I just wanted to say that I agree 100% with Mrs Yoffe's take on marriage and children. The studies and statistics she cites are important and compelling, yet, I can already feel the the storm of rage building on the horizon. It's a simple fact that children suffer incredible financial setbacks, if nothing else, when they are born out of wedlock or the victim of divorce. This is an indisputable fact, but it's amazing the distance that some will go to try to obfuscate them. In my opinion, one of the most infuriating statements I run across is when divorcing parents state that they're partly doing it 'for the children'. Bullcrap. That's simply a way for them to try to make what is essentially a selfish decision seem like an altruistic ones. Many divorcing couples also cite studies that show that children end up doing better in divorced homes rather than married ones. What they fail to mention is that those studies only show results like that when the marriage is incredibly acrimonious and violent. So if you're in a situation where there is physical abuse, then for certain you should consider leaving. If you simply decide one day that you don't find your marriage fulfilling enough or it dosen't feel like a disney movie anymore and you want out, you need to have someone smack you upside the back of your head.

My parents had a pretty rocky marriage at times but I never fail to offer up thanks that they stayed together through the years. If you want to call the fact that they never divorced a sacrifice on their part, then their sacrifice allowed me and my sisters to go to college and to persue oppertunities that would never have been as avaliable if we were the children of divorce. I have no doubt at all that all of us would have led poorer lives as a result.

Tell it like it is!!! I am the product of an unwed mother, and it was not easy when I was growing up, as much as she tried.

If someone thinks that it is a sacrifice to stay married to someone who doesn't make your heart skip a beat anymore, try the sacrifice of trying to find childcare when you're working, keeping tabs solo on a teenager's social circle while making sure that he/she does well in school, and paying on your own the expenses a child incurs when those debts could be shared - as a lot of babydaddies are lousy when it comes to child support.

everyone's living situation is different. and neither you guys or Emily are taking that into account. Some parents would be better off apart. period. You can argue that they shouldn't have had a kid in the first place and wouldn't it be great if everyone truly was committed before they had kids, but then you'd have a whole bunch of folks who wouldn't opt for the parenthood route and you guys would be bitching that "noone is getting married and having kids anymore...."

what you say about economics is only true if the parents are already on the lower end of the financial totem pole- which means there is a struggle whether there are two parents or one already. if people are well off, there isn't necessarily an economic disadvantage in separate households.

i agree that a lot of people divorce too easily. but did you ever think that maybe they got married too easily in the first place? and i feel sorry for the person that you want to stick these flaky folks that supposedly decide "i'm not feeling happily ever after" and divorce. (really, i don't think that group is as large as you make them out to be. and i would feel sorry for the kids, too, yes. great thing to teach them- you're not meant to be happy in life, you are meant to marry someone, procreate and die. and if you do that, you're golden.

Not that I'm an expert on marriage, but I wonder about people that divorce because they're "not in love anymore". I wonder if they went into marriage with some kind of warped, Hollywood version of how it was supposed to be. When you're with someone day after day, I don't think it's possible to get the same weak-in-the-knees feeling that you had when you were dating. Ideally, that feeling gets placed by something else--contentment, respect for each other, I'm not sure what else to call it. The weak-in-the-knees feeling will still be there sometimes, but not as often as it was.

In movies when the two stars fall in love and finally get together, they usually end the movie at that point. It's because what follows after is pretty boring incomparison. No one wants to watch two people figuring out how to live with each other, it's only exciting when they're falling in love. I wonder if some people just weren't expecting the boring parts of marriage.

Listen, if you want to speak for Brad and Angelina, okay...

But for those with less income, it's a different story. People mired in poverty stay in poverty because they have children they can't afford (which is why abortion is largely a middle-class issue). And studies have shown than even for those working and middle class, the standard of living for the child goes down after divorce, due to parents' having to maintain two homes and make arrangements for the new living situation.

Perhaps people expect too much from marriage. They say "life is short" when lifespans have gotten longer, and want to be excited all the damned time. True, if there is violence and abuse in a relationship - or if someone's a junkie or a druggie - of course, removing a child from that environment is better. But if parents can come to an agreement to coexist in a peaceful, productive manner if the spark is gone, then stability for the child is the first priority, as he or she is the only one who cannot choose the situation.

look, we're not really disagreeing that much here. my point is that socioeconomic problems that were there before are more of a problem than not getting married. if you are poor and have a kid it's pretty hard for the situation to become much better. i don't think it's as bad as you think for middle and upper middle classes.

i agree that people are stupid about marriage. hence why i call the ones you are talking about idiots. but these are people that arguably shouldn't have been married in the first place. not people who are perfect for each other throwing it away on a whim. you sound awfully jaded about what marriage is when it's not "weak in the knees". i would think a better way of putting it would be that marriage is a partnership with your best friend. (sounds like a slogan for a marketing campaign!). what you describe sounds like torture and screaming for adultery and murder. seriously, i would find it very hard to live with someone i not only had no passion for, but didn't like- just for the kids. who you are teaching that love doesn't exist and that people can't be happy.

Don't know if you were responding to me specifically, but I didn't mean to come across as jaded about marriage. I think a partnership with your best friend is an excellent way to put it--I married my best friend, actually.

What I was getting at is that every marriage will go through patches where the passion isn't really there, but the partnership aspect should be there to back things up. I just think that people that go into it expecting unbridled passion every single day are going to be disappointed.

While I chose to be married to have children, and I prefer my children be married before they have children, Yoffe's article was full or random statistics and anecdotal incidents, strung together like a bunch of beads, with no concern for whether the statistics were relevant, explained each other, or even contradicted each other. I think someone more qualified than "The Human Guinea Pig" could have made a much stronger argument either for or against marriage. In fact, I think most high school debate team members could have made a better, more rational argument.

One of the major problems facing the world today is overpopulation. If only a "whole bunch of folks wouldn't opt for the parenthood route. . . ." The very idea of being responsible for our reproductive decision making seems to becoming politically incorrect.

If you aren't ready for "commitment" then you aren't ready for a child. Period. A child is commitment personified.

The truth is that once upon a time people didnt have sex before they married. Once upon a time women were taught to respect themselves and not give IT away. A child without a mother and a father in their lives always has less of a chance at the best possible life. Its sad that we women cant resolve this problem ourselves by not giving ourselves to men who are unworthy of us and will not marry us

"Once upon a time" only exists in fairy tales. Women have always had babies without being married. Likely, they always will. The difference is now, they don't run off to Aunt Tilly's to have it, so know one knows.

IncogNeato wrote "Once upon a time" only exists in fairy tales."

What you are missing is that what was once rare is now probably the most common route to having a child. Also, when this occurred prior to 1965, the child was usually adopted into a stable home rather than being raised on welfare.