Bachelor speaks out
Revelry hides wedlock woes
By Jim Hanna
Senior Reporter
Wake up. Why are you reading
this Daily Nebraskan supplement
about weddings? Do you actually
like the institution of marriage?
Oh sure, the surrounding pages
are filled with stories celebrating
this most ancient of human rituals.
Maybe you even buy into the pro
marriage propaganda that has been
stabbed into your brain since birth.
Well, please allow cynicism to
shine its smiling face into these
proceedings. Let me give you a
few reasons why you shouldn’t get
married.
That’s right, amidst all of the
showers and parties and receptions
and pretty dresses and giddy grooms
and proud parents and cute little
ring-bearers and receiving lines and
cake-cuttings and free cigars and
dollar dances with joyful brides,
there is plenty of room for despair.
And because I’m in a particu
larly foul mood, I’m going to dredge
up this despair just so we don’t get
too caught up in pro-wedding eu
phoria.
Why be a marriage-basher? I
must admit that I like going to
weddings, and I even expect to be
married someday. So why be so
untoward toward matrimony?
For one thing, it’s important to
hear opposing viewpoints, espe
cially when making a decision that
will inevitably affect the rest of
your life. In addition, I think I’ve
been in too good a mood lately,
and I need to be especially vile so
that I don’t start enjoying life too
much.
Plus, it’s easier to be negative.
So, I’m going to rant, rip and rage.
I will be gloomy, sour, bleak and
miserable. I may resort to lies,
exaggerations and character assas
sination. I might even use excla
mation points. Anything to get rny
unsavory point across.
Here’s why you shouldn’t get
married:
1. You’ll probably get divorced. I
know, I know. This won’t happen
to you. You belong in the 50 per
cent of couples that will avoid the
Jim
Hanna
anguish of annulment. You’ll
manage to work out any differ
ences that may arise between you
and your mate and maintain a bliss
ful union forever and ever.
Yeah, right.
I know those figures lie. In real
ity, at least 98.7 percent of all
marriages end in divorce. The
remaining 1.3 are miserable. You’ll
probably be lucky if your spouse
doesn’t kill you before you can get
a divorce.
2. You’ll have to change the way
you squeeze the toothpaste tube.
This is a bigger deal than you might
think. Chances are you’ll marry a
person who dispenses toothpaste
differently than you and you’ll end
up in big nasty brawls every morn
ing. Similar disputes will erupt over
other issues such as whether the
toilet paper should roll out and
over or in and under, what the
message on your answering ma
chine will be and what the color
scheme in the kitchen will be. Your
self-image will plummet as you
find yourself engaged in petty battles
over lifted toilet seats and whose
turn it is to empty the cat box.
3. Your mate’s personal habits
will drive you to self-immolation.
You tell yourself that your male’s
habit of biting his/her fork and
sliding his/her teeth across the tines
will become more tolerable as your
marriage ages. Mais au contraire,
the tinny grind of bone on steel
eventually will have you beating
your head against a good old oak
board. What’s that you say? You
can learn to live with your spouse’s
finger drumming? I doubt it. By
the second year of marriage, you’ 11
be praying for a blender accident
that will lop off the offending dig
its.
4. You will lose your identity.
Argue all you will, I still insist that
loss of identity goes hand in hand
with marriage. In fact, this identity
loss is almost celebrated. Marriage
is basically an institution whereby
you forsake your own spirit for a
new unified spirit with your mate.
This is highly distressing. Maybe
by the time I’m 30,1 won’t mind
giving up a bit of my own individu
ality for the sake of marriage, but
for now, I like me all by myself.
Sadly, it seems women run an even
greater risk of identity loss as many
change their names at the altar.
Yikes. Call me selfish, but I can
fully celebrate my union with an
other human without the symbol
ism of a name change.
5. You’ll have to go to family re
unions. Before marriage, attendance
at family reunions on either side is
optional. Once you marry, how
ever, participation becomes man
datory. And as if your own family
reunions aren’t boring enough, you
have to go to your spouse’s reun
ions, where you know even fewer
people. It’s bad enough listening to
your own fat, drunk Uncle Roy
blasting the commies once a year;
who needs an entirely unrelated
Uncle Roy belching at the dinner
table?
6. You won’t have any fun any
more. Does anybody really know a
happily married couple?
7. You’ll have to listen to snotty
single people rip the institution
of marriage. Actually, I’m guess
ing single people are really just
jealous. They feel empty and hol
low without the satisfaction a life
long commitment can bring. Singles
wander aimlessly through life with
out focus and, in their frustration,
they lash out at those who have
found happiness in the sacred bonds
of wedlock. We singles are proba
bly just bitter, covetous and wish
we were married.
Naaah!
H anna is a senior theater arts major, a
Daily Nebraskan senior reporter and col
umnist.
1 - . ■ ■ '—
Research finds premarital cohabitation
no guarantee to couples’ marital bliss
By Connie L. Sheehan
Senior Editor
Cohabitation in the United States
increased 63 percent from 1980 to
1988, according to the U.S. Census
Bureau.
With about 2.6 million cohabiting
households across the nation, living
together before marriage might seem
the path to follow for a long and
happy relationship.
Not necessarily so, according to
University of Nebraska-Lincoln soci
ology professors Alan Booth and David
Johnspn.
Research from 1988, printed in the
“Journal of Family Issues,” found that
couples who cohabit before marriage
are just as likely, if not more so, to
experience problems in their relation
ships.
“Sometimes there arc expectations
that certain things will come to pass
when the marriage occurs,” Booth
said.
The couple may disagree about
having children while cohabiting, but
after marriage that disagreement might
take on a different perspective, Booth
said.
After the marriage, the husband or
wife might assume that the other partner
should change his or her mind. V/hen
things remain the same, problems
occur, he said.
Other studies have shown that af
ter an initial high, marital satisfaction
declines over the years. Booth and
Johnson’s study proposed that per
haps because of premarital cohabita
tion, these effects might be “acceler
ated” because of the couple’s quasi
marital existence before the actual
wedding.
Another problem cohabitants
may encounter is parental pressure
against their unconventional living
arrangements. Guilty feelings and
pressures about such an arrangement
can spill over into the marital rela
tionship.
The cohabitation relationship it
self may not always be the cause of
later problems, according to the study.
The problems could come because
those who enter such relationships
rather than marriage might be poor
marriage candidates.
Such partners might have person
ality problems, problems with drugs
or alcohol or difficulty handling money
or slaying employed.
Those interviewed said the proba
bility that they would get a divorce oi
separation was 9 percent for those
who had cohabited and 5 percent for
those who did not. Actual statistics
show that the percentage for ail couples
is closer to 50 percent.
Booth said younger people and
divorced people arc more inclined tc
cohabit before marriage.
The number oj cohabiting house
holds has increased sufficiently thai
laws in states sudh as California and
New York are being changed to pro
tecl partners’ rights, Booth said. Some
of the issues include property rights
and insurance availability for cohab
iting partners rather than spouses.
“But that’s not Middle America
yet,” Booth said.
BEFORE HE CAN FOLLOW
HIS DREAMS, HE'S GOT 10
FOUOW THE RULES.
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