No sooner did word get out that Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes were divorcing after five years of marriage than rumors of a marriage contract between them resurfaced.
Judging by the comments people are leaving on websites like Huffington Post, etc., a marriage contract isn’t a “real” marriage (although a marriage license is just a legal document, and marriage throughout the decades and all over the globe has always been about increasing wealth and/or status, mostly for men, but whatever). 
I don’t know (nor do I care much) if they indeed have a contract, but I do care about why people find the idea of a contract so offensive. If Tom and Kate guaranteed each other five years and they lasted five years and decided not to renew their contract for whatever reasons, they had a much more honest marriage than a couple that promises “till death do us part” — and then divorces anywhere from, say 72 days to decades later.
As I recently wrote about marriage contracts:
For those who have found the one person to live with contently through the first and second halves of marriage, great. But there’s nothing wrong in acknowledging that for some of us — perhaps the majority of us — a marriage that works happily through the parenting years is all we desire, and that dissolving a marriage after that isn’t a failure or a result of not understanding what “hard work” and “commitment” is, phrases that so often get attached to those who divorce.
When that article was reprinted in HuffPo, I got a lot of interesting comments, including those in bold below (which made me think of a quote of the — sadly — recently departed Nora Ephron, “I am continually fascinated at the difficulty intelligent people have in distinguishing what is controversial from what is merely offensive”. Is the idea of a marriage contract controversial? Yes, for now because we’re not used to viewing it as such. Is it offensive? Why should we care how other people chose to set up their marriage if it makes them happy?)
My responses are in italics:
- (I)f you are setting out together with the understanding that your relationship will end at a predetermined time, aren’t you diluting the whole concept of commitment – even for those 18 years? What reason is there to make a relationship meaningful and fulfilling if you know there is an implied end to the relationship in the first place? All things have not only an implied end but an actual end. If we learned we had six months, one year, five years left to live, would we make changes in our life? Of course; perhaps we’d discover the “true meaning of life,” meaning focusing more on loved ones and less on possessions and work, or pursue more of the things that bring us pleasure, or stop sweating the small stuff or we’d become much more appreciative. We’d be much more committed, present and focused on what is before us right now — perhaps acknowledging that we have a precious amount of time would actually make us work harder and be happier; commitment alone does not do that.
- Pre-arranged divorce, what a concept. Except, it’s not pre-arranged divorce; it’s a commitment to a set time to be together that can be added to and expanded upon. Why assume it will automatically lead to divorce?
- Way to ruin something beautiful and sacred and debase it to a tawdry business transaction. Well, marriage IS and always has been a business transaction. Is marriage always “beautiful” and “sacred”? Actually, it often is quite tawdry itself — just ask Elin Nordegren, Maria Shriver, Huma Abedin, Silda Spitzer, Anne Sinclair …
- There is something very special about forming a lifetime bond with someone. It takes commitment and emotional fortitude. No one doubts a lifelong bond is special; in fact, it’s so special that a happy fulfilling lifelong bond isn’t all that common. One needn’t be married to form a lifelong bond with someone, and one needn’t be together forever to be just as committed. Being committed to a partnership that is unhealthy, destructive or unfulfilling isn’t something to celebrate.
- What part of “till death do us part” don’t you get? The part that says not everyone says those words, and even those who say those words don’t mean it; it’s an intention, it’s not something set in stone — otherwise we wouldn’t have a 50 percent divorce rate. And why does marriage have to last until death? Can anyone provide a clear and intelligent answer to that?
- This is just more baby boomer hubris where because of their perceived uniqueness they selfishly cannot live within the confines of established norms and think they’re smarter, more progressive and want to change those definitions. The couple who decided to commit to a marriage of no less than 18 years were in their 30s — hardly baby boomers! And speaking of “established norms,” when marriage began, the “established norms” gave women no rights and was all about property and status, not love. Shall we go back to those norms? Of course not. Norms change and evolve over time, so should marriage.
- Oof. The idea of an expiration date on love makes me nauseous. Who’s talking about love? Why would love automatically end if a marriage ended, although, let’s face it, love very often ends while in a marriage! People love others lifelong and don’t necessarily live together (think: Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn). And, again — why assume the marriage WILL end?
- Why would you plan to have a change of feelings after spending 20 years as a family? No one’s planning to “have a change of feelings” — the couple’s committing to 18 years to raise their kids — maybe more, who knows? But, like people in AA who talk about one day at a time, they are talking about a critical 18 years at a time; that’s not so bad!
- PLEASE do not degrade marriage to a temporary contractual agreement. Marriage is for life. If you don’t want life, don’t get married. *Sigh* “Degrading marriage” is acting as if people don’t make mistakes, that they don’t marry for the wrong reasons or marry the wrong people. “Degrading marriage” is forcing people to stay together forever when they don’t have a healthy relationship. Many of us would like marriage to be for life, and some of us actually do make it last — happily — for life. Others — like a good 50 percent of us — don’t. Most of us marry with the best intentions, although some people DON’T marry with the best intentions (they get knocked up to snag a guy, they feel pressured by their parents, etc.) and THOSE are the people who are truly “degrading” marriage — not a couple who is committed to raising their kids into adulthood.
Getting back to a question I pose above, why must marriage be for life? I hope someone can explain that in an intelligent way that goes beyond their own belief system. Anyone?
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