Yeah, no shit people don't approve of this

[trinityvixen]

So this woman is out to save marriage from divorce in Oklahoma. This may be an unpopular thing to say, but I applaud her for at least having the courage of her convictions and going full-on with the crazy and not being a hypocrite. See, she really does think gays are a threat to marriage. And she sat a good long time and thought, "Gee, you know what else is a threat to marriage?"

Et voila, she has something she wants done about divorce. Not that she intends to be any less batshit, rights-denying, human-hating about this than she is about gay marriage. This woman wants you married, goddamnit, and you will stay that way, so help her GOD...

Her rules would basically make it impossible for all but childless couples and those who get married at Vegas chapels on drunken binges (are you listening, Britney Spears?) to get divorced. You couldn't divorce for "incompatibility" if you'd been married for ten years or more (because every thing that might happen to you to change your personality has only a ten-year window in which to happen which opens right after you get married and nothing good/bad/major will ever happen to you or your spouse after that window is closed). You also can't divorce for "incompatibility" if you have minor children, which means that unless you were living in sin with the partner with whom you had children until those children were 6-7-8 years of age, HA HA NO DIVORCE FOR YOU. I suppose that's one way to keep an eye on those people of ill repute who would dare to birth bastards in this day and age. (That's probably her next suggestion: finding a way to declare certain kinds of children legally illegitimate in a country with no royalty.)

You also can't object to a divorce on "incompatibility" grounds if the other person objects. Would love to be in that Divorce Court. ("Your Honor, we're clearly incompatible! He wants a divorce and I don't! Er, wait...") It's the kind of logical conundrum that would kill off our Robot Overlords.

The non-funny side to this is that a person who is not outright abusive or unfaithful could trap you in a marriage basically forever by refusing to divorce you. Two things about that: 1) No one should ever have that power over you again, which is why divorce exists at all. 2) If this whole thing were to pass, that person could hold you until such time as you hit the big Tin/Aluminium Anniversary and became ineligible. (Ooh, did this Rep. know that the traditional presents for that anniversary are so...tarnishable?) ::shudders at the thought::

No fault divorce! The three best words in the English language!

Comments

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

Legal enforcement will stop divorce. So will making divorce illegal. The point is not that divorce can be stopped but that stopping divorce is a stupid, intrusive waste of time for any governing body. Yes, recklessly divorcing people end up in court and waste time there. But many divorcing couples use lawyers, file briefs, and go home, peaceable as Buddhists. Imagine how much more of a waste of goddamned time it would be to try and run around mediating divorce with force--which is basically what this woman is advocating by making anyone who falls into her restrictions have to fight to get out of a marriage.

There was a time when divorce was illegal. What happened? People fucked around. People were estranged. People up and left spouses. People were awful to each other generally. And people DEFINITELY still wanted to goddamn divorce each other. Divorce, like abortion, like lying, will always happen. Making it illegal doesn't change that. Prevention--like you were possibly unknowingly advocating with talk about counseling, etc.--is a great way to decrease the number of divorces, but there's a natural divorce rate, and it's not going anywhere.

Put it another way: ever wonder why most animals don't mate for life?

[saikogrrl.livejournal.com]

Er, I wasn't advocating her view, just mentioning it as a possible response.

"Unknowingly"? Um, that sounds kind of patronising. Of course I was advocating that as a preventative response instead of enforced marriage etc, I thought that was implied.

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

I just didn't know if you'd forwarded it in the same light as I was alluding to, which is that counseling aforethought is tantamount to divorce prevention in the same way that birth control is to abortion prevention.

My apologies if you got to that metaphor just as I did. I didn't intend to patronize. Patronizing is bad, and I am sorry.

[saikogrrl.livejournal.com]

It's ok, I didn't think you were doing it on purpose :)

It's an interesting metaphor, though an imperfect comparison, since birth control is tied up in religious issues, whereas counselling is not.

We also have this kind of cooling off period here, I know my high school friend had to notify the government or something 30 days before the wedding. Maybe a longer cooling off period would help as prevention as well, without all the connotations of trapping people or 'punishing' them...

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

It's an interesting metaphor, though an imperfect comparison, since birth control is tied up in religious issues, whereas counselling is not.

But marriage is. I think it's as near to a perfect comparison as you get, seeing as the Catholic Church started up all the nonsense about legitimate marriage (and divorce) in order to obtain power over the more legitimately, overtly powerful warlords/kings. The fight to determine what is or is not marriage is intimately tied up with religious causes, and those most focused on divorce despite their inability to avoid it draw from the same pool as would (and do) say "abortion for me, not for thee."

We also have this kind of cooling off period here, I know my high school friend had to notify the government or something 30 days before the wedding. Maybe a longer cooling off period would help as prevention as well, without all the connotations of trapping people or 'punishing' them...

Cooling off would imply, to me, that one is doing so after intending to divorce, not to marry, though I can see how it would be for marriage, too. I think cooling off is generally a good idea for divorce regardless. Some time apart to remember the good and forget the bad or at least put the bad in perspective ("Do I really need to divorce this person over XYZ? Or can we just work on it?") is helpful. I am not even morally opposed to legislating that, giving a minimum (but short) period between stating intent to divorce and divorcing. The only issue I see is that prolonging divorce when desired is almost never helpful, to either party, and it assumes that a person getting divorced has the luxury of taking off all the time (or paying a lawyer for all the time) in the world to get it done. Not everyone is so fortunate.

[saikogrrl.livejournal.com]

I meant it's imperfect not in relation to marriage itself, which is tied up in religion, but in the prevention. Counselling is something inoffensive that any religious person, no matter how batshit, would most likely not object to. Whereas birth control is a highly contentious solution for many religious people.

Oh and I meant cooling off before getting married, as another prevention, to make sure they are really sure. But your idea for a divorce cooling off period is also interesting, and may help a little, even if only with avoiding taking up court time etc with relationships which may be able to be salvaged.

But a lawyer doesn't need to be retainered for all that time? Couldn't it just be a civil registration thing, like you said to register intent, then come back say a month later and say yup, we still want to divorce, please let us sign the papers.

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

I meant it's imperfect not in relation to marriage itself, which is tied up in religion, but in the prevention. Counselling is something inoffensive that any religious person, no matter how batshit, would most likely not object to. Whereas birth control is a highly contentious solution for many religious people.

My mistake there, I apologize.

But a lawyer doesn't need to be retainered for all that time? Couldn't it just be a civil registration thing, like you said to register intent, then come back say a month later and say yup, we still want to divorce, please let us sign the papers.

Um, probably?

[saikogrrl.livejournal.com]

No no, I mean you were saying it would be prohibitively expensive for some people to have a cooling off period, but I don't think it would? Why would they need to pay the lawyer for the whole cooling off period when there's nothing to be done in between but wait?

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

It really depends. What people fail to realize is that, short of a divorce between childless people with no mutual assets, divorce takes a long time regardless. Any step that lengthens the process is going to be a costly one, nine times out of ten. You wouldn't need a lawyer for a cooling off period, not the whole time anyway, but there's no way of telling what will or will not get more complicated in the interim. It's just a bad idea in general, I think, to open oneself up to spending more time in a court room.

Unless you can file the first part entirely via a clerk and this could be done feasibly for all or most in non-working hours, you're going to burden people who don't have the luxury of taking the time (or paying other people to do it).