When a civilization attacks marriage, the civilization dies...

[Michie]

In the debate about the nature of marriage, many people wonder why we don’t just give marriage back to the churches. Well, in the first place, it’s gone too far for that. Gay marriage advocates would never be satisfied with that option. More importantly though, the question is based on the false idea that marriage was invented by churches.

When a civilization attacks marriage, the civilization dies...

 

[Maynard Keenan]

Good thing nothing is attacking marriage!

 

[AvilaSurfer]

Good thing nothing is attacking marriage!

These are not the droids you're looking for. Move along.

 

[Maynard Keenan]

 

[Fantine]

Sociologically, as fewer couples have large families, and more women are capable of supporting themselves, it is less necessary for survival.

Sociologically, as people live much longer lives, making a lifetime commitment to one person is more difficult.

What this means is that if marriage is to survive, couples need support. They need to learn how to communicate well, to compromise, to support one another and accept one another unconditionally.

Coercion (pressuring women to have large families or discriminating against them in the workplace) isn't a good way to encourage marriage. Although it certainly worked for several millenia, it denies women's human rights.

Certainly tax and government incentives promoting marriage are good.

I've said before, a lot of Catholics do handstands (ending in standing ovations) praising unwed mothers to the skies for not having abortions without ever saying, "Why not get married?" or "It might be a good idea to get married." So fearful are they that if they don't put an unwed mother on a high pedestal she will have an abortion that they don't try to encourage her to do something which would give the child a more stable life.

When I had my first child at 26, my mother's good friend's daughter (21) had hers.

I had been married 5 years. I'd owned a house for 2. Both my husband and I had gotten our college degrees (his at night school, resulting in his graduation one month before the baby was born).

She refused to marry the biological father (didn't love him) and proceeded to marry an itinerant musician, several years later, who had a groupie in every venue. Eventually, of course, they divorced, too.

I am not saying she should not have received compassion....it was just the "canonization" that bugged me...

She wasn't a saint. She was someone who compounded one foolish decision with another...the really kind would have told her, "You're a parent now. You don't marry an itinerant musician with groupies in every venue. You marry someone who will be a good husband and father." Why didn't anyone tell her that?

 

[Wolseley]

When I had my first child at 26, my mother's good friend's daughter (21) had hers.

I had been married 5 years. I'd owned a house for 2. Both my husband and I had gotten our college degrees (his at night school, resulting in his graduation one month before the baby was born).

She refused to marry the biological father (didn't love him) and proceeded to marry an itinerant musician, several years later, who had a groupie in every venue. Eventually, of course, they divorced, too.

I am not saying she should not have received compassion....it was just the "canonization" that bugged me...

She wasn't a saint. She was someone who compounded one foolish decision with another...the really kind would have told her, "You're a parent now. You don't marry an itinerant musician with groupies in every venue. You marry someone who will be a good husband and father." Why didn't anyone tell her that?

Would she have listened if they had? From my understanding of the era you're talking about, the rejection of all standards previous to the generation in question were to be jettisoned---don't trust anyone over 30, if it feels good, do it; tune in, turn on, drop out, free love, no commitment, all that jazz.

Which attitudes led to all the problems we're having now. The Pepsi Generation has wakened to the fact that Mom and Dad and Gramps and Gram were right, all along.....but it's too late to do anything about it now; the sociological damage has been done.

Like wow, man---can you dig the groovy colors? Copic!

 

[catholicbybirth]

Sociologically, as fewer couples have large families, and more women are capable of supporting themselves, it is less necessary for survival.

Sociologically, as people live much longer lives, making a lifetime commitment to one person is more difficult.

What this means is that if marriage is to survive, couples need support. They need to learn how to communicate well, to compromise, to support one another and accept one another unconditionally.

Coercion (pressuring women to have large families or discriminating against them in the workplace) isn't a good way to encourage marriage. Although it certainly worked for several millenia, it denies women's human rights.

Certainly tax and government incentives promoting marriage are good.

I've said before, a lot of Catholics do handstands (ending in standing ovations) praising unwed mothers to the skies for not having abortions without ever saying, "Why not get married?" or "It might be a good idea to get married." So fearful are they that if they don't put an unwed mother on a high pedestal she will have an abortion that they don't try to encourage her to do something which would give the child a more stable life.

When I had my first child at 26, my mother's good friend's daughter (21) had hers.

I had been married 5 years. I'd owned a house for 2. Both my husband and I had gotten our college degrees (his at night school, resulting in his graduation one month before the baby was born).

She refused to marry the biological father (didn't love him) and proceeded to marry an itinerant musician, several years later, who had a groupie in every venue. Eventually, of course, they divorced, too.

I am not saying she should not have received compassion....it was just the "canonization" that bugged me...

She wasn't a saint. She was someone who compounded one foolish decision with another...the really kind would have told her, "You're a parent now. You don't marry an itinerant musician with groupies in every venue. You marry someone who will be a good husband and father." Why didn't anyone tell her that?

Some people are nurtured for success, while others are nurtured to fail.

I come from a large family. I have a mom and dad who stayed married for 40 years, when my mom died. I have 6 sisters and 4 brothers.

I was nurtured to fail. Why do I say this? No matter what I did, I received no kudos. I was always told to be someone else. I grew up thinking I belong on the compost pile.

One of my sisters was nurtured to succeed. She thought everything she did was great. She was held up as a model for me as she was the epitome of being a daughter. She believed she was perfect.

On of my brothers was nurtured for success. When he got angry, swore, broke things, he was never punished. All sorts of adulation were given him no matter what he did or what he wanted to do.

I was not given the ability to make good decisions, because every decision I made was wrong, according to my mother.

Just because someone makes one bad decision after another, that does not mean you could have done any better if you had been them.

Do people not know that pasts go with people until the end. You are who you are based on your genetics and your environment.

Janice

 

[Cosmic Charlie]

If you're going to make a statement as sweeping and definitive as "attacking marriage will destroy civilization" you really should present an argument and evidence of some kind to support that thesis.

Don't you think ?

 

[MKJ]

Would she have listened if they had? From my understanding of the era you're talking about, the rejection of all standards previous to the generation in question were to be jettisoned---don't trust anyone over 30, if it feels good, do it; tune in, turn on, drop out, free love, no commitment, all that jazz.

Which attitudes led to all the problems we're having now. The Pepsi Generation has wakened to the fact that Mom and Dad and Gramps and Gram were right, all along.....but it's too late to do anything about it now; the sociological damage has been done.

Like wow, man---can you dig the groovy colors? Copic!

I don't think that Gram and Gramps were right all along, if you are talking about the parents of the hippie generation. Chemical food, creating the family and industry structures that increasingly destroyed the cohesion of the family, the rise of the car, the beginning of the destruction of rural life and building extremely people-unfriendly suburbs, the bleeping Green Revolution, even religion as a social obligation more than a meaningful spiritual pursuit....

The hippies were rejecting some pretty seriously bad stuff. They just did not have a very good guide to know what was bad or what was good, so they examined it all.

 

[Wolseley]

If you're going to make a statement as sweeping and definitive as "attacking marriage will destroy civilization" you really should present an argument and evidence of some kind to support that thesis.

Don't you think ?

Unwin, Joseph D., Ph.D.: “Sexual Regulations and Cultural Behavior,” address given to the Medical Section of the British Psychological Society, March 27, 1935. (Library of Congress No., HQ12.U52).

Thesis: all societies which abandon heterosexual monogamy will cease to exist within three generations, or roughly between 75 and 100 years. Examples are given for more than eighty cultures which have followed this model.

 

[imind]

Unwin, Joseph D., Ph.D.: “Sexual Regulations and Cultural Behavior,” address given to the Medical Section of the British Psychological Society, March 27, 1935. (Library of Congress No., HQ12.U52).

Thesis: all societies which abandon heterosexual monogamy will cease to exist within three generations, or roughly between 75 and 100 years. Examples are given for more than eighty cultures which have followed this model.

how would allowing same sex marriage 'abandon' heterosexual marriage?

 

[Wolseley]

how would allowing same sex marriage 'abandon' heterosexual marriage?

Abandon it as a norm. Unwin discovered that whenever a society abandoned the nuclear family of one man, one woman, with children, the society would start to disintegrate; often, when a culture was entering the stage right before it collapsed entirely, it would experience an "outburst of homosexuality"---a tolerance for it, acceptance of it, a mainstreaming of it. This is not the cause of the society disintegrating, but rather a symptom of the overall disease.

Here's another good overview which includes the same topics: The Decline of a Nation

 

[TheOtherHockeyMom]

Unwin, Joseph D., Ph.D.: “Sexual Regulations and Cultural Behavior,” address given to the Medical Section of the British Psychological Society, March 27, 1935. (Library of Congress No., HQ12.U52).

Thesis: all societies which abandon heterosexual monogamy will cease to exist within three generations, or roughly between 75 and 100 years. Examples are given for more than eighty cultures which have followed this model.

Turns out Unwin wrote a book: http://www.amazon.com/SEX-AND-CULTURE-J-D-UNWIN/dp/B000K7AQFC/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top
His thesis is interesting, unusual, and very debatable, I think. Basically that when people are deprived of sex, they funnel that energy into other areas, especially mental development. He's got some gender specific notions in there as well regarding how limiting the sexual opportunities of women was more important than limiting the sexual opportunities of men.

The book seems very hard to come by, but from the discussions it seems that he didn't really discuss homosexuality specifically. His thesis was based more on monogamy and sexual repression.

I wonder if monogamous homosexuals in a committed long term relationship have sex about as infrequently as monogamous heterosexuals.

 

[Cosmic Charlie]

Unwin, Joseph D., Ph.D.: “Sexual Regulations and Cultural Behavior,” address given to the Medical Section of the British Psychological Society, March 27, 1935. (Library of Congress No., HQ12.U52).

Thesis: all societies which abandon heterosexual monogamy will cease to exist within three generations, or roughly between 75 and 100 years. Examples are given for more than eighty cultures which have followed this model.

Joseph the loser (unwin ? It was just too easy sorry) didn't write this article in question.

And, look, seriously, 1935 ?

My father isn't as old as this article.

 

[Cosmic Charlie]

Turns out Unwin wrote a book: http://www.amazon.com/SEX-AND-CULTURE-J-D-UNWIN/dp/B000K7AQFC/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top
His thesis is interesting, unusual, and very debatable, I think. Basically that when people are deprived of sex, they funnel that energy into other areas, especially mental development. He's got some gender specific notions in there as well regarding how limiting the sexual opportunities of women was more important than limiting the sexual opportunities of men.

The book seems very hard to come by,

Probably because it's been out of print since 1940.

 

[Wolseley]

Turns out Unwin wrote a book: http://www.amazon.com/SEX-AND-CULTURE-J-D-UNWIN/dp/B000K7AQFC/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top
His thesis is interesting, unusual, and very debatable, I think. Basically that when people are deprived of sex, they funnel that energy into other areas, especially mental development. He's got some gender specific notions in there as well regarding how limiting the sexual opportunities of women was more important than limiting the sexual opportunities of men.

The book seems very hard to come by, but from the discussions it seems that he didn't really discuss homosexuality specifically. His thesis was based more on monogamy and sexual repression.

I wonder if monogamous homosexuals in a committed long term relationship have sex about as infrequently as monogamous heterosexuals.

Unwin wrote more than one book.

Joseph the loser (unwin ? It was just too easy sorry) didn't write this article in question.

And, look, seriously, 1935 ?

My father isn't as old as this article.

So what? Gravity was discovered a long time before that, and it's still good.

Probably because it's been out of print since 1940.

Yeah. You can find it in the Library of Congress and a few other places, but it's not as available as the latest bulk printing of Twilight, or whatever fluff is being churned out this week. Worth looking up, though.

 

[MikeK]

I wonder if monogamous homosexuals in a committed long term relationship have sex about as infrequently as monogamous heterosexuals.

Man, I hope not.

 

[TheOtherHockeyMom]

Unwin wrote more than one book.

He wrote three, but judging by the title, date and publication information, I wouldn't be surprised if the second is a revision or a new edition of the first, and the third is on another topic.

Sex and Culture, London, 1934 (Oxford University Press)
Sexual Regulations and Cultural Behaviour, London 1935
Our economic problems and their solution, 1944

I'm guessing by your comment on it being available in the LOC and being a worthwhile read, that you've checked it out. Does he address homosexuality specifically? In the context of long term stable monogamous relationships? How does he see gay marriage affecting society vs. casual sex among people of any gender?

ETA: You can access much (but not all) of it here..more if you are willing to kick in a few bucks
J. D. Unwin - Sex and Culture

A search on the word homosexuality indicates that he uses it once in his text, so I'm guessing it's not a central part of his thesis. From a quick read, though one thing that becomes apparent is that he thinks that women joining convents is a bad thing for society.