Perrydox.com is devoted to the pursuit of truth, whether plain or paradoxical, whether simple or sublime, or simply absurd yet absolute.
Trend – Avoiding Marriage
Excuse the crude analogy I will use in a moment. It is a common question asked on social media, and blunt framing of a modern issue.
DIVORCE IS COSTLY
Women are more likely to iniate divorce nowadays. Considering the “bad contract” which can be easily broken wherein the man loses half of his wealth, can’t see his children, and has no guarantees, why would a financially secure man want to get married? That’s why modern men say they are avoiding marriage.
CRUDE ANALOGY
What is the woman “bringing to the table?” And here is where it gets crude, “What do modern women bring to a marriage that a man can’t get by hiring a cook, housekeeper, and a prostitute?
FLAWED PEOPLE
Obviously the person asking this question had a few moral flaws themselves. They aren’t alone. Could it be “modern” women are also flawed? An expanding trend is “passport bros”. These men are seeking women from other cultures than “Western” cultures, ones with more traditional values.
FLAWED MARRIAGE
By these people, marriage is framed as “transactional”, as in what do I get for what I provide? They view traditional marriage as a man working, providing financial security and physical safety. Wives kept the house, raised the kids, and provided sex.
Feminists railed that women were slaves and possessions. Never did they value the sacrifices of both wives sacrifices and husbands.
SHALLOW IDEAS
The question, “What does a man get out of marriage that he can’t buy somewhere else?” is so shallow. “What do you women bring to the table?” is also shallow. Yes, each provides basic needs. Yes, marriage is transactional on one level. But is that all? More importantly, is that the essence of marriage?
DEEPER IDEAS
What do husbands and wives get from each other?
First, it is what each gives. Second, what they give is what they get.
You know where this is going. Is it agape love. It is seeking the best for the other. It is the Christ-Church relationship (Ephesians 5). There we see the “transactional” relationship is sacrfice. It is assurance that those old-fashioned vows will be kept – “to have and to hold from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, until death do us part.”
As I get older (and my wife gets younger!), what we each give is ourselves, even if we don’t always get back an equal amount and appropriate response. This instills confidence knowing the other will always be there until death us does part – there’s those old-fashioned vows again!
All this is something money cannot buy.
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