Spinoff: Should Divorce Be Easy To Obtain?
 

This is one of the question's in Rain Man's <a href="http://www.chiefsplanet.com/BB/showthread.php?t=109798">"Pick A Fight"</a> thread. It started to generate some discussion and rather than hijacking that thread I thought I'd move it here:








It's a myth that fault-based divorce prevents abused spouses from getting out of marriage. As far as I know, abuse has always been a ground for divorce so your concern on this point is largely unwarranted. Even in cases where the abuser is so crafty that he/she can perpetrate the abuse without leaving any evidence, the abused spouse has always had the option to leave the situation with or without a legal divorce. The abuse argument for easy divorce is a canard IMO.

Back in the day, the economics of single income families was more likely to keep an abused spouse in a marriage than the administrative/judicial hurdles to divorce. Nowadays, we don't have nearly as many single income (two parent) families. Women are liberated and are welcome in the workplace.

Making divorce harder to get (i.e. going back to a fault-based system) would keep individuals who have grown bored with their marriage or who have gotten frustrated with the way their spouse loads the toilet paper upside down from walking away in search of a more perfect union.

Do we really not have enough broken homes today that we need to keep whimsical divorces cheap (not counting the support payments, loss of custody, and division of property of course), legal, and relatively common?

Bob Dole's divorce was neither whimsical nor cheap. The financial ass-raping Bob Dole took is reason enough to remain single for the forseeable future.

I believe you.

If you were the one who wanted the divorce, would you have been able to get it in a jurisdiction that required fault or mutual agreement?

If you didn't want your divorce, would your spouse have been able to get the divorce in a jurisdiction that required fault?

All you wealthy bastards deserve to be ass-raped--without lube. :harumph:

;)

I think they should be relatively easy to get. I think the costs for a divorce is outrageous. I also think they need to stop making the women the victim in all cases. They get the money, the other assets, and the kids in most cases, even if the dad is a good father. That is bullshit.

A divorce decree should be no more easy or difficult to get than a marriage certificate...

only fair that if it's 'easy' to get INTO it then it should be just as 'easy' to get OUT of it.

I hate no fault divorce. It's somebody's fault damn it. Rarely do both parties just up and decide together that they want to end the marriage. No fault makes it easy for people to not have to work on their marriage and just "break up" like they were in high school. This is why marriage is a religious institution, or should be anyway...

You'd know....wasn't that what your HS yearbook said: "Mrs. Easy...easy to get into, and easy to get out of..."

If it were harder to end then people would probably think harder about getting into it in the first place, I see the logic there.

The theory of that sounds good; but in reality, when a couple is in 'love,' would it honestly make a difference? I don't know.

Personally, I wouldn't object; but makin' it "harder" in a society based on instant gratification, is unlikely and probably pointless.

I was just thinking how women already have little to lose on the deal, because if it doesn't work out then they just get to take the man to the cleaners.

As a teacher, do you notice any difference in the kids who live in broken homes versus the kids who have intact families (generally speaking of course)?

I certainly have, just amongst the people I know and associate with on a regular basis.

It's not society's job to force people to remain legally tied to each other against their wishes. Divorce should be relatively easy to obtain.

I will note that I wouldn't be worried about a 30, 60 or maybe even a 180 day "wait" between when you file for divorce and when it is granted, to give the parties a chance to cool down or reconcile or whatever, but to make it onerous to get a divorce is just silly in my mind.

Depends on who (or what) you are married to.......

Just a generalization, but of the people I know that come from "broken" homes, they seem to have had marriage problems of their own.

I had (emphasis on had) a friend whose father was married 5 different times. Its no wonder to me that every girlfriend my friend had, he treated like shit.

I also have a friend whose parents got divorced, but he seems normal. At least he does now, after being in the Navy for 5 years.

Basically all of my friends come from "broken" homes except one of them. The only difference between us and them is, our parents got married at an older age (30's).

Of course. Big time. So, would it be desirable social policy, IF it led to couples tryin' to "work it out" in situations where there truly is hope? Absolutely.

That said, American obsession with truly radical notions of "freedom," "choice," and "egalitarianism" would trump any consideration of what many would call "marginal" benefits. We are too selfish, too arrogant, and too blind to see past our own personal gratification and "happiness."

The irony is that numerous studies I've read over the years state that, generally (of course), divorced people more often than not make the same choices and often marry someone else later who is remarkably similar to their former spouse. Of course, there are exceptions, and some people who "learn" from their experiences--make no mistake about that. Many though, end up no happier in their new relationships than they were in their old--and yet the divorce has also negatively impacted their children.

So, would making divorce more difficult be a net gain for society? Probably. Is it going to happen? Not a chance. We are too narcisistic (I am as well) for it to ever happen.

It started out as a mutually agreeable divorce in Texas, which is a community property state. However, as things progressed, she got increasingly more greedy and bitter (at the prodding of her parents, primarily), changed legal representation 3 times and dragged the process out over a year, even though there were no children.

On the day scheduled for the actual hearing (or whatever it's called), her legal counsel managed to postpone the thing after Bob Dole sat at the courthouse for 3 hours, then finagled a last-minute change of venue (or whatever its called) later in the day. After getting dressed and driving the 25 miles to the new location, the judge was already in a pissy mood because they had been waiting for 45 minutes, completely ignoring that the was no advance notice of the time and location change. On top of that, she managed to manufacture claims of infidelity out of thin air while offering no evidence of such behavior and sobbing uncontrollably.

The end result was an irritable, Bible-thumping judge who decided that Bob Dole was such a POS that the whole concept of community property wasn't worth observing, and he gave her pretty much everything. Bob Dole got a lot of debt that wasn't even his (50% of her student loans, for example), the automobile with a bank note attached, his La-Z-Boy recliner, and not much else.

Bob Dole was left so financially crippled that appealing the decision (which Bob Dole was told that in Texas, would have gone right back to the same damned judge that made the decision for the first level appeal) wasn't really a viable option.

Seven out of every ten men in prison come from a broken home.

There is no job description for society so I'll assume that your first statement is a statement of opinion rather than an assertion of fact.

Considering the vast amount of time you spend posting on the Planet and reading studies, how do you ever find time to work?

I wonder if that could be broken down in to 2 categories: Children whose parents are divorced, or children whose parents were never married.

Of course I do. Add up all my time "posting" and it would be a total of less than one-two hours, depending on the day....of the ten that I typically spend at school each day.

I've become a very talented multi-tasker. And I type about 80-90 words per minute. :thumb:

The types of hurdles I have in mind are things like denying custody and support to a spouse who leaves against the wishes of the other spouse and without any grounds for doing so (e.g. abuse, infidelity, addiction, etc.). On the other hand, if it were mutual or if the spouse who wants to leave has grounds for the divorce then custody and support would be available. If a person wants to leave a marriage that hasn't been marred by the types of things mentioned above, then they should be able to do so. They just shouldn't be able to take the kids and a portion of the spouse's future earnings with them. And they probably ought to be at a disadvantage when it comes to separating the marital property.

Does that really matter?

I'm sorry to hear your story. It's all too common IMO. This is the kind of thing that leads me to my position. If she had no evidence of misbehavior on your part, she shouldn't have been able to take you to the cleaners like she did. It's not right. Thank goodness there weren't children involved.

I think there could be, and most likely is a difference between children whose parents divorced at a young age, and a child who never knew their father.

It is doubtful that we would have divorced had there been children involved.

Bottom line, kids are put at risk. There are no excuses for that.

But the root of the problem lies elsewhere, not divorce. Making it harder to divorce would not change that statistic, IMO. People will still rush in to marriage, and have children too quick.

BS. Saying divorce isn't a mitigating factor sounds like someone who has never had children.

I've heard that when it comes to kids from single-parent families, it makes a difference whether the other parent is absent due to divorce or death (death being a better situation for the kids). I wouldn't be surprised if there is also a difference between kids who never knew one parent, kids who were young when their parents divorced, and kids who were older when it happened. I suspect it is hardest on kids who are grade school and junior high school aged (as opposed to preschool, high school, or adult children).

disagree. Trivializing the pain and saying that one kid hurts more or less doesn't change the fact that children, especially boys, need a man in their life. Period.

I should abstain from the argument as I obviously have no frame of reference, as pointed above, but, I believe divorce is just the end result of an otherwise "bad" marriage. Be it from cheating, or incompatibility. I don't think a child should have to suffer through either a divorce, or a marriage that has gone bad. Making divorce more difficult to get would only prolong the bad experience.

That being said, I don't think there is a "real" answer. Perhaps make marriages more difficult to get, or making children more difficult to have. Each of course, are a bit unrealistic...

Agreed, but I think thats his point And mine. A child from a broken home may live with both a father and a mother. My experiences have taught me that those children seem to take it better, than those who have no father or mother at all.

I refuse to accept your disagreement. ;)

We agree on most of this and I certainly didn't mean to trivialize anything, but I think it's fair to say that every unique situation leads to a different impact on the kids and some general differences can be found between groups. As much as I dislike divorce, I recognize that there are some situations where the absence of a particularly bad parent is better for a kid than the presence of that parent. I'm talking, for example, about child abusers, hopeless drug addicts, completely irresponsible bums who put their kids in danger through their extreme negligence, etc. I'm NOT talking about the majority of cases where I believe the presence of both parents is a positive.

Taking marriage vows seriously would help. The breakdown of the family in this country is disheartening. Did you know that suicide has gone up 60% worldwide since the 50's? suicide causes more deaths than homicide in this country?

I went to my daughters school one day....and met a freind of hers..."are you Sydney's Dad....I don't have a dad..." "You don't?" ..."Nope, my parents are divorced...."

This EIGHT year old girl equated divorce to not HAVING a dad....


:shake: Adults need to grow the hell up and realize their kids are more important than themselves.

I quibble with your use of the word "only." Making divorce more difficult might prolong a bad experience in some cases, but in others it would allow a temporarily bad experience to recover and prevent the kid from going through the bad experience of divorce and life in a broken home.

I'll agree to that...%100

So true. That's why they call them "vows" in the first place. Unfortunately, they are treated like boilerplate these days.

Exactly. Every marriage is vulnerable..it wouldn't mean anything if it wasn't.

People do not consider long-term consequences of their actions. People just do whatever the hell it is they want to do at the moment and think that everything can go back to normal if and when they choose. Think for a moment on all the unwanted pregnancies. Think of all the teens who smoke cigarrettes. Think of all the crimes committed regardless of the penalties. I don't believe that making divorce more difficult to obtain will at all affect people's willingness to get married.

Because a life in a home where two adults battle each other every day is a healthy environment. I ain't buyin that.

The only thing that I would say that might be in partial agreement with what your saying is that I think there should be some sort of mandatory counseling involved before petitioning for a divorce.

Or better yet, mandatory counseling before you get married. Again, though, that is a church thing. My wife and I were married Catholic, even though she isn't. Her family rolled their eyes at the "silly waste of time" counseling that the Church requires. Lemme tell ya, it was well worth it. We learned a whole lot about each other that we just wouldn't even have thought of, and it made our decision to marry a little more meaningful. It also armed us for the inevitable conflicts that arose.

I just wish everyone would take it seriously. Too many don't and that is why the divorce rate is through the roof... :shake:

I'd say that sounds about right. I'm really appalled at the extent some Planet members want the state to interfere with personal relationships.

I don't know how many different ways I can say that your abuse/war-of-the-roses scenario isn't the problem in EVERY divorce. For extreme cases like the ones you are fixated on, divorce would be available even under a fault-based system. For the LESS extreme cases, the ones that you seem to ignore, a less permissive divorce law would keep people from splitting at the drop of a hat because the party who wanted to leave would have to bear the economic cost and loss-of-custody cost of the breakup unless they were leaving for a good reason (e.g. abuse, infidelity, etc).

My political ideology is basically libertarian (although I'm not a utopian). For me this isn't an issue of increased state interference in personal relationships. The state is already up to it's elbows in marriage/divorce. In a divorce, absent mutual agreement by the parties, the state dictates property division, child custody, and future support payments. You can't get much more involved than that.