Men Should Ask These Questions if They're Considering Marriage

This past Monday, Dr. Laura's opening commentary (and the question posted to her Facebook page) was about questions to ask (and, presumably answer) before marrying. [This was originally posted in December 2015 and I'm bumping it up.]

This inspired me to come up with my own list a man should ask himself if he's thinking about marrying a specific woman. So here they are, in no particular order:

It's Not Healthy to Sign Terrible Contracts

Delano Squires had a blog entry over at one of my "favorite" blogs. With a title like "Making Boys Into Men" you just know it's going to be ripe.

Editor’s Note: This week, the Family Studies blog is publishing a series of short essays addressing the meaning and purpose of healthy masculinity in today’s world.

By "healthy masculinity" they mean "Men doing what we like." In their case, that's marrying, having children, and being compliant followers to their leadership. Let's get to Squire's contribution.

American boys and men are in a state of crisis. The notion that masculinity and traditional gender roles are “toxic” forces of oppression is a common refrain in our cultural commentary and political discourse.

Yup.

The first lesson is that no man should feel ashamed of being male, because God created him that way.

Good.

I also believe that men function best in environments marked by order, so I will teach my sons that men who want to lead families need to be led by God’s word.

Married men don't lead families. They might be allowed to appear to lead.

Women Have Options Now

 

People lamenting the the fact that a smaller percentage of Americans are married now than ever before often will ask what has changed to bring this about.

Life has changed, indeed.

One thing that has changed:

Women have options now.

Do you want to change that?

Most people don’t.

It wasn’t all that long ago that women didn’t have full access to higher education, or the workplace, or financial services. Government was smaller with much less or no “social safety net” provided by government. Women who were abused by their husband had few places, if any, to escape and the social pressure, often from their own parents and siblings, was to stay with or go back to her husband. Being divorced could mean destitution and being ostracized.

A woman’s realistic options were:

• Marry young and pop out/raise children, keep the home, maybe work in her husband’s business/the family farm, and be dependent on her husband 
• Depend on her father, uncle, or brother, helping to raise their children and/or working in their business
• Be a teacher or secretary, which they might be expected to give up if they married 
• Be a prostitute 
• Be a nun 

Of course there were some outliers, but those options were what most women faced.

Women can now thrive without ever marrying. Women can decide to leave a marriage and nobody can stop them. They’ll even be applauded and can take half of the wealth with them and get ongoing payments. They can have government take care of them if they don’t take care of themselves. They can have their own residence.

Many women really don’t want to be wife to a husband. Many women don’t want to be mothers. In the past, many women like that were pressured into taking on a husband and having children. Now that they have options, many women opt to NOT marry. That’s just one reason marriage rates are down.

I’m glad women have options, although I want government much smaller and for private charity to handle the legitimate needs of those who need help. And women having options means lower marriage rates. I don’t see that as a problem, as long as women aren’t intentionally depriving a child of their father.

Do you agree? Disagree? Your comments are welcomes, as always.

Valentine's Day Aftermath

Are you an unmarried guy who just spent a lot of money and effort on Valentine's Day, only to get what you used to get all of the time? Or did you get less than that?

Did you even propose marriage and give her a ring?

If you're not married, and you just made a big deal about Valentine's Day, and especially if you proposed marriage, you need to step back and think about what you've done and you are doing. Are you regretful? Are you doubting? Are you asking yourself "Why did I do that?" If not, you probably should be.

Most men shouldn't be in exclusive relationships, and certainly not marriage!

Most unmarried men, if they play their cards right, can get everything they want without spending a lot of money and energy on Valentine's Day, birthdays, holidays, or anniversaries.

If there is a woman who is planning to marry you this June, or any other time this year, you probably need to put the brakes on the relationship, especially if there are any red flags. If you're shacking up and/or if she has kids, plan your escape!

You don't need to be married. And there's a good chance that, deep down, you don't really want to be.

So, get out. And learn to be scarce so that you won't get trapped into wasting money, effort, and time on things like Valentine's Day or meeting a woman's family or friends for holidays.

Be a Free Man.

Translating Happy Hubby Talk

[Bumped up.] Recently I considered what I'm sure I've realized before... that many men who say how great and wonderful marriage is either had no game as bachelors or felt guilt about fornicating. A lot of them are, and always have been, nerds. They couldn't get laid when they were younger, but once some woman figured that she'd better cash in her aging chips and look for "security" and a "good provider" (someone who'd actually be able to pay her way through life) and that she could settle for a nerd because he would have a dependable high salary and probably wouldn't whore around.

Answering Marriage Seller Assertions, Talking Points, and Questions - Part 3

Read Part 1 here and Part 2 here.

Two can live together for less than separately.

What this means is if you're paying $3,000 per month and a woman is paying $2,500 per month, if you marry and move in together, she can stop paying rent or a mortgage and some redundancies will be eliminated, and the overall cost of living for the two of you will be less. Allegedly.

That benefits her. Unless you're already paying her way through life, which you shouldn't, how does that benefit you? IT DOESN'T. Even if she plans to contribute to rent or the mortgage, she will likely push to live in a bigger/more expensive place, there's no guarantee she will even keep working and financially contributing, and you're better of NOT allowing her to develop a claim to a home you owned.

Having her move in to your place puts your place at risk. She can have you kicked out of your own place, compel you to keep paying for her to live there, and claim at least some ownership. Don't allow that! DON'T MARRY! Don't let her move into your place!

Having her move in with you or you moving in with her will also will increase your utility bills and grocery bills, and she will likely insist on removing and replacing many items (especially if she thinks another woman touched them), and that will be costly.

Always keep in mind that divorce is very expensive, and even without divorce, at least half of your earnings are legally shifted to your wife. Wives make 80 percent of the spending decisions.

Stay free and keep control over your own assets and finances. Don't pay a woman's way through life. Respect their independence, their capability, their girl power. Believe women who say women don't need a husband.

Part 4

We Are Not a Project

I found a column by Suzanne Fields at conservative site Townhall. With a headline of "A Good Man Is Still Hard to Find" I took notice. [This entry has been bumped up.]

Women have been complaining since the original Adams family was evicted from the Garden of Eden that "A good man is hard to find."

Whining, complaining, nagging... yep.

Despite radical feminist mockery of the very idea of manliness, that men are natural sexual predators, most women -- with very few exceptions -- still want one.

Of course they do! It's nice to have the cash flow, the bodyguard, an errand boy, and a receptacle for your whines and gripes and thoughts.

The #MeToo movement has nevertheless changed a lot of things in the wake of the sexual harassment-scandal season. One of them is the regard in which men are universally held by women. It often seems we're back to the '80s, when there was a similar assault on the idea of manhood and some women decried all sex as rape.

Radical feminist activists Catherine MacKinnon and Andrea Dworkin were widely credited with saying that "all sex is rape" and "all men are rapists." They both deny the statements, but Dworkin conceded that she did say, "Penetrative intercourse is, by its nature, violent."

No wonder men are choosing to To Their Own Way (see MGTOW).