Tuesday, March 25, 2008

M is for 'Marriage Strike'

Met a nice, attractive middle-aged man the other day, and noticed he was single, and started chatting with him about his life.

I was foolishly thinking that he might be a good match for one of my single female friends, but here is what I discovered as I spoke to him:

He woke up one day and discovered his wife missing along with his son.

Later he discovered she had pulled up stakes and zapped off to a very distant southern state to marry someone she had met via email and had been corresponding with.

He wanted his son back, and consulted several lawyers, who told him he didn't have a chance of recovering his son.

Eventually, a divorce was finalized with him paying child support, and seeing his son each summer for a short while. Of course, his ex got half of his asset base. (No-Fault Divorce, remember?)

This was a good number of years ago. The man was so self-effacing, he wouldn't even say anything against his ex to this day. But what he did say spoke volumes.

He said he wanted his son back.

And he said he could not imagine ever marrying another woman.

He hadn't heard of the marriage strike. Wasn't a Men's Rights Activist.

He was a 'nice guy', who is no longer in the market for a wife, because of what the system did to him, and allowed to be done to him. No doubt his son will think three times before marrying too, as will his best friend who was with him, and anyone who talks to him and hears his story. And this is another way that the marriage strike expands. - Not through websites like mine spreading the bad news, but through the actual bad news happening to people, and that news percolating through society. And another man, and his son, and his friends drop out of the marriage market, just like that. Without a big fuss, or a lot of noise - they are just gone - no longer part of the marital economy of men-as-slaves.

But don't worry, girls. You probably can still get married, it will probably just have to be someone who earns significanty less than you, and has no assets to risk. That should be a 'love'ly solution to your problems, unless it wasn't really LOVE that you were looking for in the first place.

Oh, and how about we start treating women who disappear with men's children like the kidnappers that they are?


My Best To You In Your Struggles:

-M