then they shouldn't be together. IF they REALLY WANT EACH OTHER and the cheating was an "abberation" then fine, but how often is that really the case. What is really going on here is the same old thing: it's not about people trying to be happy while fulfilling necessary obligations it's about God, country, obligation, the children, something that involves submission to authority.

I think we should end marriage...like in many European countries where marriage is the exception. I don't really see the benefit of marriage, at least for guys. As a guy, you are supposed to commit to one person...but why? It's not natural. It goes against nature.

Say you were governor of a state, and you you sex with some Argentinian; if you were not married, the moral crusaders wouldn't have anything to stand on.

You set up a false dividing line between stamina and satisfaction in a marriage, when these are obviously not mutually exclusive. Are you really saying that all marriages that experience infidelity are unsatisfying? This seems mean spirited and judgemental, and isn't what I expected from you.

That the marriages that survive infidelity must be hollow shams.

There's nothing to say that - any more than there is any data to suggest that faithful marriages are not also hollow shams. Marriage is complex, and some are strong enough to survive an affair, learn, and grow stronger - and more in love. And other people live together, faithfully, in total indifference or even hate.

Surviving infidelity means you value your marriage, love your spouse enough to forgive, love your spouse enough to seek forgiveness and do what is needed to stay together for the cheater. It's a good sign for marriage. That type of commitment doesn't come from a lack of love.

You think that Kate is setting a better example for marriages and her children that couples that actually work to make their marriages work?

So when parenting gets tough, should you throw in the towel there, too? When your kid disappoints you and betrays you, you should dump them too?

Nice!

"You think that Kate is setting a better example for marriages and her children that couples that actually work to make their marriages work?

So when parenting gets tough, should you throw in the towel there, too? When your kid disappoints you and betrays you, you should dump them too?"

____________________

that's pretty much the women of salon's philosophy. if you've been around here for a while, you would see that.

Pretty shallow assessment of marriage in her comments.

Kinda shows that her need to make sure she's following the feminist rulebook is interfering with her ability to really connect.

My wife and I have been together for over half of our lifespan. We know each other better than we know our parents or siblings.

That's a lot to throw away.

Hopefully not a bridge we cross. But if things are so black and white, it means you aren't really a couple yet.

Important questions would need to be answered. For instance: Was it another girl? Can I watch?

The point of TCF's comment is the original article treats staying together as good, without seeming to care about the quality of the salvaged relationships.

One poster stated other ways couples hurt each other. That's certainly true, though if they are continuing, without trying to make them better, those would also seem to be reasons to leave. Marriage should not be a license to treat the person you vowed to love worse than you would treat a neighbor or a co-worker.

All of that is different than saying the moment you feel "unhappy" you leave.

People are staying longer together, because we've entered a cultural period where suffering is sexy again. The more people estimate life, adulthood, marriage, as about compromise, endurance, and imagine themselves as not amongst the truly prospering, the truly "selfish," they'll feel more entitled to the gains they now enjoy, less vulnerable against others' turn against all things "egotistical," shiny and good.

You're right in your rant. Those who insist on more will be targets, though.

As an 18 year veteran of a marriage that should either have never taken place or ended by year 2, I share Tracy's ambivalent distress about this study. Just because people stay together doesn't mean people are happy, whole, or fulfilled. If happiness is the desired goal — selfish as that goal may be — marriage is not necessarily the best way to get there.

While I'm all for staying together for the kids, I honestly hate the thought that you're more mature or wise if you just stick with another adult with whom you have very little in common because in your optimistic youth you were a hormonally drugged optimistic romantic. Is that the message you want your kids to have about their their own prospects?

Having NO children, I now look back, after nine years on my own, and wonder why I believed in commitment so thoroughly, for so long. Maybe it had something to do with my parents being married for 65 years and being really happy. I was committed to the idea of commitment because they were. But they had background and values in common. They had four children. They lived in another era. It worked for them.

It was hard re-adjusting my thinking, but in the end, I've been a happier person since my 2000 divorce, and I believe my ex-husband is, too. His third wife, with whom he had an affair while married to me, has married and divorced him twice (I guess she finds him a sexier alcoholic than I did) — but then she's rich — far richer than he or I am — and can apparently afford these multiple efforts. I could afford one divorce; I don't think I could afford another.

When a romance with a married man who couldn't financially afford to leave HIS wife broke up last year I was far more devastated — emotionally, that is. But then, he was clearly better as a lover than he was as a husband. No duh. He was a liar. And there's nothing like lies to put the kabosh on a great romance.

Too old to have children at this point, I doubt I'll ever marry again. Of course, the oxycotin could kick in and derail this prediction. Magic, sex, whatever you call it does have a way of confusing best laid plans. Whatever. I'm still happy I'm not married to my ex or even to my ex-lover. Occasionally fantasizing about future magic is MUCH better than living with men who don't really love me, cheat with other women, and make me crazy loving them. This is a no brainer.

Why was I supposed to be with a man for life? Can someone please remind me?

Btw, I've never even ATTEMPTED on-line dating! That's how little I want to get married again. If I were 30 years younger, I'd like to find an extended family to have children with.

Frankly, Sandra Tsing Loh's article in The Atlantic may be freaking lots of married people out, but I REALLY understand where she's coming from.