Advice to young men: Do not marry, do not have children

ENTERSTAGERIGHT ^ | 11/12/2007 | Stephen Baskerville

[grellis]

Your comment about how many people it takes to end a marriage keeps getting picked apart, but I just want to say that I agree with you wholeheartedly.

[ProCivitas]

BC, re your: "A parent not driven by selfish power issues will want to see a child grow up in A family, with cohesion. Not a child slipt up the middle...while s/he fights for “rights” over the child."

Not so. 'The Best Interests of the Child'(the generally cited standard for courts awarding physical custody) are best served by shared physical custody with an agreed custody plan. Thus neither parent is marginalized. That marginalization, or alienation, is destructive to kids --- and the harm to either parent shouldn't be discounted either.

The 'best parent' is both parents.

But if that became the general family law standard in this country, attorneys and the divorce industry wouldn't be able to set parents at each others'throats at great expense.

[null and void]

The 'best parent' is both parents.

Usually. But not always.

[Scotswife]

I guess it all depends on how you read into it.

Jesus is different from the rest of the males because He is perfect and He is God.
The rest of the males are imperfect humans - after the fall.

We see how Adam resorts to blaming the woman within seconds of the fall.

So I find the contrast comforting because it confirms to me that the attitude is the result of a sinful nature, and not the way God intended, otherwise Jesus would have shared those same traits.

[RobRoy]

>>Usually. But not always.<<

True, but that is intuitively obvious.

[Scotswife]

“Serial philandering doesn’t just happen. I won’t buy that even if it comes gift-wrapped.”

You don’t think some people are capable of serial philandering all on their own despite the best efforts of their partners?

I’ve seen people who are incapable of faithfulness - who have no business defrauding someone by trying to marry them (male and female).

Some people really are capable of this through no fault of their spouse.

[najida]

However, since the dawn of the church, that event has been held up as a “See! Women are bad!” example to justify all kinds of bad treatment that has been (and like on this thread) continues to be dished out.

No one did us any favors in the Adam and Eve story.

[null and void]

True, but that is intuitively obvious.

Yeah. It's also obvious to any casual obeserver that:

1) The Earth is flat.
2) The Sun, Moon, stars and planets revolve around a fixed earth, and
3) Since I am at the center of all I see, the entire universe revolves around me!

[Scotswife]

“However, since the dawn of the church, that event has been held up as a “See! Women are bad!” example to justify all kinds of bad treatment that has been (and like on this thread) continues to be dished out.”

But again - that is part of sinful nature, and everyone is going to read their own special prejudice into it.

Do “some” people treat it this way? yes.
Do “all” people treat it this way? no.
Because there are different ways of looking at it.

I was always drawn to the very pro-woman perspective of JPII who discussed those matters in a different light.

[Landru]

"The 'best parent' is both parents."

Amen to that.

This discussion always reminds me of something I once heard, "One needs a license to drive, to fish, to hunt, build a home etc but *not* have children?"
To me there's something wrong with that picture.

"But if that became the general family law standard in this country, attorneys and the divorce industry wouldn't be able to set parents at each others'throats at great expense."

Bet there's more than just a nugget of truth to what you've said, considering this is supposedly the day and age of children & their best welfare/interest(s) routinely used as little more than a vehicle.

...of pure politics.

[najida]

The discussion started about how these threads and so many on this forum are pretty negative towards females. One supposition being that conservatism has a Abrahamic religion base, which gives males ‘you’re the good child who has to rule the bad child’ and females the ‘bad child’ roles.

Again, I don’t recall JPII ever saying anything that made me think women were anything different than what the bible says....second class.

[Scotswife]

“The discussion started about how these threads and so many on this forum are pretty negative towards females”

I agree with you there, but I think many of these guys have similarities with some of the bitter male bashing females we run into occasionally (of which you would meet more of on a liberal site). They’ve been hurt or betrayed and are resentful. Instead of seeing hurtful actions of one person as being an individual’s problem, they stereotype and decide “all” men or “all” women share negative traits.

“Again, I don’t recall JPII ever saying anything that made me think women were anything different than what the bible says....second class.”

And you’ve read many of his writings?
He was very prolific and there is alot of material.
He had a profound respect for women and recognized the faults of men who have placed women in difficult situations.

[najida]

Honestly,
Women are treated better on liberal sites. That’s just the way it is, PC run amoke maybe, but at least it’s not the ‘American Women are Rotten Princesses’ Crap you read here over and over. Sorry, but the highest % of male posters on these threads dislike females, or hold them in contempt, or long for the good ole days of oh, about 100 years ago.

The End.

As for JPII, wow! I never knew that. What little I have seen and read was like “Doesn’t apply to me” and I moved on.

[fatnotlazy]

The ‘best parent’ is both parents.

***

Ordinarily yes, but in extreme cases of, say, alcohol or drug abuse in one of the parents, that may not be a good idea. And there are cases where neither parent is fit, in which case (hopefully) a responsible relative or other responsible adult may become the parent. I work with a woman who, with her husband, took in her sister’s children. The children’s father was disinterested, and the sister was in and out of rehab. This woman and her husband stepped in and took her sister’s children (along with two of their own). Kudos to both of them for stepping up and taking responsibility. Not many will.

[Scotswife]

“Women are treated better on liberal sites”

sure they are..but you’re going to run into the opposite thing there - women who hate men. Not all of them of course - but they’re there.

“Sorry, but the highest % of male posters on these threads dislike females, or hold them in contempt, or long for the good ole days of oh, about 100 years ago.”

Agreed - but there are exceptions, and enough to give me hope that there are reasonable men out there.
And we conservative chicks can always speak up to counterpunch - the beauty of the internet.

“As for JPII, wow! I never knew that. What little I have seen and read was like “Doesn’t apply to me” and I moved on.”

You must have gotten your info from the press.
I have never seen any document of statement released from a pope that was not mangled by the secular press.
If I want the “real” message - I go to the source and read the entire document - the entire statement in full context.

I think the first thing that impressed me was Crossing the Threshold of Hope. He devoted many of his wednesday homilies to topices of sexuality, family life, and relating them to biblical themes (it is now called the Theology of the Body)

Your concerns would make a good thread on the religion forum though.

I’ll bet if you posed the question over there you would get quite a bit of info.

[najida]

Thanks for the offer, but probably not.

There isn’t a place for those like me in the church. We’re either to be pitied, wash dishes at pot lucks or used as babysiters, but our lives are a mystery (”What! Single! No children! Your own business-house-job!” What’s wrong with you?”)

Whether it’s by choice, circumstance, tragedy or chaos, doesn’t matter, it’s my life....but it’s outside the comfort zone of most in the church.

[Scotswife]

I’m sorry you feel that way...I can think of many single women that belong to our Church. I cannot recall an attitude of pity or disrespect towards these women.

Maybe your life is a mystery to some...anyone who lives differently can be a mystery simply because many people cannot relate based on their own experience.

I find that I’ve become a bit of a mystery to many friends and even family for the opposite reason....my husband and I have a large family and we’re pregnant again.
You wouldn’t believe the rudeness and the condescending attitudes.

In my own personal attitude towards church and towards God, I’ve decided if I allow the hypocricy or failings of others color my own judgement then I’m not going to be able to set foot in any church anywhere. Wherever you find people, you are going to find disappointment.
But if I allow God to lead me - that is different.
He knows us - our strengths, our failings. He knows why we are the way we are and will meet us right where we are.

The older I get the less I care what opinions people have about me.

[Landru]

"My ex-wife and I lived in a big house with so much room we allowed my sister-in-law's boyfriend to move in with us. He needed a place to stay, because he was saving up money to buy my sister-in-law an engagement ring. A month into this arrangement, my ex-wife told me she no longer wanted to be married to me, and I kicked her out of the house. My sister-in-law's boyfriend comforted me in my time of need. About a month later, my sister-in-law and this guy broke up. Suddenly, he moved out of my house. The next day, my sister-in-law told me that her boyfriend and my ex-wife had been banging each other for months, and were now living together."

UNbelievable.
A more classic example of, "Let no good deed go unpunished" would be hard to find.

"Let's just say I very nearly did something that would've put me in the slammer for life."

Indeed, and you'd have been IMO totally justified.
Of course any impact I had would've meant I was sitting on the jury hearing the homicide case against you.
Glad you didn't, kept your cool.

"It took three solid years to get over that. But when I did, I met a complete goddess, who was everything my ex-wife was not. We've been married now for seven years, and we have a beautiful son."

Man that's got to be one of the best *endings* to a stinking lousy backstabbing situation I've heard in a very, long time.
You're one hellova man, HG.
Better than I & that's for damned sure.

"If I could meet the slime ball who did what he did to me all those years ago, I'd still beat him to a bloody pulp, but then I'd pick him up off the ground, shake his hand, and thank him for doing the best thing that ever happened to me--getting me out of a bad marriage, with my hands completely clean, so that I could move on to a good one."

>applause<
The "Jody" now has the woman he stole, let the punishment then fit the crime and it surely will.
'Nuff said.

"So there you go. Divorce was the best thing that ever happened to me. Your mileage, of course, may vary."

HA!!!
Well, Bravemen.

...feeling *enlightened*? :o)

[BraveMan]

...feeling *enlightened*? :o)

Humbled is more like it. I’d probably be doing time as well . . .

I’d like to take you and HG out on the Big Pond fishing (if I ever get the boat back in the water), hand him a cold one and plot out the Back Door Man’s demise between strikes. Then again Landru, you said it best when you inferred the Jody and the Back Door man got what they deserved; each other.

Any man, ANY MAN who chases after another man’s woman is nothing but a lowdown dog in need of being put down. He is NOT a man, but a selfish loathsome scumbag whose only concern is getting some nookie, collateral damage be damned. I’ve seen firsthand the damage done to families and children by these homewreckers and it ain’t pretty.

[TKDietz]

A lot of these joint custody arrangements aren’t really joint custody at all. There will be a primary custodian who keeps the kids most all of the time subject to visitation by the other parent who pays support. It’s joint custody in name only. Courts are not at all in agreement about whether joint custody is in the best interests of the child. In fact, joint custody is generally frowned upon by courts unless it’s one of the joint custody in name only arrangements. They look at pure joint custody as being too disruptive to children’s lives, and there are usually power struggles and other problems between the parents who tend to not be able to agree with each other about things any better than they could when they were married. How do you do joint custody? Have the kids stay at mom’s House for a week, then go to dad’s for a week and keep repeating the cycle? Three days at the mother’s house one week and four days the next? Or do the kids stay with one parent half the year and with the other the other half? Courts almost never grant joint custody in my area and when they do grant it all too often there are problems and the parties end up back in court and the judge will end up giving custody to one or the other parent. Some judges will do it only if the parties agree to do it and are able to convince the court there will not be problems. Some just won’t do it period.

Ideally both parents are very much active in their children’s lives. I don’t really know any kind of workable one size fits all solution that makes that a reality in every case though. The best way to ensure access to your children is to stay married. Too many people get divorced without good reason in my opinion.