A debate has arisen on the Right about the value of marriage. There are people on the so-called “red-pilled” Right who have now suggested that marriage is bad for men, that men should not get married.
The case they’re making is not the liberal feminist case that basically men are useless and terrible, that a woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle. The case they are making is that the stakes of marriage have been changed by no-fault divorce, custody arrangements, child support payments, spousal support, and the like.
I agree with the critique of all of those policies. I think no-fault divorce is a disaster area. I think the child custody arrangements that basically always go to the mom no matter what are a serious problem.
But the “red-pilled” Right have taken it one step further. They’re telling young men you should not get married. It’s too dangerous to get married. Don’t get married.
That’s foolish.
Pearl Davis is an anti-feminist. She states, “A man has no way to have children and those kids be actually his. They’re always hers because the courts give the women custody 90% of the time. And rich men are really the only ones that have the money to fight it and the time.”
She then criticizes people who agree the laws should be changed and women face repercussions of their own for marital failures — but also says men should find a girl who prays and then get married.
“I had this thought, too, until I found a Muslim girl that did the same thing,” she said. “I found a Christian girl that did the same thing; I found a Catholic girl. It’s happening all over, whether you want to believe it or not, it is happening. I don’t care about your religion. I don’t care about your church. This happens everywhere.”
The argument she’s making against all these marital policies is correct. Nobody is disregarding the pain of men who have been wrongfully victimized under these circumstances, where the incentive structure is completely stacked against them. That is true.
But the benefits of marriage are still unbelievable. It does matter who you marry. To pretend there is no difference in the kind of person you marry is not true. You can mitigate the risk of divorce; the person who you marry is the chief mitigation.
Throwing the baby out with the bathwater is not the solution. Instead, revise the system of laws but also urge men to find a spouse and get married to her.
If that requires shifting away from the state-mandated law and toward a contract arrangement, fine; I agree with many of the critiques of current marriage law. The problem is when you say that the solution for men is to not get married; you’ve created a second-order effect where unmarried men become actual menaces.
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The reality is that men channel their aggressive drives toward building or they channel it toward destroying. A system in which women are unmarried and men are unmarried is what the Left wants. If you acquiesce in that, you end up destroying the very fundamental basis of society that allows for the growing and building of a society beyond leftist principles.
Marriage is a risk. Of course it is. And that risk is disproportionately borne by men at this point. That is also true. But is the reward worth the risk?
The answer in a huge majority of circumstances where both people are committed and have shared values is yes.
With the red pill movement, the diagnosis is often correct and the solution is wrong.
It turns out that there is actually a formula to a successful marriage. It includes being conservative, religious, and highly educated. Seventy-seven percent of college-educated conservative parents are still in their first marriage.
In the community where I live — an Orthodox Jewish community — there are very low divorce rates. Why? Because everyone is religiously committed, because everybody goes into marriage believing it is a sacred bond that actually matters, and because people don’t date for sex. People actually date looking forward to the day when they will have kids together.
Marriage is a risk. But is it a coin flip?
No. It’s a decision you have to make: What kind of person do you wish to date? What kind of relationship do you wish to build? How seriously do you take that commitment in the first place?
Do the laws need to change?
Absolutely.
Should men get married?
Absolutely.