Marriage vs Commitment

mymarkis666 · 2016-01-08T13:01:48+00:00

My advice would be for her to find someone willing to give her the commitment she's looking for.

TempestTcup · 2016-01-04T21:53:14+00:00

Alimony is the only argument I've heard against marriage in this post; he wants to eliminate the possibility of alimony. My question is, if they live together instead of marry, are all of the assets in his name? Will she be supporting him in his efforts to build his life without regard to her life?

I think this is the real reason he doesn't want to get married; he wants to build his assets, have her take care of him, and if they ever break up, she walks away with nothing. No security, no backup, no money, no assets; all she will end up with is a wasted youth.

Or will all assets be in both names? Will they have a joint account? Who will own the house? What sort of security will he offer other than "I'll be nice to you and help you out monetarily for as long as we are together" and then she's out in the cold if for any reason they break up.

I think she'd be an idiot to put all of her eggs in his basket that he owns 100%.

cats_or_get_out · 2016-01-03T17:44:51+00:00

I don't cohabitate. Either we marry, or we maintain separate residences, finances, etc.

I understand not everyone in RPW shares this value, but it is a non-negotiable for me. To each her own though. :-) That being said, if they're fine with that, then it works for them.

My concern is that she may have some covert contract thinking going on in her mind. She might think she will win him over to marriage with her magical vagina and her homemaking skills. If this is her mindset, then that's her problem; however, a shitstorm will hit him hard once she realizes that he is indeed not going to ever marry her.

EDIT: After re-reading your post, it sounds like the shitstorm has already begun. She will never be happy in this arrangement. She feels likes she's been auditioning for the role of Wife (100% her problem), and she is getting fed up. If he is mentioning it to you, then he probably hears about it a lot from her. No fun for either one.

gftos4138 · 2016-01-03T19:25:31+00:00

Logical reasons to get married would be business/legal related.

Not well-versed in law myself, but my mother, a manager of a law firm, has pressed upon me to seek marriage if I'm going to have children in order to ameliorate the processes of power of attorney, custody, shared or cheaper insurance, and inheritance (protections for spouses and no inheritance tax), along with the tax incentives. She also advised me against combining finances and buying homes, vehicles together without the in-writing, highest commitment of marriage.

Just my 2 cents.

edit: mentioned this to my mum, and she brought up how her sister my aunt had cancer a few years ago, and although she had been with her partner for 15 years and had two children together, he was not allowed to make any decisions about her health and her parents had to do it. Additionally, if she had died he would have been left with nothing, since most of the finances were in her name.

Littleknownfacts · 2016-01-03T16:26:44+00:00

For example, if she was worried that she wouldn't be provided for if he was to get his by a bus, then he could see what she thought about him getting term life insurance with her as the benefactor, etc. That's just one example, but you get my point.

There is nothing wrong with marriage as the end goal in and of its self, not the benefits or tax cuts or what ever. Trying to find a specific grievance as to why she doesn't want to not get married will leave her with an unsatisfied taste in her mouth, because no amount of benefits make up for pure commitment, marriage being the highest form of commitment.

However it's on her to figure out if the current situation is worth it for her. Just like men will privately sleep with women they wouldn't publicly date, they will date women they won't marry. So he is probably just a bit out of her league. She needs to decide if she would rather be a better man's forever girlfriend or a lesser man's wife. It's a tough choice, but only one she can make for herself.

[deleted] · 2016-01-06T03:11:37+00:00

Well, I've seen young women dedicate a majority of their 20s to one guy, living with him, performing all of the wifey duties, while never getting a ring. Some even have a child with the guy yet he still feels no pressure to give her a legal commitment. Sure he'll finance her, let her live in the house, and will remain loyal but will never take that next step towards marriage. I see these women giving their ALL to the guys, forever auditioning for wife to no avail. The guy is perfectly fine with the arrangement, while the girl tries to hide the subtle disappointment behind her eyes every year.

Yet still there is a segment of women who after a year and 1/2 to two years of dating are proposed to in no time and have a ring on their finger. I don't know why that is, it could be because these women demand more, their not playing games, they EXPECT a ring after a certain period of time. Or it could be that the man finally met a woman who was WORTH proposing to in his eyes. Men are very decisive, when they know what they want, they get it. If they really want to marry a women, they will waste no time, you will not be left in a limbo.

A lot of modern women these days are laid back about marriage, they don't want to pressure the guy or they think that if they stick around long enough he will change his mind. Unfortunately this is to their detriment, as I've seen women cohabitate with men for years only for them to break up. The girl is left with nothing to show for it but memories and having to start over, while the guy has a new chick in his place after a couple of months. If the relationship fails, cohabitating offers nothing to the woman, there is no upside in the endgame. At least with marriage there is security, for her and for the children, it is not a one foot in, one foot out kind of relationship.

I read a study that the brain actually knows the difference between marriage and cohabitation. When cohabitating, the brain never fully relaxes, it's always a little on guard, but when married physiologically the mind feels safer, that it's being more supported. I'm not a scientist so I'm probably not explaining it clearly but if you google it, the research should pop up.

_wingnut_ · 2016-01-03T19:25:13+00:00

Trading your youth and beauty and tiny little fertility window to a man who refuses to marry you is a fool's errand. It is a prima facie statement that you are not worth marrying and are not seen as valuable

Land_Before_Thyme · 2016-01-04T00:58:54+00:00

I'd like to hear thoughts from the women here and what you think of my own advice.

My advice to him was to figure out the exact, specific issues that she has with not getting married and try to come to agreeable solutions based on those specific issues.

This is male centric advice; she wants to get married for emotional reasons.

My DH of nearly a year and I do not believe the government deigns the right to marry (or many other things it does). It should either be a religious contract or a business contract.

We extensively looked into forming a marriage contract without a marriage license. I did the legwork of seeking legal advice in states where gay marriage was not legal (at the time) to see if we could cobble together a marriage without the government.

The result was: It is absolutely and unequivocally impossible.

It would have costed approximately 25K to weave together all of the details, and at the end of the day, benefactors and hospital/healthcare decisions were still not set in stone and could still be challenged.

Tl;dr there is no "benefactor to life insurance" fix. I also am 100% certain those aren't her real worries. Her worries are her youth and beauty fading without a ring.

It always struck me as terrifically hypocritical that women expect to expost facto their living arrangements.

She has no power in the situation.

All contracts should be pre-negotiated before action is taken.

The statistics are out there -- moving in before a marriage timeline results in lower marriage rates, higher divorce rates of the subsequent marriages, and lower overall happiness ratings for the couples.

Religion really isn't a factor yet absent an invisible man in the sky, one can still have a negotiation ahead of time about what moving in together will mean.

eof · 2016-01-04T09:07:48+00:00

If he is truly committed and only concerned with the one sidedness of divorce handling, a prenuptial should clear that up quite easily.

closetrpw · 2016-01-04T14:56:30+00:00

I really think the most important thing would be a promised, life-long commitment as opposed to the term "marriage."

I think your advice was pretty good. He really needs to look at why he doesn't want to get married. If he is scared about the legal ramifications (which honestly aren't even all that bad and tend to be exaggerated on this and the TRP sub), then perhaps they can come up with their own customized marriage contract that protects him to his satisfaction. I think for me, the biggest benefit to having a government-official Marriage is a wife's ability to visit her husband in the hospital without any extra red-tape. Think about an emergency situation where he is on his death bed! The money and inheritance stuff can be adjusted with pre-nups, wills, and how you set up bank accounts. The tax stuff is not all that worth it for me. But some of the convenience of other laws that refer to "Spouse" may make life easier.

If, however, it's not about the legal obligations and more has to do with a hangup on calling her his "wife," his desire to still be seen as a bachelor among his friends, or just a hangup with a hard and firm commitment, this spells out serious trouble for the woman and she should get out. If he's not willing to sort of go public with his commitment, then I think that is a deeper issue that needs to be addressed.

If he wants children, he should really consider at least compromising with her. Maybe he can buy her a ring (it doesn't have to be a crazy expensive diamond but it's more to symbolize financial investment) and they can come up with their own commitment contract, and have a small celebration or something.

EDIT: Here is a wikipedia link sort of briefly listing all of the benefits that come with legal marriage in the US: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rights_and_responsibilities_of_marriages_in_the_United_States

I actually think a lot of these can be covered with outside contracts (Hospital visitation authorization form- that's the thing I'd be most diligent about filling out) but some definitely seem to be for spouses only (Healthcare, social security benefits, citizenship benefits, etc.). I think whether or not those will actually be beneficial for them will definitely depend on her future career/income. If she decides to be a SAHM, I think it's worth it for the Healthcare (although if he starts his own business, he could easily "employ" her and provide healthcare to her through that).

Idk, the situation definitely depends on his and her reasons for wanting to/not wanting to getting married. I personally would be more concerned about the life-long commitment aspect (ESPECIALLY if they have kids) as opposed to the registration aspect. If he has a hangup about the label "husband" or advertising himself as taken, that to me is way more of a red flag than if he is just being overly cautious about the legal obligations. If she is going to be a SAHM when they have a family, I think he should be able to offer her some form of contractual security, since she will be using otherwise marketable (and youthful!) years being his childrens' caretaker and allowing him to focus on his business.

sunhappydc · 2016-01-03T16:21:08+00:00

It's not your relationship. Stay out of it.

That said, he should look into his state's laws on common marriage, if it has it. Even if they aren't legally married, some states well treat them as married should they ever break up.

PremiumGoose · 2016-01-03T17:38:14+00:00

His reasoning for not getting married is logical. Her reason for wanting to get married is emotional. You cannot use one to reason the other. U/littleknownfacts nails it when she said things can be set in place for specific occurrences but it will not leave her completely satisfied.

You know her better than us. Maybe she's worried that she'll end up alone if she can't secure ultimate commitment. Maybe everyone we is getting married and she feels out. Maybe she's getting marks taken off in social situations because she can't 'get a man to commit to her'.

blackwaterhattie · 2016-01-07T19:14:02+00:00

This is one of the most interesting threads I have read in a long time- possibly ever. I live with my boyfriend and neither of us has any interest in getting married- each of us already has a divorce under our belts. We live in my house that I inherited- I pay the property tax and all the maintenance stuff that goes along with being a homeowner. We each have our own bank accounts and one joint one that we pay monthly bills from. If he decided to up and leave tomorrow, I would be fine financially. I would be sad and all that, but my money would be okay, even if he cleaned out the joint bank account. For me, it's important that we both feel like we could bail if we wanted to... like we don't have to be together out of necessity. We are together because we want to be- period. There's no financial ruin hanging over us, encouraging us to be together. HOWEVER, we each have a child already and neither of us wants any more children. If I were ten years younger (I'm in my mid-30s now), I believe I would feel differently about wanting the legal protection of marriage, especially when it comes to bringing a child into the mix.

On one hand, I think I would want my daughter to "hold out" for marriage... on the other hand, if she can be financially independent and do her thing, maybe a set up like mine would be ideal. This whole thread has given a me a lot to chew on, and I will be ruminating for a while. So... like, thanks to the OP, and thanks to everyone who weighed in.

blindedbythebrights · 2016-01-07T14:55:03+00:00

If he doesn't trust her enough to think that she would financially rob him one day if she had the chance, then why is he with her? There are already some ways in which she has the opportunity to do damage to him for personal gain, but she hasn't done that, right?

cezariobirbiglio · 2016-01-05T04:12:19+00:00

Why no prenup in that case? If compromise is part of his solution then maybe a well written prenup that guarantees that she won't take him to the cleaners would be acceptable.

Title	Marriage vs Commitment
Author	jesseomgwtf
Upvotes	38
Comments	117
Date	January 3, 2016 4:10 PM UTC (10 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/RedPillWomen
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/RedPillWomen/comments/3za9nf/marriage_vs_commitment/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/RedPillWomen/marriage-vs-commitment.2356 https://theredarchive.com/post/2356

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