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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

AIBU to think that the institution of marriage is fundamentally deceptive and dishonest?

129 replies

K00kie · 07/04/2017 19:56

Precisely that. Because, at the time you are often under the influence of cortisol and other hormones that won't last - and therefore you're vulnerable - you are made to pledge your entire life to one person, to the exclusion of all others. Regardless of whom you might meet later in life, and regardless of how the person to whom you pledged your life might change with time and so bear little similarity to the person you married. It amounts to institutional misrepresentation.

One might say - it's easy to get a divorce these days, so why worry? But then why bother getting married in the first place if you can get easily divorced?

In fact, even that's not easy as the very sad recent case of Mrs Owens shows - a woman refused a divorce and ordered by ass of a law to remain in unhappy, loveless marriage because, apparently, unhappiness in marriage is to be expected and is no grounds for divorce. How many couples tying the knot are aware of this?!

How many of you can honestly say after 10, 15 or 20 years of marriage or so, that you'd have made the same choice of husband / wife as you did all these years ago? How many of you can say that you still love your husband / wife after all these years?

I see so many couples around me who are disillusioned with their marriages, that seeing wedding couples makes me sick inside.

Any views?

OP posts:

robinia · 08/04/2017 10:41

I don't agree with your thread title. But I agree with a lot of what you say.

mumeeee · 08/04/2017 10:48

YABVU. I was 27 when I got married and will be celebrating our 33rd wedding anniversary in September.
We have had our ups and downs as most people do but we worked through problems together. I love my DH and wouldn't change him for the world.
Our eldest DD has been married 8 years and I know she wouldn't change her DH either.
You have some strange ideas about marriage OP

JassyRadlett · 08/04/2017 10:48

Though you must admit that it's easier to escape from an abusive relationship if you're not married to the abuser, legally at least.

Not really. It's easier to escape with nothing. Much harder to get one's fair share of finances and assets after the escape if not married.

Lumpylumperson · 08/04/2017 10:50

Though you must admit that it's easier to escape from an abusive relationship if you're not married to the abuser, legally at least.

Not especially. I think the abuser is the thing that makes leaving an abusive relationship seem impossible. Not legalities.

DoorwayToNorway · 08/04/2017 10:53

My experience of my marriage does not give me the authority to tell the whole of humanity what marriages are like. It's like someone going on a bad holiday, hearing a couple of stories of friends' bad holiday experiences and then starting a thread suggesting that "All holidays are fundamentally deceptive and dishonest". Get a grip OP.

Original poster

K00kie · 08/04/2017 10:55

Lumpy - good point about relationship boards (I am a relative newcomer to MN). I wonder if overall response would be different if I posted it there.

OP posts:

KateDaniels2 · 08/04/2017 11:00

If i were married to dh for 40 years and then decided it wasnt for us anymore. I would still consider it a success.

Original poster

K00kie · 08/04/2017 11:01

DoorwayToNorway - there has been news precisely about that recently: www.bbc.com/news/business-39529584
That's why I never go on package holidays.

OP posts:

Firesuit · 08/04/2017 11:04

Many of you have said that happy marriage is not about luck, but hard work on the relationship. I'd say it's both, with an emphasis on luck - the luck lies in choosing to marry the person who is committed in the same way as you to making the marriage work, shows you the same affection and respect you show them and continues to show it for decades. Many people don't get that in a partner.

This sums up what is going to say. "Marriage" as such is neither good nor bad, it's what people make it. And if one of the partners turns out to be a selfish abusive sociopath, it's probably not going to be good for the other. (Of course someone doesn't have to be that bad to make a marriage a commitment to regret, you can make someone's life shit by only being a bit of a cunt.)

Good people who have a positive of marriage are even more dependent on luck to get a good marriage. We expect others to behave as we would, it comes as a shock when someone else turns out to live by completely different rules. Assuming they even have rules other than maximising their own well-being at the expense of whoever they can take advantage of.

derxa · 08/04/2017 11:19

Easy to say that marriage is wonderful if you find the right person
No you have to be the right person. Tolerant, accepting of flaws.
We celebrated our 30th this very week. I cannot imagine what life would have been without my DH... and I mean 'D' when I write it.

lizzyj4 · 08/04/2017 11:21

I love this thread, there are so many long-term happily married couples.

I was with my exh for over 20 years, it ended -very- badly and I'm glad we're not together anymore, but I don't regret being married to him, it was right for us at the time. I would probably still do it all again even if I knew what the eventual outcome would be.

That said, I do agree with you to some extent OP, I have several friends who are in unhappy long-term marriages who waste a huge amount of time moaning about it but never do anything about it. That to me is the real tragedy. We only get one life and it's too short to spend years and years in a miserable relationship.

And it's true that the person you divorce is never the person you married. I think going through marriage and divorce you see both the best and the worst of another person.

DJBaggySmalls · 08/04/2017 11:22

YABU, its not marriage thats dishonest. Marriage required honesty and integrity.
I'm not long term happily married but you feel free to write off my opinion.

PNGirl · 08/04/2017 11:35

It's not really about marriage though is it. If you've been with someone 10 years with shared finances, bought a house together and had 2 kids then it's still extremely complicated if you split up. You've entered into a contract to pay off the mortgage and a contract of sorts to raise the children and financially support them. If you can't agree what to do about the house and children, it still goes to the courts to decide.

DoorwayToNorway · 08/04/2017 11:48

KookieDoll you've just proved my point. You take "some" to mean "all". Package holidays are not all holidays and they suit some and not others. I've been married 15 years and it's better than it was when we got together. But that's only my experience. I can't tell others that their experiences are wrong just because they are not the same as mine.

Sharing my life with someone else taught me that my way is not the only way. Some people don't learn this, even some married people.

IfNotNowThenWhenever · 08/04/2017 11:49

I don't want to agree with you OP, but am surprised that there are seemingly so many couples who have been happily married 20+ years on here. There is no one in my entire family who has been, other than one set of gp's and they married late, and he died young, soo..
Most married couples I know seem sort of resigned to it. Sometimes they seem fine and hapy, and then you find out abut the financial abuse, the affairs, the inequalities...I would love to believe in long happy marriages, but I find it hard. Plus, the statistics support what you are saying, sadly.
I know several couples in their 20s who are planning weddings. Many have been together a few years already. With the experiences I have had I can't help but feel cynical about their optimism!

Mermaidinthesea123 · 08/04/2017 11:52

I feel exactly the same KookieDoll, I would much rather have lived in a house with my mother, sisters and our children on our own and taken lovers as I fancied instead of the abusive men I ended up marrying and falling out of love with due to their adultery and so on.
I have no truck with marriage any more. Its bollox. I like men and have many men friends but marriage can do one.

NoSquirrels · 08/04/2017 12:01

Any long-term relationship will be difficult to "escape" from, married or not. Once you've bought property together, or had children, then all the difficulties of divorce are still there if you split from an unmarried relationship. Divorce is just an extra legality (like the marriage certificate) but all the problems of "wasting years of your life" etc. , and dividing assets, and co-parenting will still be there.

Marriage doesn't trap you. Your choices might, though.

VestalVirgin · 08/04/2017 12:07

No you have to be the right person. Tolerant, accepting of flaws.

This is a disgusting thing to say to women who have been in abusive marriages.

I sometimes advise women to get married, but only because if you have children, as a woman in most - perhaps all - countries, you are screwed over anyway, and can't leave, and marrying can help get you a bit more financial safety.

Because we live under patriarchy, there are some legal advantages to marriage that you cannot get any other way (which is why homosexuals campaigned for the right to get married), and it might therefore be advisable for single women to get married to their best friend.

But all in all, I agree with the sentiment that tying her safety and future legally to a man is not in a woman's best interest, generally speaking. It may work for some lucky few, but all in all, it is just too much of a risk to be advisable.

Just deciding to not marry does not solve the core problem, though. We need to change society so that things like inheritance or visiting someone in the hospital are not tied to marriage any more.

80sMum · 08/04/2017 12:17

I met DH when I was 16. I had just started 5th year at school (year 11 nowadays) and he had just left school and started uni. We married 4 years later. We were each others first relationship.

We're still plodding along together 43 years down the line. I have been with him for all but the first 16 years of my life. I can't imagine a life without him in it.

Checklist · 08/04/2017 12:39

DH and I both have the same attitude. Choose someone the same

age
background
intelligence level
who wants children or not

We are both in the same profession, so understand each other when talking about work, and the long hours needed! Being in love is all very well, but it does not need to obliterate your ability to think about whether you have enough in common to last, after the first heady 18 months! We've been married 31 years next month!

derxa · 08/04/2017 12:55

No you have to be the right person. Tolerant, accepting of flaws.

This is a disgusting thing to say to women who have been in abusive marriages.
Bloody hell you must be joking. When I said you have to be the right person, I meant both men and women. And to me 'flaws' are minor things not emotional and physical abuse. Believe me if my DH had carried out either of these behaviours then he wouldn't have seen me for dust.

SheSaidNoFuckThat · 08/04/2017 13:11

Vestal everyone has flaws, talking about the little things you'd like to change but can't - not abusive relationships, that's 2 very different things

BackforGood · 08/04/2017 14:14

If people really knew what is involved in being married - all the hard work, compromise etc etc and all the other things mentioned in posts here - there would be way fewer marriages

That's just not true. I very much went in to my marriage with my eyes wide open.

Apart from a tiny, tiny minority of youngsters who seem to dream of "a wedding", I would presume that most people do. Surely by the time you get married you have a lot of experience of life, and knowledge of all sorts of relationships all around you - through family, friends, colleagues, people you hear of in the media, biographies,eulogies, on so on.
Yes, that's a generalised view of the world, and doesn't mean you won't hit surprises in your own relationship, but then that's the same for any other commitment, from career choices, to - probably the bigges - having your own dc. That is hard work, and involves LOTS of compromises, and even sacrifices, but it is so undoubtably worth it to the vast majority of parents.

Having to work at something doesn't mean it is a bad thing you know.

GnomeDePlume · 08/04/2017 14:36

So what is the choice? Stay single? For many people (not all I know) that could mean loneliness especially when older and more infirm.

OP I don't want to worry you but is it possible that your parents starting to irritate each other after a long happy marriage a sign of one or both of them developing age related problems? I know that DMIL's dementia started with little niggling things which could be quite annoying.

KateDaniels2 · 08/04/2017 14:44

I have several friends who are in unhappy long-term marriages who waste a huge amount of time moaning about it but never do anything about it.

I know people who aren't married but been together a long time, who are the same.

Thats not down to marriage. Plenty of people are in relationships that arent great. Married or not.

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