Are men brainwashed into wanting marriage and loving kids?

[Winston]

Today while having lunch with an asshole expat friend who's the polar opposite of me (he proudly admits that he only cares about food and sex and evaluates everything in terms of money only), and enjoys being a shallow asshole, I raised this question to him about marriage:

"I don't understand the logic behind marriage. If two people love each other, the love holds them together. So why do we need a government contract to unite them? It seems unnecessary and unnatural, and also a hindrance with penalties and consequences, especially in the Philippines where there's no divorce. So what is the logic behind it?"

He replied that the whole marriage thing was a sham, that men are brainwashed by the media and society to want it, so that the woman can control the man and bind him, and take half his assets if she wants. And that there's nothing in it for the man.

Is that true? Is it just a sham to give women all the power over their man?

It seems like it, because I can see some disadvantages and disastrous consequences to marriage, but I can't see any real advantages in it.

Basically, I see that what holds two people together are love and chemistry, but I don't see an artificial contract from the government as a necessary component. It seems highly illogical. Can someone enlighten me about this?

Sure some say that marriage brings a deeper level of commitment, but like I said, I feel that love and chemistry should be enough to hold two people together, if they are happy together that is.

My friend also said that misery loves company, and that's why married people are constantly urging single people to get married, to share in their misery.

Oh and get this. This is going to sound cruel, heartless and horrible, but he did make some valid points with this one.

When we were talking about my baby, I mentioned that it was mother nature for a father to care about his child. Then he challenged me to name any animal species other than mankind, where the father stays around to care for his children and help raise them. I couldn't think of any animal species that did that, except maybe monkeys and apes, so I conceded the point.

So he said that again, the media and society brainwashes men into caring about their children. He then said,

"Many fathers out there don't give a shit about their children, but do you ever see the media covering this fact? No! They only cover fathers saying that they love their children and would do anything for them. And that's what you only see. Cause that's how they are programming you."

He also said that he has fathered many children here with many girls, but he doesn't give a shit about them. And doesn't want to. But I'm not sure if he's BSing or not, cause sometimes he exaggerates and BSes just for the hell of it.

Anyhow, what do you think of that? Doesn't he have a valid point? Could it be that by mother nature, fathers don't give a shit about their offspring and have only been conditioned by human society to care about them?

But then again, I've heard studies that say that children who grow up in two parents homes are far happier and do far better in life than those growing up in single parent homes. But could that be another "brainwashing" by society? lol

He did make a good point when he said that Filipino parents see their children as an investment from which to derive profit from, and that's why when Filipinas get money the first thing they do is give it to their parents, because they are BRAINWASHED into doing so. That seems to apply to Dianne too.

I don't know why this expat friend likes hanging out with me so much, since he's all about money and selfishness, and proudly admits it, while I'm constantly quoting philosophy and spiritual principles. Plus he hates reading and writing while I breathe those things.

He only says that I am so unique and different from him that he finds me refreshing to be around, even though I don't meet any of his objectives in life. Whatever. I'm not sure I feel the same about him though. Perhaps he sees something in me that's lacking in him. But he is fun to go out with, and has a brotherly vibe about him, but technically, we disagree about almost everything. But needless to say, I only see him occasionally.

[momopi]

Monogamy in the animal kingdom varies by species. Some, such as birds are 90% monogamous, others, such as many penguins, are serially monogamous for the season or year only. Some are monogamous through social structure (alpha male to female) and few are even gay (!). There's tens of thousands of species of animals out there and their match habits vary widely.

When humans lived in hunter-gather societies, I think we simply cohabited with our mates. But as population and society grew, rules had to be imposed to maintain social stability. Coupling became formalized or institutionalized through marriage. Society and religion didn't invent marriage, they simply formalized a pre-existing arrangement where a man and women lived together and raised their children.

Marriage in socio-economic terms grants status and stability. If you look at data from US Census Bureau, children from single-parent families that were never married fared the worst (poverty, eduction, employment, etc), children from divorced families fare better, and children from families with both parents fared the best. This is speaking from statistics and doesn't reflect individual cases.

In other countries, the Swedish National Board of Health and Welfare published a decade-long statistical study on children from single parent homes. They compiled data from some one million kids. The conclusion was that children from single parent homes are twice as likely to develop a psychiatric illness such as depression or schizophrenia, to kill themselves or attempt suicide, or develop alcoholism, as children from two-parent homes. Girls were three times more likely to become drug addicts and boys were four times as likely to become drug addicts as children from two-parent homes.

Only you can decide if and how you want to raise your child. Be warned that children are only young once, and has a limited period when they'll actually listen to you.

[MoscowSummerNights]

Let us look at it this way:

5 times as many American males would like Polygamy to be legalized and institutionalized than would like Gay marriage to be legalized, etc.

But you never hear ANYTHING about that do you?

Noooo. All we here about is how gays are not being given their RIGHTS.

What about OUR rights to POLYGAMY?

If men have a RIGHT to screw each other and MARRY now...then where is my RIGHT to have 4 gorgeous young wives and an older one to do the cooking? I am serious.

Not part of the media program.

You see...gays wanting to marry each other does not THREATEN the established power structure, which consists of older insecure women.

Men wanting to date gorgeous Filipinas or Russian women...we DEEPLY THREATEN the established matrons. We are seen as polygamists are seen in that we could easily be married while doing this (which is why the outrageous new IMBRA law forces men to be background checked so married men can be stopped from talking to foreign women).

As in the Victorian Era, older women CONTROL society and thus the media and the government (of the US and western countries).

As in the Victorian Era, castrated socalled "conservative" males stand up for "marriage and morality" which really means "ignore that gorgeous 19 year old who just flirted with you."

They do not WANT polygamy or men being able to easily walk away and be with a 19 year old or twenty something. They are afraid of abandonment.

And now they are also ENTITLED. Look at Christie Brinkley and Madonna getting so infuriated that their much younger husbands were no longer attracted to them.

[ladislav]

What about OUR rights to POLYGAMY?

Not to be interpereted as a legal advice:

Your right to poligamy will be duly satisfied within a very short time if you again think about location, location, location. We have to use wisdom and work within the system. You just can't fight the city hall.

The airport is right there- a flight to Indonesia is only one night- then you get off the plane, go to the nearest Islamic Affairs place and convert to Islam. As simple as that. You now have the right to four wives. Guaranteed by the world's one billion+ Muslims. As a Western Muslim you will be able to afford four 19 year olds. You marry them according to the Islamic law, not the US law.

A nice house in Indonesia is $8000, a wife can be supported by some $100 a month. English teaching jobs are aplenty. Problem solved. How? Again, by changing locations- that is the key. You want to be marching and protesting and have the Feds bring the National guard and burn your house and take your four wives away from you and stivck them in a shelter?
I know what I'd rather do.

Outside of the Muslim world as in the Philippines for example, poligamy is illegal, but not polyamory- loving many women. You can love as many as you can support. Just as long as you do not try to marry them by Philippine law, you are good to go. Sounds fine to me.

Just change locations, tweak a few of your strategies and you will get what you want very quickly.

Or choose the alternative- march on Washington, set up polygamous communes and have the army shoot you. Or jail you for life in the Federal Penitentiary where you won't ever see a woman again.

Wisdom

Discretion

Location

Think globally.

[Shokkers]

It's a funny thing (actually funny, horrifying & sad), but I looked around for the ORIGIN of Marriage...and couldn't find it anywhere.

The custom itself seems to pre-date the Code of Hammurabi.
The farther back you go, you discover it's quite Patriarchal...a system to unite tribes and communities, to record lineage, and ensure property was passed on to future generations as the Patriarchs wanted.

Marriages were normally arranged; few people got a say in who they were to marry. Men of power and wealth could have as many wives as they could support, including concubines (war widows). If you had one wife, you were poor, and for most of history, most of the world's population was poor.

(Therein lies the unfairness of Islam; Islamic MEN can be polygamous. Islamic Women can NOT. And Muslims get 4 wives, no more...of course that'd probably exhaust most anyone.)

Even though arranged marriages were phased out of Western culture, statistics reveal that arranged marriages started out miserable and got happier over time. Marriages of choice seem to start out happy and get miserable over time.

It seems to me that the United States, "Land of the Free", should be the place to legalize polygamy and/or polygyny (marriages with more than 1 husband) but we don't. Polyamory is legal, though, and on the rise...praise God.

Men aren't necessarily 'brainwashed' but they're surrounded by marriage 'billboards'. First is the idea of offspring, and although fatherhood is noble (when it's done right), few men can run a business AND a child all by themselves (see the film 'The Pursuit of Happyness'). Secondly, religious conditioning tells men they're 'sinning' if they live with a woman instead of marrying her. (TRIPE!!! Read 2nd Samuel 5:13!)
Third, women feel they're 'owed' marriage and will try a lot of ploys to get it. (In the book "The Rules", the only acceptable relationship is a marriage, and any man who doesn't propose in less than 6 months must be dumped.). Fourth, when their friends marry, single guys are socially excluded over time. Fifth, the government gives married couples more legal benefits than single people. Add all these together, and it could feel like brainwashing, I'm sure.

Best, K.K.
http://www.RockHerWorld.net

[polya]

Marriage is a scam, and this is clearly seen when couples divorce in the USA the courts screw the man totally - he gets custody 10% of the time (this 10% will be when the mother is mental or an addict). How dare the courts give custody to women who don't work & can't afford to pay for the kid, then make the man's life hell raping him for child support. Its logical to give custody to the parent who can afford to pay for the kid and not have a monsterous government raping him for child support. In Australia now they hire private investigators to find men, "repocess" their cars and let the woman sue him (she will win if he owes even $1). This is bullshit and men should stop working, stop marrying and just go surfing every day. I hope I'm not too off track for you Winston.

[momopi]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7547148.stm

Nigerian advises against 86 wives
By Andrew Walker
BBC News, Bida, Nigeria

Nigerian Mohammed Bello Abubakar, 84, has advised other men not to follow his example and marry 86 women.

The former teacher and Muslim preacher, who lives in Niger State with his wives and at least 170 children, says he is able to cope only with the help of God.

"A man with 10 wives would collapse and die, but my own power is given by Allah. That is why I have been able to control 86 of them," he told the BBC.

He says his wives have sought him out because of his reputation as a healer.

"I don't go looking for them, they come to me. I will consider the fact that God has asked me to do it and I will just marry them."

But such claims have alienated the Islamic authorities in Nigeria, who have branded his family a cult.

Most Muslim scholars agree that a man is allowed to have four wives, as long as he can treat them equally.

But Mr Bello Abubakar says there is no punishment stated in the Koran for having more than four wives.

"To my understanding the Koran does not place a limit and it is up to what your own power, your own endowment and ability allows," he says.

"God did not say what the punishment should be for a man who has more than four wives, but he was specific about the punishment for fornication and adultery."

'Order from God'

As Mr Bello Abubakar emerged from his compound to speak to the BBC, his wives and children broke out into a praise song.

Most of his wives are less than a quarter of his age - and many are younger than some of his own children.

The wives the BBC spoke to say they met Mr Bello Abubakar when they went to him to seek help for various illnesses, which they say he cured.

"As soon as I met him the headache was gone," says Sharifat Bello Abubakar, who was 25 at the time and Mr Bello Abubakar 74.

"God told me it was time to be his wife. Praise be to God I am his wife now."

Ganiat Mohammed Bello has been married to the man everyone calls "Baba" for 20 years.

When she was in secondary school her mother took her for a consultation with Mr Bello Abubakar and he proposed afterwards.

"I said I couldn't marry an older man, but he said it was directly an order from God," she says.

She married another man but they divorced and she returned to Mr Bello Abubakar.

"I am now the happiest woman on earth. When you marry a man with 86 wives you know he knows how to look after them," she said.

No work

Mr Bello Abubakar and his wives do not work and he has no visible means of supporting such a large family.

He refuses to say how he makes enough money to pay for the huge cost of feeding and clothing so many people.

Every mealtime they cook three 12kg bags of rice which all adds up to $915 (£457) every day.

"It's all from God," he says.

Other residents of Bida, the village where he lives in the northern Nigerian state, say they do not know how he supports the family.

According to one of his wives, Mr Bello Abubakar sometimes asks his children to go and beg for 200 naira ($1.69, £0.87), which if they all did so would bring in about $290 (£149).

Most of his wives live in a squalid, unfinished house in Bida; others live in his house in Lagos, Nigeria's commercial capital.

He refuses to allow any of his family or other devotees to take medicine and says he does not believe that malaria exists.

"As you sit here if you have any illness I can see it and just remove it," he says.

But not everyone can be cured and one of his wives, Hafsat Bello Mohammed, says two of her children have died.

"They were sick and we told God and God said their time has come."

She says that most of the wives see Mr Bello Abubakar as next in line from the Prophet Muhammad.

Indeed, he claims the Prophet Muhammad speaks to him personally and gives detailed descriptions of his experiences.

It is a serious claim for a Muslim to make.

"This is heresy, he is a heretic," says Ustaz Abubakar Siddique, an imam of Abuja's Central Mosque.

[Hero]

Outside of the Muslim world as in the Philippines for example, poligamy is illegal, but not polyamory- loving many women. You can love as many as you can support. Just as long as you do not try to marry them by Philippine law, you are good to go. Sounds fine to me.

Good to know. I could never choose between my two favorite Filipinas.

[Winston]

Here's my dad's wise take on this issue.


"Dear Win,

Actually, it all depends. People should not marry just for marriage sake. Don't do that because everybody is doing that. You want to get married because you found someone you love not someone who is attractive to you. A good marriage will bring happiness to both of you. Affection, attraction can only last for a while then it will fade away. A good partner is one who will share your good time and hard time not just the good time and discard you like a used tissue and throw you away. You are happier when there is someone who can share with you and when are sad who can share and ease your pain. The bottom line is a good marriage is a lot better than no marriage, but a bad marriage is better off without it

Love,
Dad"

[fschmidt]

I don't understand the logic behind marriage. If two people love each other, the love holds them together. So why do we need a government contract to unite them? It seems unnecessary and unnatural, and also a hindrance with penalties and consequences, especially in the Philippines where there's no divorce. So what is the logic behind it?"

Having the government dictate the terms of marriage is a terrible idea. This is the way it is today. But in the past, marriage was basically a private contract that wasn't managed by the government. It was the Catholic Church in the middle ages that pushed for marriage to be sanctioned by the church in order to increase the church's power. This was the first step towards the mess we have today.

Having a marriage based on a private contract makes perfect sense. This establishes a basic understanding of what is expected of each party from the beginning. Winston, your personal experience is good example of why this is needed. The typical basic terms of marriage were that the woman would be faithful to the man and that the man would provide for the family. This is fair and productive contract to form a family. Without such a contract, families are more likely to break up, to the detriment of children.

As for polygamy, it is a terrible idea. If some men get multiple wives, then clearly some men will get no wives. Monogamy allows every man to have a wife.

[ladislav]

As for polygamy, it is a terrible idea.

But it's delicious!

If some men get multiple wives, then clearly some men will get no wives.

Only in countries that are 50% male and 50% female. Not where there are 47 young men for every 53 women. You will be saving some girls from life of loneliness being polygamous or polyamorous.

Monogamy allows every man to have a wife.

Except in soceities where there are more women than men. You will in fact be helping women to not be without a man by loving more than one.

[momopi]

As for polygamy, it is a terrible idea. If some men get multiple wives, then clearly some men will get no wives. Monogamy allows every man to have a wife.

That would be true if the gender ratio at birth was equal, and marriages were arranged (like Rev. Moon of Unification Church) or mandatory by certain age.

The normal human gender ratio at birth is 105 boys to 100 girls. In many countries where gender-selective abortion is practiced, the ratio is much wider. In Asia, where hepatitis B is prevalent, women infected with hep-b is estimated be 1.5 times more likely to have baby boys than girls. The gender ratio at birth in China and S. Korea is 113 boys : 100 girls, in Taiwan it's 110 : 100, in Malaysian Chinese ethnic group, it's 107:100. In Punjab, India, it's 126 boys to 1 girl.

"Hepatitis B Accounts for 40% of Missing Asian Women"
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/20 ... 092603.htm


In a competitive, free market mating environment, both men and women lean toward those with higher sexual market value. Men desire the most beautiful girls, and women want to marry handsome men and/or up the socio-economic ladder. Think of it as a bell curve. Those with the highest sexual market value can have their pick through the spectrum. Those on the bottom, are rated as undesirable. Thus, short girls want tall guys and nobody wants the short guy.

Let's look at another attribute, intelligence. People's IQ scores are determined by their genetics, nutrition, and environment. Kids didn't choose to be unhealthy, malnourished, or live with low quality of life. Yet they have to live with the consequences. Statistically, those with high IQ in the US make almost twice as much as those with average IQ, 3 times as much than those with blow average IQ, and 7 times as much as those with low IQ scores.

Monogamy doesn't grant every man or women with a spouse, in the same way that capitalism doesn't grant every man or women wealth. If you're not born with it, you have to work for it.

[DonFrancisco]

What about OUR rights to POLYGAMY?

A nice house in Indonesia is $8000, a wife can be supported by some $100 a month. English teaching jobs are aplenty. Problem solved. How? Again, by changing locations- that is the key.

Wisdom
Discretion
Location
Think globally.

Hi Ladislav,

How in Your opinion Indonesia compares to the Philippines?

Thanks!
Frank

[Jake]

For those who are considering marriage in Western nations including bringing a foreign wife into a Western nation, please read this essay here http://www.dont-marry.com This is the state of marriages and having children in Western nations. It's better to expat outside Anglosphere and to a man friendly and family friendly country or just don't get married.

[V]

I think everyone here is sort of preaching to the choir, for the most part.

Seems to me, there are three issues here. First, there is the relationship itself. Man/woman (or whatever combo) are in love, lust, like, convenient arrangement, afraid they can't get something better, or whatever. They hook up and are "together." That is your basic relationship. Second, there is the marriage itself, which is some sort of agreement, usually accompanied by some sort of ceremony or celebration, where the individuals make promises to each other about the future of their relationship. Third, there are third parties (i.e. governments) who want to stick their nose in and set controls over other peoples' lives, and do so by offering marriage "contracts."

There is no reason for governments to be involved at all. If they weren't, there would still be relationships and marriages/agreements. It's the fact that the governments stick their noses in that causes problems. In the USA, there was no "marriage contract" or marriage laws until after slavery ended, when some people wanted to prohibit or at least control interracial marriages. Like everything else, once a government gets some power over people in a particular subject matter, they try to extend their power to everyone else. Nature of the beast.

Take the government out of the equation and there are no battles over "same sex marriage" or "spousal support" or "spouse/partner insurance protection," etc. People would simply have relationships and some of them would enter agreements (like business partnerships) where the terms of what is expected would be specified, as well as the terms of a breakup. Most would probably have a religious ceremony to mark the occasion, and/or throw a party.

There are two problems with the way things are today. First, women and feminist males (and the politician whores who want their votes) continue to create more and more laws that are more and more anti-male. They only do this because they can. If the government didn't have the power to "regulate" marriage, these political battles would end immediately. The "war between the sexes" in the Western world would also end before long, as people figured out what was best for their own relationships. The way things are going now hurts both men and women, as more and more men make the rational decision that it is not in their own best interests to let governments dictate how they are to live their lives and control their relationships.

The other problem is the historical weight of the "fairy tale." Girls grow up with Cinderella and the other stories of the handsome prince on the white horse taking her off to the castle to live happily (and wealthy) ever after. Women grow up and constantly use this as their yardstick -- they are taught that they are entitled to the 21st century version of this man and this relationship. The Western culture (which the media reflects) plays into this entitlement mentality.

The result, 40 years after women "burned their bras," is that the tables have been turned and now the men are fed up and "burning their bridges."