Reader and occasional commenter A Visitor recently alerted me to this post over at Vox Day’s blog: N Matters, a lot. The key point of the post is this graph:
The study, and graph, reaffirm similar findings in the past about how a woman’s N (her sexual partner count) affects the odds of divorce. Studies and charts like this have been discussed before, both on this blog and plenty of others, so I won’t go into depth on it. I do like this one part from Vox’s post, though:
The interesting thing about this study is the way that it shows how the second-greatest risk is marrying a woman with only 2 partners; the researcher’s theory is that this might be the result of over-emphasized comparisons; the woman has just enough experience to realize that there is something else out there, but not enough to realize that most of it isn’t an improvement.
While not sold on it, it is a pretty solid theory. But I digress.
The reason for this post, and the reason for this post’s title, is to emphasis the importance of visual cues. This chart is a powerful visual aid to explain to others the perils of marrying non-virgin women. It is bright, simple to understand and gets the point across without the reader needing to have any skill with statistics.
So for the time being, I will probably use this graph as my primary visual explanation for why I insist on marrying a woman with an N of 0. Setting aside all other concerns (of which I have plenty), the divorce angle cannot be ignored.
Most especially, I cannot ignore the impact divorce might have on any children that arise from the marriage before hand. If I am stupid and marry poorly, knowing that I should do better, than that is on me now. I will deserve it. But my kids don’t deserve to be put through the wringer. They deserve to have a stable and loving home- not one that is ripped apart. In addition, I would never want them exposed to a myriad of “boyfriends” and “step-dads” that their mother (whom I should have never married) will bring into her, and their, life.
Men, there are many ways to respond to someone who tries to shame you into marrying a non-virgin. But few will have quite the punch as pointing out that it greatly increases the chances of divorce, and the impact that will have on your children. Flip their shaming right back at them, and ask them why they want to make it more likely that your children will be put through the horrors of divorce. Ask them how they could be so callous. And remind them to think of the children.