[HN Gopher] The Divorce Colony (2015)
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The Divorce Colony (2015)
Author : daddy_drank
Score : 42 points
Date : 2023-12-17 06:38 UTC (16 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (magazine.atavist.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (magazine.atavist.com)
| topaz0 wrote:
| Note this came out in 2015, and was posted here at the time:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10722467
| dang wrote:
| Thanks! Macroexpanded:
|
| _The Divorce Colony_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10722467 - Dec 2015 (22
| comments)
|
| (year added above too)
| motohagiography wrote:
| It would be interesting to read a charitable case for why divorce
| was prohibited . We see it written up as women being forbidden
| from owning land, or perhaps without a marriage, not being
| recognized as full people with the freedom to own it. It probably
| had some rational basis beyond cruelty and was likely about
| incentives, like reducing the reward for spouses to kill each
| other for inheritances. Maybe it was the epiphenomenal result of
| just not producing weak societies that get overrun by
| neighbouring ones that leveraged specialization and progress over
| short generations. If it were true that children are growth and
| wealth, we stop growing when we stop producing them, and simply
| die off.
|
| Arguably, the incentives for marriage today are misaligned and
| probably socially bad, as rationally, the best prospective
| partner to marry is the one who will provide for the most
| advantageous divorce. The article is a quaint slice of life, but
| it overlooks the demographic reality underlying it.
| purpleflame1257 wrote:
| For a long time, the prevention of divorce was intended to
| protect women. It meant partners can't just be thrown aside if
| a better deal comes along. Eventually, of course, it became a
| trap for women (and men). Nowadays, unless you're religious,
| marriage is essentially just a socioeconomic winner trophy.
| gumby wrote:
| > Nowadays, unless you're religious, marriage is essentially
| just a socioeconomic winner trophy.
|
| That is unnecessarily cynical. Civil marriage provides
| several conveniences for the participants: it establishes a
| default common property structure (so there are no tax
| consequences for pooling earnings or for who pays the bills
| each month, or common ownership of assets, especially useful
| in the case where one dies); if one is injured or sick the
| other has the authority to sign hospital paperwork etc;
| handling the legal mechanics of kids (from picking them up
| from school to paying fees etc) and so on. It also provides
| some hysteresis in a long term relationship (which will
| always have disagreements), again especially useful in the
| case of kids.
|
| Sure, this is a bloodless justification, but is t that the
| domain of civil law? Yes, you could laboriously set those
| things up individually if you want, but the bundle is more
| convenient and takes care of things ahead of time.
|
| And it's voluntary. If you don't want a marriage, don't have
| one.
| Amezarak wrote:
| > no tax consequences for pooling earnings or for who pays
| the bills each month
|
| I'm not aware of any tax consequences for splitting bills,
| or for one person paying bills while the other doesn't, or
| for any such scheme. I'm also not aware of any problem with
| pooling money. At any rate, I've had joint account owners
| on my savings account and never had any tax issue. I
| suppose hypothetically in some situations that it might
| count as a gift (I do not believe most would) and exceed
| the gift tax limit, but I doubt anyone ever has paid taxes
| for this.
|
| > handling the legal mechanics of kids (from picking them
| up from school to paying fees etc)
|
| Both parents have parental rights whether or not there is a
| marriage. There's nothing extra marriage provides legally
| here.
|
| As far as I can tell, the civil benefits of marriage are
| almost entirely limited to inheritance/estates and hospital
| paperwork. It's also usually the only way to get someone on
| your health insurance. Generally, there's not even any tax
| benefits (except in specific cases with specific credits
| YMMV, or sometimes if one spouse doesn't work.)
| hibikir wrote:
| In fact, in the US, there are situations where marriage
| is a penalty: See old people divorcing because one needs
| expensive long term care, and Medicaid only takes over
| after all the marriage's assets have been completely
| drained.
| speeder wrote:
| A theory I saw is divorce ban is to prevent women from
| switching husband.
|
| And thus give men a reason to actually marry and have a life
| within women rules.
|
| When divorce is too easy, then men avoid marriage and focus on
| random sex, since they aren't the ones that suffer the most if
| a random child happen.
| cafard wrote:
| I assume that in Europe and America the prohibition of divorce
| comes from Christianity, deriving from Matthew 19.
| Amezarak wrote:
| This is certainly where the modern religious justification
| comes from, but it was commonly prohibited except in extreme
| cases or for adultery among many peoples before Christianity:
| the early Roman Republic/kingdom, among ancient Germans, etc.
| Indeed one imagines that the social practices of the early
| Germanic peoples may have had more influence on 19th century
| norms than religion- theory is one thing, practice another.
| In a parallel universe without Christianity we might expect a
| similar social norm!
| ndriscoll wrote:
| There's a straightforward line of reasoning for the benefit of
| any children if they exist: divorce is highly disruptive for
| the child, and should not be available except under extreme
| circumstances for much the same reason why people are forced to
| pay child support today. Likewise, one could imagine forcing
| marriage upon people for the benefit of any children born out
| of wedlock.
|
| In fact, society could much more readily support children
| financially than it can provide a missing parent, so if
| anything it's a bit strange that we allow divorce or absent
| parents but require financial support.
| jauntywundrkind wrote:
| What an amazing read, about something I had no idea about.
|
| It's such a different tale than what we deal with today, but the
| same thread. A group of people angry and upset at how other
| people run their lives, and more than willing to use the state to
| suppress and deny the others.
|
| Today it's lgbtqia and pro-choice and non-white-people that the
| state is being coerced into hounding & frustrating, but it's the
| same wringing of hands scared forces, that can't recognize
| healthy bounds of what the state should do.
|
| I'm glad to have run across this not-that-far-back bit of
| historical precedent. In my view, these struggles sap us so, and
| we would be so much greater if we could socialize better the
| improperness of using government to intrude on people's lives.
| Having a good historical basis, I hope, might help.
| Geisterde wrote:
| Having a completely different take on who the state is involved
| with hounding, I still agree completely. Whatever my
| disagreements with your views are, I regard the prospect of
| using political means to get my way to be abhorrent.
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