Letters to the Editor
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yeah, every generation (really, every individual) goes through an evolution (except those so rule-bound that they avoid ALL THAT)
we still have millions of young people marching to the alter every year and remarkable divorce rates ... even "cute" terms like "starter marriage" ...
ultimately, everyone has to figure it out for themselves ... some folks who want to avoid the pitfalls of "infidelity" (including both their own fears of being hurt as well as their misgivings and fears of failing at fidelity) embrace open relationships of one form or another for some period of time or other ... some stay there ... others drift.
It's all part of why a real partner -- at least here in the USA -- is still (starry-eyed) that SPECIAL SOMEONE ... and not some arranged marriage partner... and why some Americans look wistfully at countries where marriage does not demand some form of sexual bondage. For a country which continues to place such importance on sexual fidelity in marriage, the numbers are pretty appalling...
I think it's partly because we expect so much out of marriage ... emotionally, materially, "spiritually" ... and so many enter into marriage really unprepared for the challenges of making a go out of the day-to-day ups and downs small steps, small pleasures, and accomodations that make happy coexistence possible. Our absurd work-weeks, commutes, and generally overscheduled, superstuffed lives make that one-on-one relationship difficult to maintain and can make even having some magical "circle of friends" outside of extended family simply unimaginable, except usually church related. For millions of Americans, "friends" are pretty much limited to co-workers.
People are hungry for friendship,,
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@ susan sunflower
I find your last post on target. What is the solution?
What you said about friendship? Yes. People probably turn to people outside their marriages sometimes for friendship as much as anything else. It is really impossibly unrealistic to expect one person to fulfill all emotional needs. As people grow more trapped by their jobs and more isolated in their communities, they grow lonely. Having fewer children is, from an environmental standpoint, sensible, and yet it presents its own difficulties.
My brothers and I are having problems trying to sort out what to do about our aging mother. My daughter and I were discussing it and I pointed out to her that at least I have siblings. I told her, when it comes to my senile old age, "you're it kid." For the first time I think she realized the downside of being an only child.
As we become more scientific and, perhaps more skeptical, we also pull away from organized religion so that even the resources traditionally found in churches are less available. We really haven't set up a way to cope with people living to be one hundred, many of whom may end up never married or divorced, sibling-less, churchless, and of course jobless and feeling useless.
Sometimes when people toss away marriages because they are discontent for some reason, I wonder it they realize what they are actually doing. Oh well, there's always Second Life.
I have never been there. I didn't realize avatars could have sex.
Anyway, despite it all, I am still glad to be single -- especially when I read the marriage in trouble stuff in Cary's column.
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by chance I caught a program last night on UCTV (university of California) on Herbert Marcuse ...
occasioned by the publishing of -- the essential or complete Marcuse -- the editor was a student at UCSD ... in the course of the 1 hour program, talking Marcuse's greatest hits, they talked about One dimensional man and Eros and Civilization ... the former most struck me (I read both long ago) ... talking about how in an "industrial" or -- more apt currently -- "cubical farm" world, repression of instincts is essential to "the dominant paradigm" necessary to the sort of productivity desired.
Anyhow I thought of this thread and my last post .... Americans work more hours, more days than most of the world -- yet real wages have been flat or regressing for 20 years or more. Most two worker households are seriously DEPENDENT on both salaries -- the second worker is no longer working for self-fullfillment or luxuries, unless buying and maintaining a house is considered a luxury (something that actually can be argued)
Anyhow -- The author pointed out that in terms of "one dimensional man," the head-down, nose-to-the-grindstone lest the boss see you slacking, worker bee mentality has risen to extraordinary levels -- aided and abetted by the availability of credit, of course.
I have seen many posts by "young people" who report feeling absolutely suffocated by their college debts, their job insecurity, their over scheduled lives... that their "youth" has been eaten up by survival concerns. [There are such vast differenced between different socioeconomic and cultural levels, I think it's perilous to generlize too far, but the lucky ones who actually got to and got through college seem to feel remarkably bleak about their futures, drone like) ...
When I then consider the stagnation in much of the urban populations ... something has got to give ...
One can hope that it's not some new -- what the hell, kids give me joy -- baby boom ... but we might be ripe for some serious "turn on, tune in, drop out" redux, but much angrier this time.
I have grown accustomed to angry, vitriolic attacks on "boomer parents" -- characterized as selfish, self-indulgent and generally useless -- but I remain uncertain exactly how old the writers are, much less their vilified parents.
In a college class about 20 years ago, I recall mentioning how disturbing I found family sitcoms -- the Brady Bunch as exemplar -- in which the parents were depicted as dropping EVERYTHING to deal with every one of their children's crises ... overinvolved, I would have said. Oh no!, cried my 20-years younger than me classmates, that's how parents are "supposed to be" ...
It's too easy to blame television ... but as I said in an earlier post, I really think that many people today have no idea what "happiness" looks like beyond the material ... as if the awesome spirit of the trancendentalist or even the great naturalists/poets are no longer felt -- that there is a terrible void resulting from far too little idle "free time", introspective reflection, and conversation.
Imagine an America with european work weeks, vacations, healthcare, safety net, public transportation ... The absence of all that in fact helps produce this suffocating rat race that keeps everyone on edge and in their place. It's not "coincidence"... it's keeping the workerbees hungry and insecure.