[quote=davelj][quote=harvey][quote=davelj]You use the word “definitely” and I’m not sure where your proof lies. This might be the case. And it might not. Frankly, I would like to think that it is. I just haven’t seen much evidence of it.[/quote]
You’re say you’re not sure there is evidence of correlation between parenting and a woman’s choices in relationships…
…on a thread about prostitution?
Let’s take a trip to the Bunny Ranch and chat with some of the gals. If you can find one girl who had a father even half as committed as flu, I’ll buy you an hour with her.[/quote]
I’m not sure that prostitution is more about socioeconomic background than anything else. (Although one could argue that not having a father around can lead to a bad socioeconomic situation… and then we’d be getting into issues of correlation versus causation.)
Allow me to make a crass comparison to raise a point.
Profile 1: Upper-middle class wife (whose parents remained married) who remains married to her husband (and the father of her children) – whom she doesn’t really like much anymore – only “to keep the family together” and maintain material comforts.
Profile 2: Woman from lower socioeconomic stratum (whose parents divorced) who has sex with men in exchange for the money she needs to live and take care of her kids.
What’s the difference, really? They’re both having sex with men they don’t love to maintain a standard of living for them and their kids. The first is legal; the second one’s not.
I’m just sayin’…
(I’ll pass on the Bunny Ranch but I appreciate the offer.)[/quote]
There are HUGE differences between these two situations.
When children are involved, everything changes. Marriage is about far more than “romantic love.”
I’m willing to bet that the #2 woman would prefer to be with the father of her children instead of having to “turn tricks” in order to support her children. Keeping the family intact is very important, though it’s not “politically correct” to admit this. There is overwhelming evidence that children have better outcomes when they live with both parents vs. living with divorced parents. Also, splitting marital assets leaves **everybody** worse off.
Agreeing to hang out for as long as everything is “hunky dory” is called dating…though some people get confused and marry when they are not really committed to the other person. REAL marriage is (IMHO) what people do when they are committing to go through the most difficult times together.
Most children would prefer to have their parents stay married even if the parents have a “loveless” marriage (not referring to the outliers where there is **severe** adiction/abuse/adultery going on).
Some interesting info on divorce and happiness, which might be intuitive to many married people, offers a likely explanation for why many don’t divorce even when they are in a “loveless” marriage:
————
Does Divorce Make People Happy?
Findings from a Study of Unhappy Marriages
By Linda J. Waite, Don Browning, William J. Doherty, Maggie Gallagher, Ye Luo, and Scott M. Stanley
• Unhappily married adults who divorced or separated were no happier, on average, than unhappily married adults who stayed married. Even unhappy spouses who had divorced and remarried were no happier, on average, than unhappy spouses who stayed married. This was true even after controlling for race, age, gender, and income.
• Divorce did not reduce symptoms of depression for unhappily married adults, or raise their self-esteem, or increase their sense of mastery, on average, compared to unhappy spouses who stayed married. This was true even after controlling for race, age, gender, and income.
• The vast majority of divorces (74 percent) happened to adults who had been happily married five years previously. In this group, divorce was associated with dramatic declines in happiness and psychological well-being compared to those who stayed married.
…• Two out of three unhappily married adults who avoided divorce or separation ended up happily married five years later. Just one out of five of unhappy spouses who divorced or separated had happily remarried in the same time period.
