Why Areas with More Men Have Higher Marriage Rates

Why Areas with More Men Have Higher Marriage Rates

(Link): Why Areas with More Men Have Higher Marriage Rates

Excerpts:

Aug 26, 2016

In places where men outnumber women, it might seem like science would suggest that more testosterone and fewer available females might lead to less stability in relationships. But a new study shows that’s not the case.

The research showed that counties in the U.S. with more men than women generally had higher (Link): rates of marriage, fewer births outside marriage and fewer single female heads of household — all of which are generally signs of greater family stability, according to the researchers.

…. In other words, the new research does not support the assumption that if there are (Link): more men in an area, there will be more unmarried men.

Schacht said these results can be explained through the so-called mating market theory, which applies the principles of supply and demand to partnering.

“If you’re the rarer sex, you have more bargaining power; you have greater leverage in terms of what you demand out of a partner,” Schacht said. So in places with more men, the men are more responsive to women’s desires, in order to find a partner, he said.

“‘I Kissed Dating Goodbye’ [Book] Told Me to Stay Pure Until Marriage. I Still Have a Stain on My Heart” – Regarding: Dating Book by Author Josh Harris (with other related links about the IKDG book) and Criticizing “Purity Culture”

“‘I Kissed Dating Goodbye’ [Book] Told Me to Stay Pure Until Marriage. I Still Have a Stain on My Heart” – Regarding: Dating Book by Author Josh Harris (with other related links about the IKDG book) and Criticizing “Purity Culture”

August 24, 2016 update: I added a new link at the bottom of this post: people continue to attack the idea of sexual purity by publicizing backlash against the Harris IKDG book.

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I myself have never read the IKDB book, which was written by Harris. I have read about the book on other sites in the past, and it is my understanding the book discussed how to date, and other such topics, and is not strictly about sex or virginity.

The author uses this review of the IKDG book to bash “purity culture,” and in so doing, touches on the topic or staying chaste until marriage.

I am in the middle of this debate. I cannot completely agree with all the critics of “purity culture,” depending on what they are criticizing about it and why.

I believe that the Bible teaches both male and females are to sexually abstain until marriage, so I don’t believe in tossing out this teaching all because some young women feel they have been hurt or oppressed by it.

On the other hand, how some Christians have taught about sexual purity has been lop-sided – males are typically not addressed, only females – and Christians could do a better, or more sensitive job, in how they present the concept of remaining a virgin until marriage.

With that introduction, here is the link, with some excerpts (and note, I am not in complete agreement with all views in this piece; however, I’m not a supporter of a lot of Christian dating advice. Christian dating advice tends to act as an obstacle to singles who want to someday marry):

(Link): “‘I Kissed Dating Goodbye’ told me to stay pure until marriage. I still have a stain on my heart“

Excerpts:

By Liz Lenz

July 27, 2016

In 1997, Joshua Harris published “I Kissed Dating Goodbye,” a book that was in part a warning about the harm that relationships before marriage could cause. Harris evoked images of men at the altar bringing all their past partners with them into the marriage to reinforce the point that love and sex before marriage took pieces of your heart and made you less.

At the time, Harris was just 21, but he was already a rising star.

…He [Harris] was what we, as young evangelicals, wanted to be. And so we strove passionately to attain the ideal of premarital purity he laid out for us. Now, almost 20 years later, even Harris appears to be questioning whether his advice did more harm than good.

…But Harris’s book was hugely influential.

…On the surface, I am a purity-culture success story: I am a heterosexual woman, a virgin until marriage, now with two small children and a husband I deeply love. We attend church. We believe in God. And yet, for me, the legacy of purity culture is not one of freedom but one of fear.

Purity culture taught me that I ought to be passed down from father to husband, more an inheritance than a human.

 I was taught that men are my cover and my shield, when for the most part they have been the ones causing damage through molestation, rape and abuse.

I was taught that my holy calling was to open my legs for one and only one and bear him children. Barring that, I was to keep them closed and never express desire or lust or fear or longing.

So many women in my life cracked under the untenable pressure, often giving up on God all together. Others were forced into marriages with men who hit them and hid their abuse behind another message of the church borne from purity culture, that God hates divorce.

Celibate Christian Woman Asks Christian Host Why God Will Not Send Her a Husband

Celibate Christian Woman Asks Christian Host Why God Will Not Send Her a Husband

A couple of days ago, I saw this episode of The 700 Club.

A celibate Christian woman wrote Pat Robertson this question –

And her question is one all Christians avoid: they just scream at a 20 year old today to MARRY NOW NOW NOW!

They have no advice and no encouragement to give any adult over 35 who wants to be married but still finds him or herself single.

The usual Christian response is just to shame this lady for supposedly not having done enough to marry when younger, in spite of not knowing her background, or what she did to try to marry – Christians just arrogantly ASSUME if you are not married past a certain age, it is all your fault, and there were no mitigating circumstances.

So here’s her question to Pat, host of The 700 Club:

Dear Pat,

The Bible says that it’s better to marry than to burn with lust, but what about someone like me who can’t find someone to marry?

Women, Stop Listening to Sexist Relationship ‘Experts’ by D. L. D’Oyley

Women, Stop Listening to Sexist Relationship ‘Experts’ by D. L. D’Oyley

If you are not already aware, Steve Harvey, whom this author discusses, is a Christian. He is sometimes a guest speaker on Christian network TBN.

(Link): Women, Stop Listening to Sexist Relationship ‘Experts’ (page 1)
(Link to Page 2) by D. L. D’Oyley

Excerpts:

Feb 2016

She Matters: If they’re men who hold shoddy views about sex and women, it follows that their advice to women will also be shoddy.

…It’s a common theme among men, including many so-called relationship experts. And that’s a huge problem.

It should be obvious why that’s an issue, but in case it isn’t: You have men who hold screwed-up views about sex and women telling women how to be better women to land a man.

If the perspective with which they view women is shoddy, then it follows that their advice to women will also be shoddy.

Why You Will Marry the Wrong Person by A. DeBotton

Why You Will Marry the Wrong Person by A. DeBotton

(Link):  Why You Will Marry the Wrong Person by A. DeBotton

Excerpts:

IT’S one of the things we are most afraid might happen to us. We go to great lengths to avoid it. And yet we do it all the same: We marry the wrong person.

Partly, it’s because we have a bewildering array of problems that emerge when we try to get close to others. We seem normal only to those who don’t know us very well. In a wiser, more self-aware society than our own, a standard question on any early dinner date would be: “And how are you crazy?”

Perhaps we have a latent tendency to get furious when someone disagrees with us or can relax only when we are working; perhaps we’re tricky about intimacy after sex or clam up in response to humiliation. Nobody’s perfect. The problem is that before marriage, we rarely delve into our complexities.

Whenever casual relationships threaten to reveal our flaws, we blame our partners and call it a day. As for our friends, they don’t care enough to do the hard work of enlightening us.

One of the privileges of being on our own is therefore the sincere impression that we are really quite easy to live with.

Our partners are no more self-aware. Naturally, we make a stab at trying to understand them. We visit their families. We look at their photos, we meet their college friends. All this contributes to a sense that we’ve done our homework. We haven’t.

Marriage ends up as a hopeful, generous, infinitely kind gamble taken by two people who don’t know yet who they are or who the other might be, binding themselves to a future they cannot conceive of and have carefully avoided investigating.

….But though we believe ourselves to be seeking happiness in marriage, it isn’t that simple. What we really seek is familiarity — which may well complicate any plans we might have had for happiness. We are looking to recreate, within our adult relationships, the feelings we knew so well in childhood.

I’m Not Pining for a Long-Lost Love. I’m Single by Circumstance by S. Reed

I’m Not Pining for a Long-Lost Love. I’m Single by Circumstance by S. Reed

I wish more articles addressed the “single by circumstance” situation as the one I am linking to in this post does.

Unfortunately, I don’t see too many articles about that topic, and in the meantime, a lot of conservative Christians who rail against delayed marriage, or declining marriage rates, assume that most or many single women are intentionally avoiding marriage.

So, these conservative Christians (and sometimes secular conservative groups or people) scold women for being single, and they engage in fear mongering, where they do things like tell women they will supposedly die sooner or live miserable lives if they don’t have a husband (Bella DePaulo has refuted many of these types of claims, and I have a few posts about her work on my blog).

Many single women – such as myself – wanted to get married and still want to – and I find it either hurtful, frustrating, or absolutely insulting and infuriating to see these articles (usually by conservatives) who assume I’ve remained single by choice, so they then shame or scold single women such as myself, or they feel they must argue me into getting, or convince me to, get married. However, I don’t need to be “sold” on marriage.

I don’t need to be convinced that marriage is nice. I’m already sold on the idea or marriage.

However, the fact remains that wanting something like marriage does not magically make it come to pass.

Then, you have conservative authors (such as (Link): this one), assume I could easily get a boyfriend or husband if only I made myself weak and stupid to attract a man (or dropped a hell of a lot of standards).

You see, it’s supposedly that pesky feminism or that stubborn insistence that I have self-confidence, or be independent, (or that a guy feel like a good match for me), that is keeping me from landing a man (*roll eyes* at all the backwards thinking and sexism in those assumptions).

The simple truth is, you can be a great person – smart, funny, attractive, and have a host of other great qualities – and just not be able to meet a comparable person you would like to partner with. Nor should you dumb yourself down and become clingy and needy in the hopes doing so will attract a partner.

Speaking of all that, like the author of this article does, I too tire of societal assumptions that if you are single, or have not married past a certain age, it must necessarily mean you are horribly flawed in some way. You can be a good person and a good catch but simply never run into anyone decent, or not anyone who is compatible with you.

(Link): I’m Not Pining for a Long-lost Love. I’m Single by Circumstance by S. Reed

Excerpts:

• ….Countless movies, books, televisions shows, musicals and operas teach us to believe there’s someone out there for everyone: Just wish on a star, or get a makeover, or take a chance and boom! True love will find you. So if you haven’t found that person — or lost him somehow — people have trouble understanding why.
• ….For some, that glaring absence can be explained only by some horrible flaw I must possess or a love gone wrong in my past. Although I have many faults, I’ve never noticed that folks who are in relationships are perfect. And when I look back at my romantic history, I think: “That’s a lot of bullets dodged.”

Why “Netflix And Chill” Replaced Dinner and A Movie – Dating in 2016 by M. Weigel

Why “Netflix And Chill” Replaced Dinner and A Movie – Dating in 2016

(Link):  Sexual Freelancing in the Gig Economy

Excerpts:

• By MOIRA WEIGEL
• MAY 14, 2016

• A FRIEND of mine complains about how many of the men she meets on Tinder use corporate language to chat her up. First, they “reach out.” Then, after spending the night together, they “follow up.”
• This kind of flirting is banal, but it makes sense. We constantly use economic metaphors to describe romantic and sexual relations. Few people today refer to women as “damaged goods” or wonder why a man would “buy the cow when he can get the milk for free,” but we have “friends with benefits” and “invest in relationships.”
• An ex may be “on” or “off the market.” Online dating makes “shopping around” explicit. Blog after blog strategizes about how to maximize your “return on investment” on OkCupid.
• We use this kind of language because the ways that people date — who contacts whom, where they meet and what happens next — have always been tied to the economy. Dating applies the logic of capitalism to courtship. On the dating market, everyone competes for him or herself.
• ….If you want to understand why “Netflix and chill” has replaced dinner and a movie, you need to look at how people work. Today, people are constantly told that we must be flexible and adaptable in order to succeed. Is it surprising that these values are reshaping how many of us approach sex and love?

The Lobster: A Dystopian Tour de Force (A Movie About Adult Singles)

The Lobster: A Dystopian Tour de Force (A Movie About Adult Singles)

(Link): The Lobster: A Dystopian Tour de Force (A Movie About Adult Singles) by C. Orr

• Yorgos Lanthimos’s allegorical rumination on finding a mate is witty, cruel, and deeply unsettling.
• …Thus opens The Lobster, the stunning English-language debut of the Greek director Yorgos Lanthimos. A black comedy laced with moments of shocking cruelty, the film is a dystopian allegory about the human need to find a mate—a brilliant, if morbid, meditation on relationships in the age of the dating app.
  

Seven Truths About Marriage You Won’t Hear in Church by F. Powell

Seven Truths About Marriage You Won’t Hear in Church by F. Powell

I first saw this link Tweeted by Jory Michah’s Twitter, who got it from Relevant.

• My blog stalker, (Link): John Morgan will now probably blog about this on his blog (without crediting myself and/or Jory Michah), or, he’ll probably leave a comment on this blog post at Relevant that I am citing in my post

Most of the page is pretty good, but as you know, I don’t accept the “Equally Yoked” teaching, which the author of this page advocates.

First of all, there has been a Christian man shortage in America for decades now, leaving Christian single women with no recourse but to marry Non-Christian men.

Secondly, I have (Link): news story after news story on my blog of professing Christian men who have been arrested for using child porn or for beating or murdering their wives – such being the case, a woman is just as well-off marrying an ethical, kind atheist man as she would taking a chance on a Christian single man (provided she can even find one).

(Link):  7 Truths About Marriage You Won’t Hear in Church by F Powell

Excerpts:

• 2. There is More Than One Person Out There You Could Marry.
• 4. A Spouse Does Not Complete You.
• Jerry Maguire has brainwashed a generation of people to believe a lie. Spouses do not complete people. I bought this lie, and it wasn’t until I let go of any notion my wife could fill some void that I was able to truly love her. I had been expecting Tiffani to do something only God can do.

Research: Being Single [or Fear of Being Single] is a Meaningful Predictor of Settling for Less in Relationships

Research: Being Single [or Fear of Being Single] is a Meaningful Predictor of Settling for Less in Relationships

Via: (Link): Five Signs You Are Settling For Less Than You Deserve in Your Relationship

via DivorcedMoms Site

Excerpts:

By Terry Gaspard, Featured Journalist – February 07, 2014

…. You may even know intellectually that nobody should have to settle for less than they deserve but your emotions are conflicted.  This may leave you unwilling to take the chance of breaking things off because you fear you won’t meet someone else and will be alone for a long time.

Perhaps some of your friends have been single for a while and they complain about how hard it is to meet a nice man or woman. Underneath all of these rationalizations is a deep seated fear of being alone.

New research conducted by (Link): Stephanie S. Spielman demonstrates that fear of being single is a meaningful predictor of settling for less in relationships.  In her groundbreaking study, Spielman discovered that the fear of being single predicts settling for less in romantic relationships.

She found that fear of being single is a strong predictor of staying with a partner who is wrong for you.

Salvation Army Bans Duggar / Quivering Cult’s ‘Retreat’ (Called ‘Get Them Married’) that Promoted Arranged Marriages for Teen Girls – Quivering Advocates Are Anti-Adult Singleness and Anti-Celibacy

Salvation Army Bans Duggar / Quivering Cult’s ‘Retreat’ (Called ‘Get Them Married’) that Promoted Arranged Marriages for Teen Girls – Quivering Advocates Are Anti-Adult Singleness and Anti-Celibacy 

Before I present you with the links to the news reports about this story (which are much farther down the page), I wanted to make some introductory comments in general, and a few specific comments refuting a few points from a pro-Quivering page about celibacy.

In regards to the specific news story I am blogging about today, this Quivering group is completely overlooking Apostle Paul’s comments in (Link): 1 Corinthians 7 that it is better for people to remain single than it is to marry – and Paul does not say that this teaching is in regards only to “a few,” or only a “minority” of people.

The Bible nowhere states that marriage is “a norm,” or that God expects or wants all, or most, people to marry.

It just so happens that in other cultures thousands of years ago, most people did happen to marry – one should not deduce from this cultural situation that God supported it or wanted it to be so. It just was what it was.

If the Bible said that all or most ancient Jews painted their bodies green once a year and balanced weasels on their heads while jumping up and down on a watermelon one week out of a year, one should not assume from this that

• 1. God created that cultural practice and/or that
• 2. God wanted Americans in the year 2016 to practice these things as well.

The Quivering group’s position on marriage, celibacy, and singleness is unbiblical, not to mention disturbing.

According to this article (linked to much farther below), the Quivering group was going to call this event, (where they set up marriages for little girls to marry), “Get Them Married.”

Why not have an event called, per 1 Corinthians 7, “It Is Better To Stay Unmarried”?

Am I opposed to marriage? No.

Is the God of the Bible against marriage? No.

But the Bible does not say that being married is better or more holy for girls, women, or culture, than being single, but a lot of Christian groups, and these wacky Christian cults, insist otherwise.

Christians need to do a better job of recognizing adult singleness and celibacy as legitimate, godly, biblical lifestyles and choices for all persons (and not only meant for a small minority of people who were supposedly “gifted” with it), instead of promoting marriage and natalism as the only legitimate avenues or as ways of fixing culture, the nation, or as pleasing God.

Why Do Churches Treat Singleness Like a Problem? via Relevant Magazine

Why Do Churches Treat Singleness Like a Problem? via Relevant Magazine

I first saw this link Tweeted by Defend The Sheep’s Twitter.

• My blog stalker, (Link): John Morgan will now probably blog about this on his blog (without crediting myself and/or Defend the Sheep), or, he’ll probably leave a comment on this blog post:

(Link):  Why Do Churches Treat Singleness Like a Problem? via Relevant Magazine, by R. Karman

Excerpts:

• Please don’t misunderstand me, I do wish to be un-single one day. I do want to have children, and I am not opposed to dating. I am not rejecting all potential relationships and I love the concept of marriage, I really do.
• …But, marriage is not God’s only gift.
• And it is not the central focus of my life’s trajectory, either. Though, to my disappointment, it feels like until finding “the one” becomes my top priority, I may never fully fit into the mold many within the Church long for me to embody.
• At the age of 29, I was turned away by couples-only small groups, told by the attendants—some of my closest friends—that we were no longer in the same stage of life, then placed in a group with recent college graduates.
• ….I’ve been told that I will not truly know what it means to love until I am married with children.