Easy come, easy go

[Sounder]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/fina ... -wife.html


Who are the crazy people in a crazy world?

[MacCruiskeen]

Reminds me of a joke I heard recently:

Q. What's the difference between an investment banker and a large pizza?
















A. A large pizza can feed a family of four.

[Luposapien]

If someone marries for money, they are a prostitute. Not saying there's anything inherently wrong with that, whatever get's you through the night and all that, but lets call it what it is. It's not an emotional relationship, it's a business transaction, and if the John can't lay the money down, well...

Who are the crazy people in a crazy world?

I don't know that I've ever met a sane person. Normal is just the average of abnormals.

[crikkett]

Here's another:
Why is divorce so expensive?











It's worth it.

[crikkett]

If someone marries for money, they are a prostitute. Not saying there's anything inherently wrong with that, whatever get's you through the night and all that, but lets call it what it is. It's not an emotional relationship, it's a business transaction, and if the John can't lay the money down, well...

Who are the crazy people in a crazy world?

I don't know that I've ever met a sane person. Normal is just the average of abnormals.

Ah, I love the smell of misogyny in the morning. It smells like... pancakes.

1) My mother always told me that it was just as easy to fall in love with a rich man as a poor one. In her defense, discriminating taste is not whoring oneself out, and she did marry for love. (In my own defense, we have different tastes in men.)

2) If marrying for money makes someone a whore, what then is your judgment against a person who marries for status, such as a man who takes a trophy wife? (And face it, Trophy Wives need lots of polish. Dear old Jack got what he paid for.)

3) Business transaction or not, the relationship featured in the OP's article was plenty emotional.

[Sounder]

Luposapien wrote...

If someone marries for money, they are a prostitute. Not saying there's anything inherently wrong with that, whatever get's you through the night and all that, but lets call it what it is. It's not an emotional relationship, it's a business transaction, and if the John can't lay the money down, well...

An excellent and simple deconstruction. And on the bright side, if financial collapse helps to clear up category confusion before we see cultural collapse it will all be well and good.

That crazy bit was a toss off line, and stupid as well, yet you made something decent out of it so thanks.

[Luposapien]

1) My mother always told me that it was just as easy to fall in love with a rich man as a poor one. In her defense, discriminating taste is not whoring oneself out, and she did marry for love. (In my own defense, we have different tastes in men.)

Yee Gads! Perhaps I wasn't being clear enough, but I certainly didn't mean to imply that only a woman can be a prostitute (I tried to keep the statement gender-neutral, though I can see how using "John" as a moniker for the payee in the situation might have gone contrary to my intentions), or that someone cannot marry into a different tax-bracket if that is where their heart leads them. What I was trying to get across was that if someone is marrying only for money, then the relationship, even if exclusive, is essentially no different than any other transaction between a sex-worker and their client.

2) If marrying for money makes someone a whore, what then is your judgment against a person who marries for status, such as a man who takes a trophy wife? (And face it, Trophy Wives need lots of polish. Dear old Jack got what he paid for.)

I'd say that this person is trying to fill up the bottomless pit of their ego by throwing other people into it.

3) Business transaction or not, the relationship featured in the OP's article was plenty emotional.

That is true, though the emotions described in the OP (whether an accurate portrayal of the actual situation or not) don't sound like what one would expect from someone who had married for love.

[crikkett]

What I was trying to get across was that if someone is marrying only for money, then the relationship, even if exclusive, is essentially no different than any other transaction between a sex-worker and their client.

I maintain that the relationship between a sex-worker and his or her client is quite different than being 'kept' or 'marrying for money.'

The most fundamental difference is that most sex workers report back to an agent of some sort.

Another difference is that marriage is a full-time relationship and even when one partner is 'toxic' or a 'gold-digger' they have a contributing role in the marriage.

And finally, tell me, if you know anyone who fits the description of marrying for money, how often do you think they actually put out once they get their title? That's not whoring.

As for your judgment on people who take Trophy Wives,

I'd say that this person is trying to fill up the bottomless pit of their ego by throwing other people into it.

you're much kinder to your 'whoremongers' than your 'whores'.

...the emotions described in the OP (whether an accurate portrayal of the actual situation or not) don't sound like what one would expect from someone who had married for love.

And what divorcing couple sounds like they married for love?

[crikkett]

Here's an article which describes the so-called 'toxic wife' behavior as an extreme of human nature rather than whoring. (Can you tell that this misogynistic attitude really bothers me? Thanks for reading.)

A sample of 400 isn't very scientific, and the headline isn't necessarily proven by the article, however the data is still pertinent to this thread.

http://www.physorg.com/news147615590.html

Myth about 'dirty old men' supported by science
Medicine & Health / Psychology

Middle-aged men want younger women, often touting their intelligence and their high income. This is shown in research at Gothenburg University and Oxford University that studied 400 lonely hearts ads to see how men and women choose partners.

By examining lonely hearts advertisements, researchers at the University of Gothenburg and the University of Oxford have now tested how valid these presumed preferences are when modern individuals choose partners.

In the study, published in the journal Evolutionary Psychology, the researchers looked at 400 lonely hearts ads in the Swedish newspapers Göteborgs-Posten and Aftonbladet and on the Websites Spraydate and match.com.

To some extent, the findings support established theories:

-- Women, more than men, look for solid resources and social status. As a result men also offer this in their ads, through formulations like 'large house' and 'economically independent.'

-- Men in all categories prefer younger partners. Of a total of 97 men who mentioned age in their ads, only three were looking for an older partner – among men aged 40 to 59, only one out of 67.

-- Younger women, on the other hand, prefer older men: fully 14 of 16 women aged 20-39 were looking for an older partner. Among women over 60, however, the majority were looking for a younger man.

Another point of departure for the study was that men are more fixated on appearance than women are. This turned out not to be the case.

"When it comes to physical characteristics, it turned out that men and women were the same. Both used words like, 'athletic,' 'beautiful,' 'pretty,' 'tall,' 'handsome,' and 'trim' to the same extent, and this goes both for their descriptions of themselves and for the characteristics they were looking for in a partner," says Jörgen Johnsson at the Department of Zoology, University of Gothenburg, one of the researchers behind the study.

"This might indicate that men have learned to respond to women's interest in looks, therefore stressing to the same extent their attractiveness in the ads. The fact that both sexes focus on looks may also be influenced by our times, with the great fixation on appearance in the media."

Source: Swedish Research Council

[kurish]

null

[Luposapien]

I don't like to think of myself as a misogynist (though I'm as much a creature of my culture as anyone else, and have my fare share of character defects), so I'm struggling against the urge to go full-on defensive here. I can see that you take this very seriously, so, at the risk of digging my hole deeper, let me try this again.

I agree that the original "Toxic Wife" article was heavily sympathetic to the husband, and that it painted a rather extreme situation as something that is much more common than it really is. I'm not trying to take the side of either participant in this drama, or of the author of the OP.

I will also admit that my original statement was rather flippant, and overly reductionist. However, I will attempt to hold onto at least a shred of what I was trying to get across, which is that I see an underlying similarity between the dynamic being portrayed (rather cartoonishly) in the OP and the one that occurs when one person pays another for sexual gratification.

I think that's about as far as I'm willing to stick my neck out on this one, though.

[American Dream]

Without "taking sides", I want to mention a new movie that might be of interest:

http://www.harlemonestop.com/event.php?id=5994


WOMEN INDIES NIGHT

GOLD DIGGIN' : FOR LOVE OF MONEY

NY PREMIERE

By Pamela J. Richardson. 75min. 2008. USA. English. Doc.

A hip, sexy documentary that takes us inside the minds of

those who use their charm for financial gain. Naomi, niece

of notorious polygamist cult leader Warren Jeffs, tells all,

from her nudist home, her escape from the cult at 13 and

how money became her motivation. We also meet Carla,

whose husband knew her a month before transferring his

life savings into her account and many more. This is a film

that will make you laugh, think and cry, but most of all see

the creativity of those who would do anything to enjoy life

and avoid the responsibility of a job.



Thu. Dec. 11 @ 8:30pm at The Schomburg Center.
Q&A after the screening followed by a catered reception.

[Luposapien]

Almost forgot. Thanks, Sounder. I think you see what I was pointing towards.

[IanEye]

And what divorcing couple sounds like they married for love?

If you see her, say hello, she might be in Tangier
She left here last early spring, is livin' there, I hear
Say for me that I'm all right though things get kind of slow
She might think that I've forgotten her, don't tell her it isn't so.



We had a falling-out, like lovers often will
And to think of how she left that night, it still brings me a chill
And though our separation, it pierced me to the heart
She still lives inside of me, we've never been apart.



If you get close to her, kiss her once for me
I always have respected her for busting out and gettin' free
Oh, whatever makes her happy, I won't stand in the way
Though the bitter taste still lingers on from the night I tried to make her stay.



I see a lot of people as I make the rounds
And I hear her name here and there as I go from town to town
And I've never gotten used to it, I've just learned to turn it off
Either I'm too sensitive or else I'm gettin' soft.



Sundown, yellow moon, I replay the past
I know every scene by heart, they all went by so fast
If she's passin' back this way, I'm not that hard to find
Tell her she can look me up if she's got the time.

[crikkett]

LOL

I'll stop now that I think I made my argument clear. You just don't know how tiring it is for me to hear women called whores, especially since a majority of working-age women I know are supporting their husbands right now. Times are tough. More than a half-million jobs (533,000) were shed in America last month alone.

Luposapien thanks for hearing me out.