Said Ruth Bader Ginsburg, in 1992, shortly before Bill Clinton nominated her to the Supreme Court, quoted yesterday, in Aaron Blake's WaPo column, "What Ruth Bader Ginsburg really said about Roe v. Wade."
Blake is quoting that to correct people who might think Ginsburg thought that Roe was wrong about the existence of a right to abortion.
Although Blake included it in his quote from Ginsburg's speech, he doesn't otherwise mention no-fault divorce. Let's talk about why Ginsburg connected the no-fault divorce movement with the abortion-rights movement — and why these movements happened in the same time frame. One could say both movements pushed government out of the intimate sphere that belongs to the individual. Another way to put that was both movements served the agenda of the sexual revolution.
There's very little talk about no-fault divorce anymore, even as abortion has remained controversial all these years. What was once "ran parallel" is rarely even thought of anymore. In the 18 years of this blog — according to the search function — there isn't a single post containing the words "no-fault divorce."
Of course, abortion is different, unavoidably different, because one can never completely leave behind the knowledge that it cuts off a human life. But abortion and no-fault divorce both minimize something big.
Interestingly, it's the bigness of marriage that forms the basis of finding a right to same-sex marriage in Obergefell:
From their beginning to their most recent page, the annals of human history reveal the transcendent importance of marriage. The lifelong union of a man and a woman always has promised nobility and dignity to all persons, without regard to their station in life.
The lifelong union.
Marriage is sacred to those who live by their religions and offers unique fulfillment to those who find meaning in the secular realm. Its dynamic allows two people to find a life that could not be found alone, for a marriage becomes greater than just the two persons. Rising from the most basic human needs, marriage is essential to our most profound hopes and aspirations....
Marriage responds to the universal fear that a lonely person might call out only to find no one there.
ADDED: Abortion responds to the universal fear that a lonely person might call out and find someone there.
Posts
42 comments:
Not discussed? Divorce was discussed plenty here in the comment box in the context of "same-sex marriage." Specifically that the argument being presented for it, as exemplified in Obergefell, was fraudulent. That for decades the people then-pushing marriage as this live-long union had denigrated it as "just a piece of paper."
And with no-fault, that's exactly what civil marriage had been reduced to. And the result is generations of broken children of divorce. As well as generations of couples deciding there is no point in going to the bother of marriage if it can be broken just by someone walking out.
No Boomer thinks ill of no fault divorce, it's true, but there's a growing segment of the children of no fault divorce who would love to start having conversations about rolling it back.
We're around and we're increasingly radicalized against most of the sexual revolution's aims: abortion, premarital sex, mothers working outside the home, divorce, even oral contraception. Yep, radicals.
"...the transcendent importance of marriage....." "...marriage is essential to our most profound hopes and aspirations.... "
So, that's why we advocated for and support no-fault divorce?
Sorry, we can see right through the flimflammery.
As an often-wise blogger once wrote, "Begin with the hypothesis that what they did is what they wanted to do. If they postured that they wanted to do something else, regard that as a con. Work from there.
"Abortion responds to the universal fear that a lonely person might call out and find someone there."
Oh, bon mot! I feel like you channeled G K Chesterton for that line.
No-fault divorce and abortion are an attempt to support and value human flourishing. On paper it made sense. Time has shown that the opposite happens. We are a nihilistic, depressed, and ... lonely society.
The purpose of marriage is to provide a framework for a man and woman to create and raise a child. Obergefell denigrates that.
Roe allowed the destruction of children at the whim of the mother.
No fault divorce elevates the happiness of mother and/or father over the best interests of the child.
The Great Society monetized the destruction of the family, incentivized fatherless children.
Kids these days...
No fault divorce makes marriage a bad deal for a man.
I truly don't understand why everyone always says "rapeorincest" like it's one word. Why is unforced incest privileged wrt abortion?
"No-fault divorce and abortion are an attempt to support and value human flourishing."
Kate is on target. Can't we see by now that individual human flourishing occurs in relation to others - the joining to and creation of others around you?
The utopian society envisioned and implied by the political left will never, ever be achieved on core principals that see no wrong in an individual severing promised intimate bonds, or invasively halting the most creative act humans can do, that of creating another human to join the group.
Isn't is obvious?
Leaving aside the question of whether a woman should be able to abort a newly forming human (I'm generally strongly in favor of free will) - the question of "Why would a woman ever want to abort a newly forming human" still seems to me to be the crucial issue. Women have a superpower to carry another human being formed, and bring it into existence. What artist has ever done a greater creation than this?
And here in my mind I can hear an Elizabeth Warren type argument that a woman must have a right to the freedom of her body, otherwise she is at an economic disadvantage in the workplace, etc. And this is another way we can see the con: Warren is anti-capitalist out of one side of her mouth, but pro "women in capitalism" out of the other.
I want to state that in this post I am not arguing pro or anti abortion. I am arguing that the principals on which the left would attempt to build a society are incongruent and won't ever produce the results they envision or hold out.
No-fault divorce isn't an issue because there's no constituency for locking people into lifelong misery. Remember, no matter how wisely you pick your spouse at the outset, people change.
Kids know when their parents hate each other, and forcing those parents to stay together wouldn't make a happy home. For every kid who wishes their parents were still together, there's another that's happy that the screaming has stopped.
And in practical terms, without no-fault divorce, people just commit fraud. Couple used to cooperate in staging fake episodes of adultery, just so they'd have a way out
Ah yes the continuing ‘legal’ battle. Where’s a Hawaiian judge when you need ‘em?
Given Dobbs and the compelling arguments of it’s continuation because…stare decisis, Ann’s best argument about stolen elections seems most compelling to apply here- it is time to move on. The legislatures await…
the last thing we need is to go back to divorce courts. In the old days, laws about divorce was there to protect the woman. Especially, a wife with kids. Now, women can work in business and professions. No need to protect anyone. No need for alimony, just child support.
"Remember, no matter how wisely you pick your spouse at the outset, people change."
If they changed and failed on their half of the relationship, then that's not "no-fault", is it?
Roe was supposed to be preceded by Doe v. Bolton: instead, the cases were switched at the last minute. Margie Pitts Hames, lead lawyer on Doe, allegedly lied about and to her client. Margie was quite ambitious. "Doe" finally got her case files opened -- it's worth looking at them to see how the legal sausage is made. How did pro-choice activists respond? They tried to murder the woman who was Doe, shooting at her twice, once as she held her infant grandson.
Both Doe and Roe were very troubled women. Both could have obtained hospital abortions available at that time based on psychiatric evaluations. But the pro-choice activists chose them to change the laws instead and kept them in the dark while using them. Both became pro-life and were brutally, brutally mocked by the entire pro-choice community for that "choice." It's a chapter we should not forget when it comes to "trust the women." When "Doe" would appear at rallies, she was taunted and pelted with shoes, etc. for daring to become pro-life. There is a deep and violent sickness in the pro-choice movement that merits a closer look. I've known a lot of insane people who run clinics. Vicious, damaged, often brutalized nutcases. Not all, but then again, most pro-choice leaders have never set foot in a clinic.
As noted above, no fault divorce is often discussed, just not always under the moniker "no fault divorce." For instance, the effect of broken families in the general breakdown of our society is widely recognized and no fault divorce is a contributing factor.
Easy divorce made marriage less of a sacred institution. Once marriage became less of a less grave act, it became easier to dispense with it altogether (just a piece of paper). As a result, we have more single parent households either because the parents divorced or because they never married in the first place. And the children suffer. Unless they were aborted first.
We reap what we sow. When it comes to instinctive matters of love and sex, it seems that the human animal is often not that smart. The excesses of the sexual revolution (as with all revolutions) often went too far. Abortion is one of those issues that went too far as exhibited in Roe. It is common sense that at some point, the structured agglomeration of cells that makes up a fetus becomes an entity that deserves to have rights, human rights. To ignore those rights and abort an almost full term fetus is not only inhuman, it is immoral and I would argue it is insane. Most societies in the world recognize that truth except perhaps for China, North Korea and the USA under Roe. The rejection of Roe by the Supreme Court may end up being one of the most moral decisions ever made by the Supreme Court.
Dobbs throws the decision making back to the elected representatives where it always should have been. We will now have robust debate and discussions about when the fetus deserves to have rights. Mississippi law already says 15 months in line with most of Europe. Other states will make different decisions. The law will develop gradually and in time there will be a consensus but it will take time. That's what happened with "no-fault" divorce. In my community which is not in the US we are still tweaking the "no-fault" divorce laws and passed amendments last year.
Already we are seeing a shift because of Dobbs. Demand for the day after pill has skyrocketed as individuals realize they cannot rely on D&C abortion for contraception. In other words individuals are taking more responsibility. I view that as a good thing.
I'm old enough to remember the spate of early criticism of Roe from law profs and practitioners as unscholarly, unconstitutional and overreaching. There was very little dissent.
Oh for the days when law profs and their progeny were intelligent and less corruptible.
And here in my mind I can hear an Elizabeth Warren type argument that a woman must have a right to the freedom of her body, otherwise she is at an economic disadvantage in the workplace, etc. And this is another way we can see the con: Warren is anti-capitalist out of one side of her mouth, but pro "women in capitalism" out of the other.
Tucker Carlson had an interesting segment last night on why corporations are so eager to assist female employees to obtain abortions. It's not virtue signaling, although that is also important to them. It's "Get back to work!" Pregnancies are inconvenient for employers.
@Tom T.
I resent my dad even more than I did when I was a kid now that I've been married for years longer than he was married to my mom. Because I recognize how easy marriage is if you're treating it as the number one relationship. Two people who treat each other as the number one priority don't hate each other.
Whether it was the law or the change in society granted legitimacy through law, the shift in focus from traditional family as a sacred institution deserving of special status and reinforcement to just another option among a menu of choices has resulted in a net negative impact on this country. When the highest value is self-actualization, and the people who most advocate for support of traditional family structure are demonized, you get what we have today. I am not saying that there were not issues to be addressed regarding rights and freedoms and respect for other people, but the cure we chose seems to have been worse than the disease. The sexual revolution, the women's liberation movement, the easy dissolution of family, the elevation of alternative relationships to be equal to hetero marriage, the easy destruction of your own children all have consequences on society. Sure, they seem like great advances in freedom, but did we actually create more harm by advancing them while undermining the traditional family? The "my happiness first" approach does not always lead to an increase in actual happiness.
Many years ago, when at the funeral of my grandmother, I heard my aunt telling my mother how she regretted divorcing her first husband (the divorce would have been tight at the beginning of the no-fault era.) The easy out might have resulted in the feeling that it is simpler to just separate rather than build back better (TM). This same Aunt ended up divorcing her second husband as well, but interestingly enough they continued to live in the same house until he passed away. I also met a couple whose vows were "until we decide not to", or some such, rather than until death, etc. It was realistic for our day and age, very practical, but just how much anxiety would a woman have knowing that she could never rely on her husband to be faithful and that at any time he could simply walk away and she would have no basis for which to suggest they work on it. Uncertainty breeds distrust and distrust breeds conflict. Most likely this results in dissolution more readily than otherwise. Kids group up with with the idea that marriage is for convenience, not for commitment. No way you can convince me that this is an improvement.
It's as if Aaron Blake and the WaPo are trying to provide cover to Democrats who have had 50 years to craft Legislation legalizing abortion and who have done nothing -- except fund-raise.
There's very little talk about no-fault divorce anymore, even as abortion has remained controversial all these years. What was once "ran parallel" is rarely even thought of anymore. In the 18 years of this blog — according to the search function — there isn't a single post containing the words "no-fault divorce."
Of course, abortion is different, unavoidably different, because one can never completely leave behind the knowledge that it cuts off a human life. But abortion and no-fault divorce both minimize something big.
I'm curious whether more kids have been aborted since Roe, or had their lives screwed up by a "no fault" divorce.
Thank you for this. I hadn't thought at all about the different paths those two things took, and I should have
Pregnancies are inconvenient for employers.
Pregnancies are inconvenient and expensive for employers. Insurance rates go up if you employ women of childbearing years because the cost of prenatal and maternity care is so high. Fewer claims, therefore lower premiums, if you can get the girls to abort! Plus, gosh, if they actually have babies, those babies grown up and go to daycare and school and get sick and who stays home with them? Still Mommy. (It's really difficult these days to make a convincing case for not hiring women of that age at all, so encouraging not having children is the next best thing.)
But working women will be told that it's because their employers "care" about their "freedom." And they'll believe it.
I've been a woman all my life and I intend to be one for the rest of my life. I love being a woman, especially in this era in which I have choices and options the likes of which my grandmothers could only dream. But man, sometimes members of my sex disappoint me so much.
"No need for alimony, just child support."
Until child support requirements for men are conditioned on proof he's the father, child support is simply fraud.
No fault divorce is still an issue in the US today. The Catholic Church and many Protestant denominations (Church of Christ I know, and there are other, smaller sects) still do not believe in no-fault divorce. One part or the other is forever banned from remarriage in the church. I agree that the majority in this country accept no-fault divorce as being acceptable, both to society and to God.
Shooters, schools and otherwise, pretty much come from broken homes. What's never talked about are how divorce affects adolescent male children.
Any number of times I have seen people have children and still decline to get married because the licwense is "just a piece of paper" and anyway, "we're in a committed relationship."
That committed relationship, of course, last until one partner decides not to continue with the committment, and then if there are children and property involved, they find out a marriage license isn't just a meaningless piece of paper.
Michael K and Jamie, yes, this 1000%. And many of these large companies are self-insured, so a pregnancy carried to term under their health insurance policy comes out of their pockets in that way as well. In offering abortion stipends and such, companies get to talk out of both sides of their mouth - offer generous parental leave benefits and unlimited PTO* (to take care of that sick baby whenever you want) but they really hope women take them up on the abortion benefit instead.
*unlimited PTO is a scam - just try to take them up on it and still have a meaningful career.
My usual joke when asked how I felt about gay marriage was to respond "I'm willing to settle for the return of heterosexual marriage." If it costs less than a few hundred bucks to get divorced, not sure to what extent a couple is really married.
No-fault divorce reduced marriage to a property contract
=========
"As to the relation of marriage itself, we shall find that the common-law view has been greatly modified. A hundred years ago the wife was hardly recognized as a separate person; her legal identity was merged in the husband's, whose chattel she was, and for whose civil acts he was almost absolutely responsible. For felonies short of treason and murder she was not punished, if committed at his instigation, and the husband might administer to her a "moderate correction," which the courts gravely ruled to mean a stick no bigger than ones little finger.
"With us, all this has been absolutely changed. The clear and almost effected tendency of to-day is to consider that the marriage relation makes no difference whatever in the status of the two married persons, except to affect the descent of their property after death, and to make it a penal offence for the husband to refuse to support his wife."
--The Ethics of Democracy by F.J. Stimson. Scribner’s Magazine (1887)
"…this curious confirmation of the old French economist’s cynical reason for marriage that it is an institution made necessary by property, and designed for its protection and preservation alone.”
--The Ethics of Democracy by F.J. Stimson. Scribner’s Magazine (1887)
I mentioned this article when I included Stimson's complex sentence in the long-sentence post. But his observations seem to be becoming quite prescient :
"Therefore, without prejudice against any one proposed reform, it is impossible not to end, if not with the deduction, at least with the suggestion - that (for some reason which we will not now attempt to fathom) the three institutions - of private property, of marriage, and of personal liberty from State control - are so inseparably bound together that neither one may fall without the other two."
http://www.archive.org/stream/scribnersmag01editmiss#page/n671/mode/2up
No-fault divorce killed film noir and thus can never be forgiven.
Sex partners with "benefits". Juvenile adults with a disorientation.
Remember that in the Supreme Court case, the issue was NOT about a life-long union. It was about TAX BENEFITS. It was about MONEY.
Weddings are becoming increasingly expensive and elaborate spectacles. One reason is that people want to try to make marriage seem important and meaningful in a culture that denigrates it.
More states allowed abortion in 1972 than allowed gay marriage in 2014.
Raw judicial power. Ginsburg loved it. She was so wise she got replaced by ACB.
I always thought it was incredibly telling that no serious effort was made to legitimize so-called same-sex "marriage" until after no-fault divorce laws were basically universal.
A community whose entire raison d'etre is defined around the idea that the most important quality of an intimate relationship is its sexual gratification potential (and let it be noted for the record this describes an awful lot of straight people as well) is unlikely to have interest in an arrangement expected to be permanent regardless of the loss of sexual appeal.
On our last real conversation (although we have never denigrated one another we do not speak unless necessary), my ex- looked me in the eye and said that she never felt worse than when she perjured herself and told a judge that I had "psychologically abused" her although I had never abused her in any way whatsoever. Her lawyer told her it was "the least incorrect thing" she could say to get a divorce for fault. I actually felt sad for her. The early 80s could be a hard time for many people.
I moved on and eventually found love and a nearly 40 year (so far) marriage. She had (I understand, no actual knowledge) a 10-year marriage to a man who used no-fault to dump her, and has lived alone now for over 35 years. At least our children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren are nearby for her.
There are rights and rights. That is to say, there are fundamental or natural or god-given rights that we may have, and there are options that we can exercise, options that may be valuable, but aren't regarded as fundamental, sacred, or inviolable.
Because my older sister and I were "wards of the court" in a nasty custody battle, I'm sort-of glad that no-fault divorce reduces the trauma of any one divorce.
But it increases the number of divorces, and the total social trauma & disruption from divorce.
"Real Love" is the combined heart-felt feelings of lust & caring AND the reasoned decision to be committed. For life. For the children.
It is socially optimal for all kids to be raised in nuclear families with mothers and father that love each other - enjoy being together AND trust they they are both committed.
Our society needs far more status, likely thru gov't money, to go to those couples who marry, stay together, and have & raise kids.
Blogger Vonnegan said...
Michael K and Jamie, yes, this 1000%. And many of these large companies are self-insured, so a pregnancy carried to term under their health insurance policy comes out of their pockets in that way as well.
That's why the only TV I watch is Tucker Carlson. He has uncommon insights,
If you don't want a divorce, don't get one.
Recognize with civil marriage it is not just a case of two people deciding to enter into married life together. Anyone can do that at any time. And always could. Men and women, men and men, women and women, men and women and women, all combinations and flavors.
Civil marriage is different in that it is not just about the couple (or throuple, etc.). It is about ALL of civil society.
To say that there is a fundamental right to civil marriage is to claim that you have the right to demand that everyone else recognize your marriage. It is not to say you can do X, it is to demand that other people do Y. It is to subjugate other people to your will. Of course there is no right to do that, much less a fundamental right.
Post a Comment