Dennis Prager Divorcing

Dennis Prager.com ^ | December 30, 2005

[onedoug]

Deenis Prager on now discussing his own impending divorce....

[GretchenM]

Wow -- that is one awesome *link to the world* you provided. Thanks!

[Nonstatist]

You can't be telling me about how important marriage and religious "values" are to Western Society, blah blah blah , if you can't keep a (ie. your SECOND) marriage together, where the major problem is they were "growing apart"!?

Everybody's "human". but I don't want to hear lifestyle "advice", day after day, from someone who can talk the talk, but not walk the walk.

[Misterioso]

I did join, with the opinion that DP is phony.

[Matchett-PI]

"I have found that the folks who would take glee at the personal stumbling of conservative such as Dennis and Rush and Bennett do not like the conservative messages they broadcast, so try to use their humanity as proof of some sort of hypocrisy."

Our Constitution is based on the biblical worldview - ie: Fallen man is not basically good (even though he is capable of doing good from time to time).

We can hope for the best from each other, but plan for, and expect the worst (Caveat emptor).

Those who think that people are "basically good" and therefore human nature is capable of being "perfected" in the here and now, are all PC leftist utopian kooks who will try to use big government to make it happen if and when they are able to obtain power.

Click my screen name and scroll down to "The Emory Report" and read why our Patent Laws were set up the way they were.

[Yaelle]

I hear your careful explanation of how it's a dance, and not always the cheating spouse's fault, but I respectfully disagree. Let's leave off the whole subject of children, for a moment, and imagine a guy who is always rebuffed by his wife. She treats him shrewishly and never makes him feel like a man. It's been a year since she's been intimate with him. He works hard at his job and there is a lovely, wonderful, single woman in his office. They have worked alone together on many occasions. They are getting to know each other and really hit it off in ways he never did with his wife.

There you go, right? The perfect scenario. Oh, and this could be changed from husband to wife if you like.

The correct thing, the absolute moral thing to do, is for the husband to legally separate from his wife. He could try marital counseling with her first, if he so desired. But the right thing to do is NOT to cheat on the wife, to break the marital vow. Legally separate and then do what you want. That seems like a more decent thing to do.

And since Dennis Prager said just now on his show that infidelity is not involved here, maybe he is doing the decent thing.

(Oh, and I have never been involved in any sort of cheating spouse scenario. But I do see how it devastates others, and it is one of the Big Commandments.)

[HitmanLV]

It's possible for a moral, clear minded person to seek a divorce (or two) in their lifetime, and remain moral and clear minded.

Why is that so difficult to understand?

[mcg1969]

I did join, with the opinion that DP is phony.

Yes, and that's what I'm talking about. How about sharing some substance. By all means, explain what you mean.

[Yaelle]

I never got the sense his first marriage broke up because he cheated. Where did that come from?

Oh, just because he has done so many shows about infidelity or men's sex drive. He even made that movie about it (I saw it in the synagogue when he showed it at a talk he gave). It showed scenarios about how difficult it is for men to turn down flirtatious offers... I can't remember the whole deal.

[HitmanLV]

I don't advocate cheating at all. I'm sorry if that wasn't clear.

I don't blame a spouse in the situation you raise for growing alienated from their poor spouse. I don't blame them for rejecting the poor spouse and taking a better romantic companion. Those are, I think, good things and not bad things.

I agree, the tactic of cheating is wrong. The goal of finding a better spouse is a good one, though. So the failure is one of tactics, and not of mandate. In that respect we agree - the tactic stinks.

I'm not listening to the show and am glad to hear infidelity isn't the issue. That being said, that doesn't preclude the possibility of being married to a dreadful person and rejecting them (which I do maintain is a morally defendable thing to do).

I think cheating is awful, but I don't see it as a simple dynamic of one person being good and the other being bad. I have never seen it in any instance of my life that way. I have never cheated, but I have quit on people who I think deserve being quit on.

Trust me, there is nothing wrong with quitting when appropriate.

[Mrs. Don-o]

Just a fact-question, if you or anybody else can answer it:

I always assumed that a religious marriage involved a vow of permanence ("til death do us part" or words to that effect) made in the presence of God. I only recently realized that not all religious groups have such a vow, and some do not have explicit, spoken marriage vows at all!

So my question is: does a conservative Jewish wedding involve explicit vows, promises, pledges or whatever? And if so, what ar they?

[Yaelle]

I don't think his impending divorce will affect his clear-mindedness. I am sure he will stay the way he has been.

The difference between his divorces and Rush's is that Rush is a political and social commentator/entertainer with a somewhat obvious and somewhat loveable emotional neediness, and we can all imagine it might be tricky for him to pick the right woman, and it might be tricky for that woman to put up or keep up with Rush. I don't see him as having 100% great introspection on which woman would be a great partner for him. And he has no kids.

But I think that Dennis appears so informed and introspective of the relationships between the sexes that we do expect him to make the right choices and to put children's needs ahead of his own wants.

I have a teen boy about the age of his; of course that son is going to act tough and SAY that the divorce won't bother him. But now both his parents will probably take up with other people and his life will become very different. His parents will be oversexualizing, right when this boy needs to learn about more than just sex in male-female relationships. I do not think that because a child is a teen that his parents' marriage is meaningless in his psychosexual maturing.

[HitmanLV]

It really is very difficult for a male to rebuff a propositioning, very well built, attractive, and sexually agressive young woman.

Dennis isn't kidding. I feel the same way, and I have never cheated on a romantic companion.

[Yaelle]

Trust me, there is nothing wrong with quitting when appropriate.

I kind of already said that I agree with you, like in Rush's case. I will not condone adultery but needing to leave a relationship that it harmful to your soul is OK, IF there are no children.

Sadly, if you have kids, you are stuck unless there is something too harmful to endure, like addiction, adultery, or abuse (Dr. Laura is right about at least that).

[HitmanLV]

I think the money line of your post is "I think that Dennis appears so informed and introspective of the relationships between the sexes that we do expect him to make the right choices and to put children's needs ahead of his own wants."

It's entirely possible that the right choice is getting a divorce in this case, that's all I am suggesting. I don't know any details, but it's certainly possible.

[Mrs. Don-o]

IF (and I guess that's a big IF) you took a vow to your spouse to enter into a permanent bond of marriage, and you take up with somebody else (whether via adultery or via divorce and remarriage) that's immoral because it's the breaking of a vow. It's a falsehood of a particularly serious sort, like perjury. And if God was formally invoked as a witness, then it's sacrilege as well.

If there was no vow, then there was no such violation.

[HitmanLV]

Yep. I don't take divorce lightly, especially when kids are involved.

That being said, I think it can be the best course among a set of bad courses. Depends on the situation.

Dr Laura is right about what she says. The thing is, a person can have a wonderful relationship with a spouse that suddenly goes down the crapper when, for example, one party decides that having sex with someone else is among the most important things in thier life. Rejecting that spouse (or just having the maturity to accept that you have been rejected) isn't an unspeakable catastrophe.

[HitmanLV]

I agree. What does that have to do with anything, though?

As a practical matter, how can two people stay together when at least one of the persons decides they want to regularly date and have sex with their son's hunky young soccer coach, for example?

And yes, in the era of Brokeback Mountain, I suppose either spouse could be so smitten. :-)

[Nonstatist]

and remain moral and clear minded

Ya, and an honest taxpayer, good bridge player and someone who cuts his lawn regularly.

But the guy is a public speaker, preacher, polemicist. Would anyone listen to his spiel if he wasn't religious, or based on his theology? If he was just a psychologist, no one would listen to him, and he wouldnt have much to say. You don't have to be a theocrat, just not an obvious relativistic hypocrite, is all.

[Yaelle]

So my question is: does a conservative Jewish wedding involve explicit vows, promises, pledges or whatever? And if so, what ar they?

Absolutely. A Jewish marriage is a formal, written contract (called a ketubah), signed, with witnesses, on the wedding day. This webpage explains both the traditional ketubah text (used by the Orthodox) and the Conservative, which Dennis Prager would have promised. See the Lieberman Clause, which was added to the traditional tex in case of civil divorce.

[HitmanLV]

Dennis has never been a strong opponent of divorce. I don't know where this idea comes from but certainly not from listening to his radio show.

What is relativistic about him? What makes him a hypocrite? Especially since he is not a strong critic of divorce?