Marriage is not love, it’s a societal construct that allows the government to formally recognise you and your partner as a couple, and receive whatever comes with that, the fact that people think it’s a gesture of love comes from media presenting it as such, and the people, who consume that same media, reinforce that idea as if it’s their own, which then puts the idea in you, that you yourself inherently view marriage as a ‘loving act’ when In actuality, to repeat, it’s a societal construct made to recognise two people as a couple.
The idea that it is love, is so deeply ingrained in our society that it empowers women who have a man propose to them, and emasculates men that wish to have a long term relationship with a woman and not put a ring on her finger, when really, you’re just paying society to remove an anxiety they put in you, because marriages can end, can be built on lies or one of the myriad other reasons that lead to divorce so the idea that ‘you get extra security’ when you marry is a true, but foolish notion. Sure, if you want to put up with otherwise deal breaking offences because you married that person you can, but the difference between that and working it out because you love that person is the societal consequences of divorce, which is not love, it’s the fear of punishment, which, actually, is a really good way to breed contempt and animosity, not a good way to nurture a loving relationship.
Now if a loving couple wants to get married they can and should, it’s a societal construct for a reason, but conflating the two is simply wrong, as a matter of fact, being ‘in love’ is not even a pre-requisite to getting married! So yeah, it’s purely an institution used to bind two people in the governments eyes, and grant them the things that come with that.
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This is an opinion as old as time
Ok, and?
I am married but if I could have had our relationship regally recognised in a way outside of marriage/civil partnership I would have done that instead.
Having said that, a ring and a day in a nice dress and some cake was all very lovely.
I think a lot of people (including me) would agree with you.
Agreed. The amount of girls I see that dream of getting proposed by their awful boyfriends because they think they will suddenly be happy is insane. It’s a formal relationship status symbol that’s it.
Is the strawman in the room with you now?
It can be the difference of being able to live with your long term partner in their country or vice versa.
With more and more long distance relationships happening via the internet. Sometimes it’s the only way to legally be permanently together.
I don’t think this is unpopular.
The marriage contract itself was created pre-women’s suffrage as a legal way of passing ownership of a woman from her father to her husband. It’s not all that romantic. We tie a lot of different meanings to it now though.
What is with all the marriage opinions in the last few days??
i think this is men’s perspective that i agree with , but my mom always tells me women want financial security from marriage
I dont think you understand what “unpopular” means
Now saying marriage is ONLY about love… that’s the unpopular opinion. Maybe.
Bub wtf literally the world has thought this since the word was invented you think you’re the 1st one? This isn’t an unpopular opinion
Obviously? Literally everything is a social construct lol
Marriage is both a societal construct and a loving act, when done right.
It’s a financial contract.
Marriage has always been a financial and social contract, for much longer than it’s ever been about love, yes, nobody denies it.
That’s pretty debatable since all human societies have some form of this. Not to mention that human children take over a decade to raise.
What’s wrong with social constructs?
I for one don’t need to involve the government in my personal relationships.
My position has always been:
As an individual, I don’t give a damn about marriage and have no plans of getting married.
But if I were a dictator or monarch with absolute power I would never abolish the practice, as it’s one of those institutions that are simply needed for society to function. Think of it as Chesterton’s fence – we aren’t entirely sure why it’s needed (we know superficially, but it runs a bit deeper than that), but removing it would be a mistake.
But yes, OP is right that society has attached an overblown and unhealthy importance to marriage (and especially to weddings).
As a guy maybe this is different but it can mean something, and not change anything. A relationship isn’t a promise to stay together, it’s a trial phase to see if you work together, marriage is saying “I’m done searching”. You can let it only mean something legally, you can ignore that usually causes it but that doesn’t give you the right to say that’s what people SHOULD do. Also everything is a societal construct, emotions, logic, science, math, art, all just are agreed social contracts that x means y. 1 is a symbol that represents a number of items, your reading this by looking at symbols that represent sounds that when combined make words which is also a social construct. Everything is made up, so using “it’s made up” as your reasoning for why something shouldn’t exist means nothing should exist. Also who the hell cares what my government, or you see it as, I like knowing I have a way to show someone that even though I’ve dated people before, they are different and they are who I want to spend my life with. And either way, what does this make you goal? Find someone that makes you happy till they don’t? Stay single? Have what others would consider a marriage without the title? I mean it won’t fix Jack shit, because it’s a title and titles don’t change anything but that doesn’t mean it can’t mean something. Idk don’t wait for just anyone to marry you because you think that marriage is the solution but don’t avoid marriage just because it doesn’t mean anything to you.
LOL
Some men are under the delusion it’s about love. Women know better 🤣🤣
So are Tuesdays. Doesn’t mean they aren’t useful. So are human rights. Doesn’t mean they aren’t important.
This is not unpopular.
Married here and happy as a clam. Marriage has only solidified our bond and made our lives easier. I think it’s fine if people don’t want to get married. But it is sad to see such cynicism regarding love and relationships. I didn’t get married for the government. I got married because I love my husband.
Yeah it’s called patriarchy and the construct is that the woman is given from the father to the husband. You know bc women are property. This is why if you beat up a stranger it is called assault, but if you beat your wife or children (property) it’s just DV.
So is money, country, ownership, Taco Tuesday, and democracy.
A while ago it served a purpose of making a couple a single unit and giving a man some degree of ownership of his wife. Often this was not a union based on love but rather a union based upon finances or strategy.
If you were poor you wanted your daughters to marry into a higher class. Royal couples were married to form alliances between countries.
Even the jewelry related to marriage served a purpose which was to provide the bride with a safety net in the event that the marriage failed or her husband died suddenly. Its purpose was to be of enough value so she could sell it to support herself.
A lot of marriage practices were of a practical nature and not a romantic one. Just like diamonds being marketed as valuable, historically speaking, marrying for love and the marketing attached to it is extremely recent.
I agree for the most part, except your comment that this constrct was caused by the media. The idea existed long before there was a media.
Are you discussing legally-recognized marriage, or just a couple’s choice to commit? There’s a lot of overlap for practical reasons, but there needn’t be.
I don’t think legally-recognized marriage should be a thing – it’s creepy for the state to be in your personal business to that extent.
I should be able to designate whoever I want to have whatever legal benefits currently accrue to legally-recognized “spouses.”
Separately, if I and another person decide we want to “commit” to a lifelong relationship, that’s between us, and whatever friends, family, religion, social club – whatever – we decide to make that commitment to; the commitment should have no legal standing whatsoever.
It is by definition a social construct. That’s never been debated. But the removal of arranged marriages is what makes it different in today’s society.
So the society constructed it into the modern interpretation of love and compatibility.
It was a financial arrangement between two men (father/husband) for the ownership of their (usually) underage daughters. It has been this way since the beginning of time. Love didn’t even factor into marriages until the Victorian era when consumerism really ramped up and women began gaining rights.
Don’t know where you get this idea about empowering women and emasculating men. Historically marriage was simply a business deal, the purpose of which was to increase wealth, social or political status/power, and to protect and defend.
Marriage is a social construct, but it was not build on some extremist feminism ideals to emasculate men. It was built to protect the assets of a society (of which, women and children were considered part of the property assets), and to increase the power and wealth of the society and individuals involved.
The reason a man had to ask for permission from the father of the girl or woman he wanted to marry (or that his family needed/wanted home to marry), is because she belonged to the father – she was considered the fathers property. In exchange for his daughter, a payment was required, usually in the form of a ring/jewellery or livestock or other mutually agreed upon assets.
ring was also a security measure for a woman because back then, inheritance etc was only passed down in the man’s name, women couldn’t work to earn money and they were “property” so they were not really afforded rights like we have today. The ring was a way to ensure that if their husband died in war or from disease or just decided to abandon her, that she would have something to take care of the children they were assumed to have.
There is so much more to this historically but that’s all I can be bothered typing for now .