What's Wrong with Marrying for Love?

Falling in love is the expected and proper prelude to marriage. As presently interpreted, this means that you marry for love and that you work at it after marriage. A successful marriage is the final realization of a romantic attraction. A good marriage is one that contributes freely and fully to personality development; a poor marriage is one that hinders it. Getting married is primarily a romantic adventure with an emphasis upon individual rights and freedom from parental control, rather than a carefully reasoned choice involving a prudent weighing of other factors important for a lifelong union. Passionate attachment and anticipated happiness outweigh such considerations as companionship, cultural similarities and common social experience. We proudly announce that we no longer marry for convenience, to promote a career or to please our families but to establish a personally desirable relationship that is voluntary, rests on personal choice, and aims at individual happiness and personality development. Romance is beautiful. Wonderful. But as the primary basis for selection of matrimonial mates? On which to build a lifelong union? Many things must be considered. This is the verdict of other centuries. Young people need the counsel of their elders. Parents do know something about the nature and needs of their own children. They can judge their mates through the eyes of their greater age and experience. And 'they do seek the happiness of their children. Does modern research throw any light on the validity of romance as a basis for mate selection? What are the findings of recent studies of marital problems? Romance according to some researchers is a process of fantasy formation, usually adolescent when one idealizes another person, ignoring the faults and magnifying the virtues of the loved one. (After marriage there is usually an emotional return to reality.) Other students of the problem see it as a striving for emotional security, so lacking in casual relations Df our everyday life. Whatever the facts may be in each of these interpretations, it should be noted that all see romantic love as some brm of compensating emotion, personally satisfying, ide-ilizing someone else but unrelated to reality. Studies of marital failure and success show quite clearly hat the longer the period of acquaintance before marriage, he greater the chances of marital success. Perhaps most essential is the importance of similarity of ocial background for marital success. This means that like hould marry like. "Marriage," writes a well-known family sociologist, "involves living with a person, not merely loving him." It is this prosaic fact that places romantic love in its proper proportions as a basis for marriage. Romance must be termed the prelude to the more sober and realistic consideration of a mate hut

There are Some Rules for a Happy Marriage

The timeworn admonitions, such as "Praise her new hat", "Share his hobbies", "Be a sweetheart as well as a wife", "Don't keep a blonde in the guest room" have been avoided inthis article not only because they are threadbare from repetition, but also because they don't seem to accomplish their purpose. Maybe what we need is a brand-new set of rules. Here they come. RULE ONE: Neither party to a sacred union should run down, disparage, or badmouth the other's former girls or beaux, as the case may be. The tendency to attack the character looks, intelligence, capability, and achievements of one's mate's former friends of the opposite sex is a common ease of domestic discontent. Aspersions, insinuations, reflections, or just plain cracks about old boy friends and girl friends should be avoided at all times. RULE TWO: A husband should not insult his wife publicly, at parties. He should insult her in the privacy of home. Thus, if a man thinks the souffles his wife makes are as tough as an outfielder's glove, he should tell her so when they are at home, not when they are out at a formal party where a perfect souffle has just been served. The same rule applies to the wife. RULE THREE: When a husband is reading aloud, a wife should sit quietly in her chair, relaxed but attentive. If he has decided to read the Republican platform, an article on elm blight, or a blow-by-blow account of a prize fight, it is not going to be easy, but she should at least pretend to be interested. She should not keep swinging one foot, or clap her hands in an effort to catch the mosquito to bite her when her husband is reading aloud. She should not break in to correct her husband's pronunciation, or to tell him one of his socks is wrong side out. When the husband has finished, the wife should not lunge instantly into some irrelevant subject. It's wiser to exclaim, "How interesting!" or, at the very least, "Well, well!" She might even compliment him on his diction and his grasp of politics, elm blight, or boxing. RULE FOUR: A husband should try to remember where things are around the house so that he does not wait for his wife to get home from the hairdresser's before he can put his hands on what he wants. Perhaps every wife should draw for her husband a detailed map of the house showing clearly the location of everything he might need. Trouble is, I suppose, he would lay the map down somewhere and not be able to find it until his wife got home. RULE FIVE: Two persons living in holy matrimony must avoid slipping into the subjunctive mood. A husband is always set on edge by his mate's "Far be it from me" or "Be that as it may". The safest place for a happily wedded pair is the indicative mood, and of its tenses the present is the most secure. The future is the domain of threats and worries, and the past is a wasteland of sorrows and regrets.

Unplanned Pregnancies

You are a sexually active woman. Both you and your partner have been using some form of birth control. Then you miss your period. You don't take it seriously because you have been so careful about contraception. Initially, you tell yourself that these things happen. May be it's the stress or just a routine glitch in your menstrual cycle. After all, women rarely menstruate like clockwork. But just to make sure you take a home pregnancy test. The test is positive. You are pregnant! But you are not turning cartwheels with joy.
For the average woman, finding out that she is pregnant means that it is time to break out the champagne (non-alcoholic!). However, the average woman is probably also married, healthy, financially stable, and the pregnancy has been planned and is the result of consensual sex. Take the case of a woman who has become pregnant after she has been raped. Or consider a woman for whom pregnancy is dangerous. What if the woman is not physically, mentally or financially capable of looking after a child? What about teenage pregnancy?
Pregnancy is not a welcome occurrence for women who do not want to become pregnant for whatever reason. Having a child is something that requires planning and should be a voluntary well thought-out decision. It is the woman who has to carry the baby in her womb for the next nine months and both parents have to bear the tremendous responsibility that rearing a child entails. While making a baby is fun and games, bringing up the child is not a joke. Conception is only the first step on the long journey of parenthood.
Faced with an unplanned pregnancy, a woman has three choices. She could have the baby and face the consequences; she could carry the baby to term and then give it up for adoption; or she could terminate the pregnancy.
Women who cannot bring themselves to abort the baby should remember that having the baby is not always the smartest decision. If the mother is unmarried, both the child and the mother will bear the stigma of illegitimacy. It is not easy bringing up a child alone. Sometimes children from single parent households are not as well-adjusted as other children.
In the case of women who opt to carry the baby to term with the intention of giving it up for adoption, they often discount the bond that develops between mother and baby after nine months in the womb. Women often do not anticipate what a wrench it is to give up the baby to strangers after nurturing her in the womb for nine months. They should remember that adoption is not a reversible decision.
Most women balk at the thought of having an abortion. This is only natural. Terminating a pregnancy is a major decision and one that women should not take lightly. Women should not view abortion in a casual manner as another means of contraception. You don't get rid of a baby merely because you have been careless or because it is inconvenient to have one. But if you have not planned to have a baby and if you cannot give it a good life after it is born, then you should seriously think about having a child. It is not enough to give a child the gift of life. You must be able to ensure a certain quality of life. The point is that women should have the right to choose.
There are two camps on the controversial issue of abortion: pro-life and pro-choice. The pro-life camp is anti-abortion. In their opinion, a foetus is human from the moment of conception. Therefore, having an abortion is equivalent to murdering a baby. The pro-choice camp is for abortion, believing that the decision to have the child should rest with the mother. Debates have been raging around the world on the issue. Governments have vacillated, wondering whether to legalize abortions. In countries where abortions are illegal, women who do not have the financial resources to secure the cooperation of a doctor have been forced to go to quacks who often do not know what an abortion entails. They perform invasive procedures in the most unsanitary conditions that have resulted in complications like damage to the woman's reproductive organs, infertility and even death.
Where does that leave us? While most women have an opinion on this issue, either pro-choice or pro-life, they are often surprised when it comes to making a personal decision. Theory often flies out of the window when you have to put it into practice. There is 'right' decision. What is 'right'will depend on the circumstances of every pregnancy.

Marriage

"Married" redirects here. For the radio comedy programme, see Married (radio series).
"Matrimony" redirects here. For the sacrament or liturgical rite in Christianity, see Christian views of marriage. For the card game, see Matrimony (solitaire).

Marriage is a personal union of individuals. This union may also be called matrimony, while the ceremony that marks its beginning is usually called a wedding and the married status created is sometimes called wedlock.
Marriage is an institution in which interpersonal relationships (usually intimate and sexual) are acknowledged by the state or by religious authority. It is often viewed as a contract. Civil marriage is the legal concept of marriage as a governmental institution, in accordance with marriage laws of the jurisdiction. If recognized by the state, by the religion(s) to which the parties belong or by society in general, the act of marriage changes the personal and social status of the individuals who enter into it.
People marry for many reasons, but usually one or more of the following: legal, social, and economic stability; the formation of a family unit; procreation and the education and nurturing of children; legitimizing sexual relations; public declaration of love; or to obtain citizenship.[1][2]
Marriage may take many forms: for example, a union between one man and one woman as husband and wife is a monogamous heterosexual marriage; polygamy — in which a person takes more than one spouse — is common in many societies;[3]. Recently, some jurisdictions [4] and denominations have begun to recognize same-sex marriage, uniting people of the same sex.
A marriage is often formalized during a marriage ceremony,[5] which may be performed either by a religious officiant, by a secular State authorised officiator, or (in weddings that have no church or state affiliation) by a trusted friend of the wedding participants. The act of marriage usually creates normative or legal obligations between the individuals involved and, in many societies, their extended families.
Article 16 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights declares that "Men and women of full age, without any limitation due to race, nationality or religion, have the right to marry and to found a family. They are entitled to equal rights as to marriage, during marriage and at its dissolution. Marriage shall be entered into only with the free and full consent of the intending spouses." The Cairo Declaration on Human Rights in Islam gives men and women the "right to marriage" regardless of their race, colour or nationality, but not religion.

Ref - "Wikipedia"