, no one can keep the engagement ring after refusing your proposal.
5. If you don't get married, you don't have to worry about perfecting the art of arguing.
6. The founder of eHarmony thinks you shouldn’t get married.
7. If you get married in NJ, your wife can plant a GPS tracker in your car.
8. If you don't get married, you won't have to come up with terms like "none-ogamy" to describe your sexless marriage.
9. Nor will you have to train your marriage dragon, whatever that is.
10. And finally, if you don't get married, you won't have to divide your apartment in half.

Rich women don't want to marry either

Charlize Theron isn't interested in marriage.

A long-term relationship...That's the kind of union that I want. The actual ceremony is not something that is important to me.

My guess is that it's because she's able to support herself financially. Is it just me, or is this sort of attitude common among celebrities and other women who are independently wealthy? If you are a breadwinner, male or female, our family law system makes marriage a losing proposition.

And let's not forget that richer people also want fewer children. Gee, I wonder why. Do you think it has anything to do with child support?

Marriage: easy in, not so easy out

You can now get a marriage certificate from a vending machine for a buck. Don’t worry, it’s not official. On the other hand, I'm sure a good lawyer could get your lady a sweet alimony deal based on one of these novelty certificates, especially here in California.

Let’s hope something like this becomes available for prenups.

Four more reasons (links)

1. If you’re a man who wants to feel what it’s like to be pregnant (no thanks), you can try this contraption.
2. More resentment of men for, well, being men.
3. I wonder how many men these days wish they could sell their wives.
4. Congrats to Master P’s lawyers. Why do I have the feeling this victory will be short lived?

Your online hijinks can and will be held against you

I’ve written about the crazy stuff that happens on Facebook] before. And we all know the stories of politicians done in by indiscreet e-behavior. But most of us aren't important enough to have anyone care about one or two misguided tweets... unless we’re married.

More and more, lawyers are combing the internet for evidence to use in divorce and child custody cases. That’s right, the stuff you post online might find its way into the body of evidence in family court.

In one child custody case, a woman’s lawyers used “a YouTube video of her former spouse partying on a 60-foot yacht in the Bahamas with multiple women” to persuade the judge that he was a bad parent.

In another example...

Chicago divorce attorney Dean Dussias had a client who was concerned his wife was cheating on him with someone over the Internet. After conducting searches and finding alias names in emails, Dussias discovered she was performing sexual acts and streaming the video on the Web for money.

Awesome. But if that doesn't make you cringe at the prospect of divorce proceedings, check out this even wilder story...

The smartest things I've read today

"Condemning is easy; fixing is hard." -- From an psychotherapists’ look at how Rep. Weiner might save his marriage.

And also from Psychology Today, "Everything said about Anthony Weiner is... bullshit."

From the Salon article I wrote about earlier.

[T]his latest political sex scandal had me seriously reconsidering whether monogamous marriage is realistic... All of this leads me to re-conclude that I won't be marrying a politician or a celebrity. That isn't to say that I won't also reconsider my definition of marital faithfulness -- and if I do, something tells me I'll have plenty of company.

"Men will not be committing [sex crimes] if they are sexually satisfied at home." -- The grand idea behind the founding of the Obedient Wives Club.

And more wisdom imported from Malaysia.

Men have only one desire, which is for women, while women have nine desires for a new handbag, new shoes and many more... Women today, however, feel that it is the men who should understand them and fulfill all their needs.

Marriage getting cheaper?

Leave it to the free market to work around problems created by over-regulation. Now you can offset some of the financial risk that comes with marriage by buying divorce insurance.

“WedLock” is a new type of casualty insurance that gives the unhappily married a payout after he or she is divorced.

It’s seems the founder came up with the idea after being burned by divorce himself:

[He] conceived the idea for Wedlock following his divorce 10 years ago. “My finances went to hell in a handbag,” he said. “I thought I can't be the only schmuck this is happening to. That was my ‘aha' moment.”

If you ask me, this is a welcome innovation that addresses one of the key issues I have with marriage. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like it’s going to be a solution. Without prohibativley expenisve premiums, your payout probably isn’t going to put a significant dent in what you might be on the hook for in terms of alimony and/or child support:

Infidelity, everyone's doing it

As I’ve pointed out before infidelity is not all that common. It's difficult to measure, since no one really wants to admit to it, but no matter how you slice it, lot's of people are doing it. But how many? What portion of spouses are unfaithful? 10%? 50%? 80%? Salon looks at the opinions of a few experts who study the matter:

The best educated guess, according to researchers at the University of Texas at Austin, is that an affair takes place within 40 to 76 percent of marriages: "A conservative interpretation of these figures suggests that although perhaps half of all married couples remain monogamous, the other half will experience an infidelity over the course of a marriage."

And here's another take:

As the anthropologist Helen Fisher explains, a meta-analysis of a dozen American infidelity studies found that "31% of men and 16% of women had had a sexual affair that entailed no emotional involvement; 13% of men and 21% of women had been romantically but not sexually involved with someone other than their spouse; and 20% of men and women had engaged in an affair that included both a sexual and emotional connection."

OK, so it depends on who you ask, and what you call infidelity. But suffice it to say, a lot of people are stepping out.

Satisfy your man, and he'll never stray

Other cultures just seem to do things better than we in America. For whatever reason, we tend to ignore, or refuse to except, the laws of nature. Not these women in Malasia.

The Obedient Wives Club is a place where members can go for counseling and discussion forums on the how's and why's of keeping their men sexually satisfied:

[V]ice-president Dr Rohaya Mohamed [a woman] said the secret to a happy family and subsequently the solution to all of society's ills is a happy man at home, which can be achieved if women served their husbands like “first-class prostitutes”.

And director Fauziah Ariffin (a woman) agrees:

Top 5 weekend links

Better pay your “child support” or the law will catch up to you.

Turns out, not only could you end up paying alimony and child support after a divorce, but you could also be on the hook for your spouse’s tax debts.

Another piece of evidence supporting my long held belief that people who like cats are crazy.

The Heritage Foundation thinks marriage is in trouble (agree), and we need to save it (disagree).

Don’t wear a skirt while riding a bike in NYC.

Bravo Alec Baldwin

The original Jack Ryan has a piece in The Huffington Post defending Rep. Weiner against everyone piling on top of his personal crisis. Here's Alec Baldwin, the realist:

[Wiener] needs something to take the edge off. For some people, regardless of occupation, that could mean booze, drugs, gambling, food or shopping. For high functioning men like Weiner and other officials who have lived through such scandals, who are constantly on the go, that leaves one tried and true source of a reliable high. The affirmation that comes when someone lets you know they want to sleep with you. Or even cyber-sleep with you.

The bottom line is this: people cheat because they can. And of course, because they want to. As Baldwin puts it:

Appointment sex with your spouse doesn't always arrive when you need it most. A modern cell phone, loaded with contacts of willing fellow players [is] ready for you at virtually any time.

People, and men in particular, have sexual needs. I remain skeptical that those needs can be met within the confines of a monogamous marriage. The Weiner affair (pun intended) is just one more piece in a rather large pile of evidence.