Something else that I’ve not seen factored into the 50%ish divorce rates is how many times the parties have been divorced. For instance, you may have 75% of the population that never divorce, but if only 25% of the population divorce twice and remarry, they will have accounted for an equal amount of recorded marriages and a disproportionate amount of divorces reported than the true number of 25% of the population divorcing.
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Something else that I’ve not seen factored into the 50%ish divorce rates is how many times the parties have been divorced. For instance, you may have 75% of the population that never divorce, but if only 25% of the population divorce twice and remarry, they will have accounted for an equal amount of recorded marriages and a disproportionate amount of divorces reported than the true number of 25% of the population divorcing.
Statistics are not always accurate. Easy to manipulate. You say 40% of women cheat. Then if I asked you to line up your wife, mother, both grandmothers, all four of your great grandmothers and two other female relatives letssay sisters if you have any. Then according to the stats 4 of them had cheated half of their marriages they where in ended and of those 70- 90% of those divorces involve a women who didn't feel the need to hold to the 'till death do us part' vow. Does that paint an accurate portrait of your family? I doubt it. Just like the stats your using paint the picture of the agenda of who paid for it them. Just like all the other statistics about marriage and divorce paint the picture they were paid to paint.
Seven factors that effect how statistics can be skewed.
1. Statistics Benefit the Group Who Collected the Information
A group pays for the info to be collected if it doesn't help there agenda its not put out.
2. The Sample Size Is Small
A poll is taken by 3,200 US women does not acuratly protray the roughly 320,000,000 US women
3. Error Margins Are Too Large
smaller the sample group the larger the margin for error
4. The Sample Representation Is Inaccurate or Biased
If the information being gathered has only one purpose and is gathered independently for that purpose its ignoring context and other influences then its inaccurate.
5. Incentives are Inappropriate for the Sample
alot of People will agree to what ever you want them to to get free stuff
6. The Context Is Not Reported
Things like what VV76 brought up. Home many of those divorces registered are from serial monagamous ect...
7. The Statistic Flies in the Face of truth
Take the example I gave of your family. The stats say that 4 of them should have cheated and what not, you know the stats to be false.
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Excellent points!
I have a cousin on his second or third marriage, and his first wife is on her second, and his second wife/woman is on I don't know what number....and his current wife has children from more then one previous relationship and I'm sure at least one was a "marriage."
A few people trying to find "the one" can do a lot to alter the over all statistics, and make things appear worse then they are.
Hi there.
Just my own perspective here on the question.
The men I know who are into PM do it for a few different reasons:
1. Tradition. They were born into it (like my husband) and they never considered NOT being poly at some point in their life.
2. They want a lot of children and PM is sometimes the best way to make this happen.
2a. Something I've personally observed is the childless couple who desire a second wife mostly to serve as a surrogate. I'm not so certain this is a great idea for the second wife because she's just needed to provide a baby. I'm also not so sure it's great idea for the first wife who's going to have to deal with the emotional issues of watching her husband have a baby with someone else when she can't do that herself.
3. Dominant men (sometimes known as bullies) like to surround themselves with women and children they can boss around.
4. The very rare and elusive man who does it for sincerely held religious reasons.
5. Others.
I don't see any problems with the men accepting this once they decide to commit to it.
The women I know do it for other reasons.
1. Tradition. They were born into it and they don't consider any alternatives...even if it would make them happier.
2. Like Cap said, they have 'baggage' and PM is an answer for them. It was for me.
3. They like having other women in the household. One of my SW is definitely this person and she's openly bi and PM has been nothing but joy for her.
4. Security. Some women seek out PM because they find a kind of security by marrying into an established family. The husband is already a proven provider and if there's kids then he's also a proven family man.
5. Security. Some single mothers accept PM as a way to provide themselves and their children with a safe, stable home.
6. Others.
As to the acceptance for the women? Some are accepting of it before they even start. Then there's others, like myself I'm sure, who choose it for their own combination of reasons and their acceptance comes over time.
They were both sent into captivity! Israel to the assyrian captivity and Judah the babylonian captivity.
Likely true. You are also right about Satan being out to destroy Christian marriages, and marriage in general.
I don't differentiate between non-Christians and Christians on this issue because there is rarely much difference in behavior between them generally.
And my contention is about the vow in general, cheating is but one component of violating that. Whether Christians cheat at lower or higher rates I cannot say; wouldn't be surprised either way.
Let's face it. In most cases, Christian mating patterns before marriage differ little from their secular brethren. I see no reason that would change during marriage; especially since they divorce at the same rate as non-Christians. And we're talking about someone disobeying God's will about divorce; no reason to think they wouldn't also disobey His will on adultery.
This situation was one of the major reasons for polygamy early in human history. But as you say, it was also so fraught with problems they had statutes regulating the interaction between the wives.
Nope. While successive marriages are more likely to fail; around 50% of first marriages still end in divorce.
Marriage is in really is in rough shape right now. It really is that bad out there. 50% is a coin flip.
Look, most of those arguments are even MORE true of judging by ones social circle. And by your line of argument I could toss out all stats period. The well known downsides to statistics doesn't mean we get to discount stats we don't like. Just because some are invalid, doesn't mean all are. Just because we don't like something, or it makes people feel bad or it doesn't reflect the people we know or it's not the way we'd like it to be; doesn't mean it's not true.
You can't judge truth just by looking at the people in your social circle or immediate family. There are a host of factors that will cause the sample to skew. For example, you could all be of one religion. Or of a common social class. I could give a half dozen reasons the people of my family going back 4 generations didn't divorce; not the least of them being only 1 of those generations married during a time of no-fault divorce. That alone makes the argument silly.
This all reminds me of a common refrain heard in politics. "I can't believe Trump won; everyone I know voted for Hilary!" As if ones social circle is representative of the entire country. It's a common hangup; we hear the same refrain just about every election cycle.
Look. We don't have to keep at this line of conversation. We're well off topic and unlikely to resolve this.
Again, what is this based on?
Statistical comparisons between "Christians" and "non-Christians" generally identify people as Christian simply if they say they are, or if they occasionally attend church. A definition which is often meaningless - I lived in Ireland for some time, something like 95% of the Irish call themselves "Catholic", and might attend mass once a year, but in terms of actual faith and action the general citizens are if anything more secular than New Zealand (my impression while living there). You can't trust the statistics.
Statistics often say that "Christians" behave similarly to the secular world, to a greater or lesser degree. But our personal observation shows that though there are many people who call themselves Christians who behave that way, there is also a core of people of true faith who behave completely differently.
And it is that core that are truly Christian. A good chunk of the rest are not, they're just misapplying the label.
There are no statistics that truly compare the Elect with the secular population. Because nobody can correctly identify the Elect in order to conduct a survey.
If true Christians are so insignificant enough to not affect the statistics than they can safely be ignored when considering general behavior. Considering how they'd behave is a meaningless intellectual exercise. You're unlikely to find one for a mate, there aren't enough to go around.
I've noticed that some will reject science when they reveal something about human nature they don't like. If you want to toss out statistics because they don't agree with what you want to think about people or Christians then we have only subjective experience to go on and conversation is almost pointless because if you're going to reject hard evidence in favor of your own subjective experience (or wishful thinking thereof) you're certainly going to reject my own subjective experience or observations. I could tell you my experience but you wouldn't care for what it says about Christians.
So I will point to scripture instead; what this wisest of men noticed is painfully obvious all around us if you have eyes to see...
I have nothing more to say on this subject.
It is our whole culture. Have you seen that TV show "Married at First Sight" ? They match up two strangers and marry them up. They are careful to point out that these are REAL MARRIAGES. And then take marriage vows to marry for life. And then they send them on a honeymoon and then by contract they are supposed to live together...
..and then 8 weeks later or something they are supposed to decide if they want to stay married, or not.
They are perfectly serious and they see no contradiction. They do not take the vows seriously, both men and women.
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This is a good point. I think it is a generally accepted marriage principle that the real damage in an affair is the broken trust. A woman really wants to have an intimate relationship, and if she finds out that you have been dishonst not only will she have difficulty trusting you in the future, but she begins to think that she never really had the relationship that she thought she had with you in the first place. If you are honest and you can talk about things at least you are working on a real relationship even if things are painful or difficult.