Kentucky’s divorce rate has plummeted.
Between 2016 and 2023 it fell 25%,
compared with a nationwide decline of 18%You aren't wrong. We've been in a 4-income economy since 2020. Housing here is up 2x since 2020 and 5x from mid 1990s.
Not that this is too far off from existing trends, so I'm unsure if measuring in Kentucky alone is enough to control against the broader national trends:
https://www.morganstanley.com/ideas/womens-impact-on-the-eco...
> 45% of prime working age women (ages 25-44) will be single by 2030—the largest share in history—up from 41% in 2018.
https://iop.harvard.edu/youth-poll/50th-edition-spring-2025
> Just 48% of young Americans say having kids is important—the lowest ranking among the six life goals we measured. It signifies a generational shift away from traditional family formation.
The word choice of your comment is beyond absurd and your usual schtick of cherry picking links to back up your point doesn't make it any less absurd.
It's mostly men who don't wanna get married and/or start a family and do all that stuff because (in states that have yet to reform their laws) they stand to lose half their shit and not even have half a kid to show for it.
I have zero sympathy for people, of any gender, for whom not being on the favorable end of unequal treatment in divorce/custody is the marginal difference that makes them not get married.
Additional citations below:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UThiu3Q_NcQ
https://19thnews.org/2025/09/poll-traditional-family-gender-...
It's your opinion that I take issue with.
> I have zero sympathy for people, of any gender, for whom not being on the favorable end of unequal treatment in divorce/custody is the marginal difference that makes them not get married.
I guess you have zero sympathy for a large chunk of men then, because first you say that men don't get married because they lose their stuff in a divorce, and then you say that you have zero sympathy for people who don't get married because of it.
https://www.fcfcoa.gov.au/fl/pubs/defacto
You can now be forced to pay child support - including for kids that aren't your own kids - without ever being married.
There are people who'll do anything for money. Some of those people are women, and occasionally a man succeeds at this too. Children are a way to extract large amounts of money over time from partners. The state cooperates with this practice because the state will be on the hook otherwise.
IIUC, the new neutral bias applies regardless of marriage.
If a woman is looking to create a kid whom she has sole custody of, then what she is really looking for is a DIY sperm donor. I'm sure there are plenty of men downright eager to sign a contract relinquishing any paternity claim/liability as a condition of dating.
If you're talking about cases where a woman wants to create a kid, while retaining a unilateral ability to choose whether to have the man in the kid's life or not? That is a terrible dynamic and is exactly what needed reform.
Are there?
I don't know. I don't think most men are as mercenary as that.
As someone who was literally offered this situation (a lesbian couple I was friends with that wanted a child) I can say that it simply wasn't something I could seriously consider.
How could I exist knowing that I had a child that I had little or no relationship with? A child who would constantly wonder about their father and why I wasn't part of their life?
I don't think it's just me, I think most guys would have a problem with that.
And maybe the ones that don't wouldn't be the best choice for being a father?
What kind of a batshit characterization of women is this? You think women will only marry a man if they are guaranteed custody of any potential children in a potential divorce?
People change as well. Who you marry is potentially not who you want or need a divorce from. Sometimes the economic unpleasantness can be avoided with prenups, but this is much more rare than it should be. Choices can lead to substantial long term obligations and liability, binding for one to two decades, and I think better choices can be made (based on the evidence and the data).
My opinions in this thread are not gender driven, but data driven.
(~40% of pregnancies in the US are unintended every year as well, per the Guttmacher Institute, although I don’t have Kentucky specific numbers at hand in that context)
Hard to know at this point if the problem is with specific judges, with the way the law is written, or if the presentation of these experiences are made to seem more numerous by the way the article presents the story. It also didn't cover instances of abuse coming from mothers, so there's at least a little bias in the story.
France has the legal status of living in concubinage, so man and concubine. Pretty much the same as live-in girlfriend.
Some terms that could work: Man and bride Concubine Wedded/conjugal/nuptial state/union This is my wedded bride. This is my wedded man. etc.
I know it's a thing in Canada, Australia, and Washington state (if you cohabitate for some number of years, they can claim that it's a "de-facto relationship" and get property division). Apparently the current UK government is trying to push it
I looked up for Germany and found nothing
the keyword to look up is "Eheähnliche Gemeinschaft".
The root issue is that the state is involved in the wrong way. It refuses to fund childcare, so marriage is economically incentivized.
But then it makes divorce super financially one-sided and easy to get, so now high earners will try to avoid marriage. But high earners are the ones who make marriage worthwhile, per the above point
Then it has LGBT acceptance in urban centers now, so there's an easy, convenient, and legally protected way for people to avoid the whole marriage pipeline
The only real fix we have for this is to just import more people, who knows whether that will pan out
In general though, I agree with the sentiment that for high earning men it's the shittiest deal imaginable and even the extreme option of dying alone is better
God I hate these people
No offense.
Other proceedings can take custody away. For example, if both parents are abusive, they should both run the risk of losing custody, regardless of if they are married or divorced.
Divorce by itself is irrelevant.
I’m not saying we should leave kids with abusers, I’m saying the process of determine whether one or both of the parents are abusive needs to seperate from divorce.
This is already happening.
Many district attorneys have begun refusing to prosecute abuse claims - or any marital crime - until divorce cases are over.
In some cases the abuse adjudication might happen first. But it shouldn’t happen at the divorce hearing.
The idea being to separate the civil divorce from a criminal prosecution.
Divorce should always seek to maximize parent rights for both parents.
Other proceedings can deal with abuse.
Overall, it’s a desire to keep the divorce and criminal processes seperete.
WarOnPrivacy•4mo ago