An Email On Marriage To The Testosterone Group

I write emails to my friends which I put under a label in Gmail as The Testosterone Group. Every so often, I write something, or they write something that I think is valuable enough to share. There are five of us. Three are married while two of us are single.

I sent a link to an article that researched marriage and concluded that married men who are happier than their wives end up getting divorced. This is something I have always believed, but I never did the research on it. Finally, someone did. In short, marriage is misery for the married man.

This email is on marriage with the original link that prompted the discussion.--C.

Being happier than your wife could end in divorce.

I think the husbands here would say we are just two kvetching bachelors congratulating ourselves on not having a life we really wish we had. But I point to the numbers:

50% of marriages end in divorce
70% of married men admit to cheating on wives
60% of married women admit to cheating on husbands

The thing you have to consider about these dismal stats is they don't capture the true picture of it all. 50% of the marriages that last include people who are effectively unmarried but continue the fiction for the sake of religion, kids, finances, etc. As for infidelity, those stats are underreported because people lie. Finally, the people who are married for real and remain faithful don't seem terribly happy.

I told my girlfriend that I would share a home with her and leave all my things to her if I croaked, but I would not marry her. Marriage is a license for a person to take the other person for granted. She didn't want this arrangement despite the fact that she would essentially be getting the same thing as if we were married. This is because she would always have to maintain herself and treat me right or else I was gone.

Most of the downsides to bachelorhood are a myth. It is said that bachelors have shorter lifespans which is true. The life expectancy of a married man is nine months longer than for a single man. But I think this is because unmarried men have bad habits that lead to this such as drinking and drug abuse. Either way, 9 months is not enough for me to live a life of misery. 9 years might be a different story. As for women, there is no statistical difference between life spans for married and single women.

Finances are another matter. Leaving out taxes, two incomes are better than one. You can buy more stuff. You can afford that home theater system. The downside is you have to watch chick flicks and Lifetime. Since women hate working, they will find a way to stay at home and not hit a lick. Then, you are better off being single because you can cut your expenses in half.

Having someone clean the house is nice, but you are better off paying a housekeeper to come in and do it for you. My past three girlfriends were slobs. I did more housework than they did. It only gets worse after marriage.

This leaves the emotional side of things. It is nice to have someone there for you to lift your spirits. The only problem is that the cause of most of your depressing thoughts is that person you sleep with. Plus, problems at work and with money are amplified when you have a wife and kids depending on you.

There must be something to being married considering that so many people do it. Even people who divorce are likely to remarry. Even people averse to marriage like Gene Simmons and Kurt Russell find themselves in relationships that are virtual marriages. Why do it?

I don't have the answer for this. The only time I have ever been tempted to get married is just to satisfy a woman's demand for a commitment. The woman's need to be married is clear--money. It is always about the money. They want a legal claim to your resources. Period. They do not want to work. They will even tolerate infidelity for the sake of that money. And they will drop a man as soon as he can't earn anymore.

It is a raw deal no matter how you look at it.

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