Fundies and the low Atheist divorce rate

[AtroposHeart]

Have you ever seen a fundie tackle the problem that Atheists(tied with Catholics) have the lowest divorce rates.

 

Also considering that they seem to go out of their way to portray non-submissive woman as the cause of all divore and marital strife.

 

I have never meet an atheist woman that you could boss around easily.

[Swamptribe]

Atheist, married to the same guy almost 30 years. Go figure.

[atheistjd]

Yep, atheist here (obviously). I have pretty much everything going "against" my relationship according to teh fundies:

- lived together pre-marriage - for more than 6 years - and enjoyed every minute of it ;)

- kind of unequally yoked in that Mr AJD is moderately agnosticatholic

- we are both, at the same time, pursuing advanced degrees - at our secular state Uni no less

- we vote very separately and generally for very different candidates (except for that time I convinced the mister to vote for the liberal black academic from Chicago - so I guess you could say I actually have gotten him to vote my way more often than he's had the same effect :o )

- big fans of the birth control over here... no children yet and none on the horizon

- big fans of egalitarianism and not having gender roles - the mister usually picks up more than his fair share, in fact, at least when it comes to cooking and ironing

Because of the above, I see us lasting for a looooooooooooooong time. Mr AJD is definitely a keeper and I'd like to think he thinks the same about me, partially due to my, you know, opinions and advanced degree(s). No plans on getting divorced here.

Whoops - forget to mention that my (fundie-lite, SUPER anti-divorce) parents are divorced. Yeah - mostly due to the church. So I'd like to think I'm living proof of those statistics :D

[bananacat]

If the fundies are even aware of this fact (they make a big effort to not be exposed to reality), then they would just say the study was flawed, full of "liberal bias", or even an outright conspiracy. Or they'd say that it doesn't matter because we're all having premarital sex anyway (although they are too, but we don't feel ashamed of it). Or they would just claim outright that the marriages don't "count" so it doesn't matter how long they last. They're pretty good at rationalizing their beliefs and a few pesky facts won't get in their way. Hell, most of them still manage to convince themselves that Christians are a persecuted minority in the United States even though they are the vast majority.

[dirtyhippiegirl]

Would probably bring up ye' ole study that notes that couples who live together before marriage have higher divorce rates.

[ChunkyBarbie]

They would flat out refuse to believe it. If you don't believe what they believe you are wrong and probably a liar.

[koolmom]

Would probably bring up ye' ole study that notes that couples who live together before marriage have higher divorce rates.

That's the one the fundies keep dragging out and showing off to the public, as if they can prove one causes the other.

[debrand]

This subject came up on the Discovery Health forum on the Duggars. A poster-can't remember her name but it wasn't Chrislukas- explained away the results in such a way that no study could ever be trust. I can't find that particular thread though.

I did find this page about the study

http://www.adherents.com/largecom/baptist_divorce.html

Here is the good old stand by, "They aren't actually REAL Christians." Funny that Johnson is divorced.

Bill Johnson certainly doesn't deny that Christians are getting divorced. He's divorced himself. He and his second wife, Donna, co-teach Rebuilders, Prestonwood Baptist's ministry to remarried couples. Some people in the class have been married two and three times.

But Mr. Johnson is also a therapist and federal probation officer. His work experience has caused him to note that it's awfully popular to be Baptist. "When I interview criminals going into prison or coming out of prison, most of them are Baptists," he said, laughing. "Everybody seems to be a Baptist, even if they're not religious or Christian." Dr. Nancy T. Ammerman thinks Mr. Johnson has a point.

What does it mean when someone claims to be a Christian, she asks? "In this country, the vast majority of people define themselves as Christians," said Dr. Ammerman, professor of the sociology of religion at Hartford Seminary in Connecticut. "People have a particular denomination with which they identify. That does not mean that they go to church or that they even know anything about that denomination." Southern Baptists are the largest Protestant denomination in the country, and nondenominational churches cover a wide spectrum of beliefs.

Maybe there are just a lot of Baptist criminals. Seriously, if there were large numbers of Muslims or Hindus getting divorced or going to jail, Johnson would not try to explain away the numbers. He would jump on the study to prove how great his faith is.

But Dr. Ammerman demurs. "There are huge numbers of Catholics in recent years who've had marriages annulled," she said, noting that they would never call themselves divorced because "they've gone to great trouble to stay in good standing with the church."

The doctor is ignorant. Catholics have to get a civil divorce before they are granted an annullment. They would answer that they had been divorced.

[oscar]

Our experience does not speak to this statistic - I am not atheist and I am actually not sure what my husband's beliefs are. But I have an anecdote that pertains to the fundie response.

My husband and I had recently reconnected with a friend from college, whom I would consider to have gone from being mainstream Catholic to hardcore fundie to fundie-lite. She and her ex-husband had met in high school, and she dropped out of college to marry him a year after my husband and I started dating. After several years out of touch, we learned that she and her husband had divorced, she was having difficulty finding a well-paying job because she lacked a degree, and because her ex-husband provided no support for their several young children, she was not able to go back to school.

She was, however, beginning to date again, and she was telling us about all the things she was looking for in a relationship and all the things she'd learned were necessary to make a marriage work. I pointed out that these were all things that didn't work in her first marriage. Moreover, none of them were things my husband and I practiced in our marriage, and he and I were still together and very happy.

Her response? "Well, your marriage isn't really a real marriage." Evidently, she meant we were more like best friends who lived together, shared interests and had an intimate relationship, as opposed to a Christian marriage under her interpretation of Ephesians 5:21-33.

So, I suspect that one fundie response to this statistic might be to think of ways in which marriages between atheists differ from the fundie ideal - atheists marry later, the numbers don't account for cohabitation failure rate, or whatever - and then claim that successful marriages between atheists are outside the norm and certainly not normative.

This is the other side of the coin to debrand's point about fundie rationalizations - Christians who get divorced aren't real Christians, and atheists in happy, long-term marriages don't have real marriages.

[Feberin]

Yep, atheist here (obviously). I have pretty much everything going "against" my relationship according to teh fundies:

- lived together pre-marriage - for more than 6 years - and enjoyed every minute of it ;)

- kind of unequally yoked in that Mr AJD is moderately agnosticatholic

- we are both, at the same time, pursuing advanced degrees - at our secular state Uni no less

- we vote very separately and generally for very different candidates (except for that time I convinced the mister to vote for the liberal black academic from Chicago - so I guess you could say I actually have gotten him to vote my way more often than he's had the same effect :o )

- big fans of the birth control over here... no children yet and none on the horizon

- big fans of egalitarianism and not having gender roles - the mister usually picks up more than his fair share, in fact, at least when it comes to cooking and ironing

[

My husband is also a agnostic Catholic and I'm an atheist. I think atheist marriages last because everything is more fair and couples can be honest with each other. I mean imagine if Anna told Josh that she was tired and so he needed to open up the cream of whatever soup, toss in some tots and fix dinner. But in their minds they are superior so the statistics must be flawed.

[atheistjd]

My husband is also a agnostic Catholic and I'm an atheist. I think atheist marriages last because everything is more fair and couples can be honest with each other. I mean imagine if Anna told Josh that she was tired and so he needed to open up the cream of whatever soup, toss in some tots and fix dinner. But in their minds they are superior so the statistics must be flawed.

Agreed. Also, the honesty comes from a lack of judgment and ability to grow together and separately that doesn't exist in highly genderized partnerships... If Mr AJD decided he wanted to stay home with our children (if and when we have them) because I make more money (which I likely will), we would discuss it and try to make sure we both had our needs met. I wouldn't secretly think he was abdicating his manly responsibility. Same for when I decide NOT to stay home with said children, or am unable to do laundry one night, or whatever. These people make it so easy to fail, and I can only imagine the kind of judgment and resentment that happens when you husband is your spiritual leader and you both "hold each other accountable" to these insane standards (can we say Pepsi addiction anyone?) :roll:

[Lunatic]

I'm an atheist and my husband is an agnostic (raised Catholic). We've been married 10 years, have two kids and have a great marriage! We don't divide chores by gender, we both pitch in and do whatever needs to be done. I think that helps to eliminate a lot of resentment. I made more money when the kids were born so he was a SAHD (DAD, not DAUGHTER). I have some religious friends who, while not fundy, do everything for for their husbands because they're SAHMs. They have to rush home to cook dinner, even when the husband is working at home! That boggles my mind!

[Austin]

Our experience does not speak to this statistic - I am not atheist and I am actually not sure what my husband's beliefs are. But I have an anecdote that pertains to the fundie response.

My husband and I had recently reconnected with a friend from college, whom I would consider to have gone from being mainstream Catholic to hardcore fundie to fundie-lite. She and her ex-husband had met in high school, and she dropped out of college to marry him a year after my husband and I started dating. After several years out of touch, we learned that she and her husband had divorced, she was having difficulty finding a well-paying job because she lacked a degree, and because her ex-husband provided no support for their several young children, she was not able to go back to school.

She was, however, beginning to date again, and she was telling us about all the things she was looking for in a relationship and all the things she'd learned were necessary to make a marriage work. I pointed out that these were all things that didn't work in her first marriage. Moreover, none of them were things my husband and I practiced in our marriage, and he and I were still together and very happy.

Her response? "Well, your marriage isn't really a real marriage." Evidently, she meant we were more like best friends who lived together, shared interests and had an intimate relationship, as opposed to a Christian marriage under her interpretation of Ephesians 5:21-33.

So, I suspect that one fundie response to this statistic might be to think of ways in which marriages between atheists differ from the fundie ideal - atheists marry later, the numbers don't account for cohabitation failure rate, or whatever - and then claim that successful marriages between atheists are outside the norm and certainly not normative.

This is the other side of the coin to debrand's point about fundie rationalizations - Christians who get divorced aren't real Christians, and atheists in happy, long-term marriages don't have real marriages.

Best friends who exchanged vows in a legal way, live together, are best friends, share interests, and have an intimate relationship =/= marriage? :shock: And this coming from a person whose Ephesians 5 marriage didn't work out is. . . well. . . particularly rich!

That's exactly how I would describe our marriage, and it's worked for us for three decades and this is the first/only marriage for both of us. Methinks your friend is full of crap.

[Evie Teale]

Okay, I brought this study up to my husband, and his fundy response,

"First, not everyone who says they're Christian, really is, and second, most atheists don't get married anyway. They just live together or have some kind of pagan ceremony." That was the end of the conversation.

Yes, I have lived with this for 19 3/4 years. Yes, I am divorcing him.

[oscar]

Best friends who exchanged vows in a legal way, live together, are best friends, share interests, and have an intimate relationship =/= marriage? :shock: And this coming from a person whose Ephesians 5 marriage didn't work out is. . . well. . . particularly rich!

That's exactly how I would describe our marriage, and it's worked for us for three decades and this is the first/only marriage for both of us. Methinks your friend is full of crap.

She's in a difficult situation and I feel bad for her. It seems like her church is her main source of support right now, as she has never been close with her family and her in-laws cut all ties after the divorce.

So I can understand why she might be inclined to rationalize things as she has - her church teaches that egalitarian marriage is the first step on a slippery slope that leads to same-sex marriage to incest to bestiality to a person marrying a brick or a shoe, and if she distances herself from her church, she has a lot to lose.

I remember a discussion on the old board about a blog post where someone - Doug or the Bayly Bros. or someone like that - argued that it was possible for a marriage in which both partners were happy and contented to actually be a bad marriage if it did not conform to certain precepts - that things that "worked for you" might not be the things that "worked for God."

[Austin]

She's in a difficult situation and I feel bad for her. It seems like her church is her main source of support right now, as she has never been close with her family and her in-laws cut all ties after the divorce.

So I can understand why she might be inclined to rationalize things as she has - her church teaches that egalitarian marriage is the first step on a slippery slope that leads to same-sex marriage to incest to bestiality to a person marrying a brick or a shoe, and if she distances herself from her church, she has a lot to lose.

I remember a discussion on the old board about a blog post where someone - Doug or the Bayly Bros. or someone like that - argued that it was possible for a marriage in which both partners were happy and contented to actually be a bad marriage if it did not conform to certain precepts - that things that "worked for you" might not be the things that "worked for God."

Sorry - I didn't mean to come down so hard on your friend.

And I agree that people seem to be able to rationalize anything they want, even if it's not particularly rational.

I was actually thinking on the way to work this morning if anyone has done a study where the general "morality" of religious vs. non-religious people was compared. It's hard to define morality, I suppose, but if they just picked some kind of universally-agreed-upon (if there is such a thing) list of things that most people feel it's wrong to do: lie, cheat, steal, and so on. Since some Christians argue that all morality comes from God or faith in God, I'd be interested to see how that really plays out in a random sample of each group.

[Evie Teale]

I've been thinking about this and I have a question.

Can it be that atheists are more tolerent of differing views/opinions than Christians?

I'm not trying to simplify matters, but if the wife in a fundy marriage decided to become Catholic, for instance, that marriage is probably over, but if that happened in an atheist marriage, would there be discussion and tolerance? This is the feeling I get from lurking here, at least.

[oscar]

Sorry - I didn't mean to come down so hard on your friend.

And I agree that people seem to be able to rationalize anything they want, even if it's not particularly rational.

I was actually thinking on the way to work this morning if anyone has done a study where the general "morality" of religious vs. non-religious people was compared. It's hard to define morality, I suppose, but if they just picked some kind of universally-agreed-upon (if there is such a thing) list of things that most people feel it's wrong to do: lie, cheat, steal, and so on. Since some Christians argue that all morality comes from God or faith in God, I'd be interested to see how that really plays out in a random sample of each group.

No worries - what she said was horribly stupid, but I don't think it's something she necessarily made up herself. The idea that a happy marriage that does not conform to certain ideals might actually be a bad marriage or a false marriage seems to be an idea that is already floating around out there in fundie-dom, and it could be used to explain away the significance of a lower divorce rate observed among atheists.

I agree that it would be neat to see what that kind of morality data would look like among different religious and non-religious groups. How would you avoid problems with social desirability bias, since participants from different groups might be differentially motivated to either provide honest answers, or answer in ways that portray themselves in a good light? Hmmm.

[Austin]

I agree that it would be neat to see what that kind of morality data would look like among different religious and non-religious groups. How would you avoid problems with social desirability bias, since participants from different groups might be differentially motivated to either provide honest answers, or answer in ways that portray themselves in a good light? Hmmm.

Yes, I think that would be/is the problem with such a study. It would have to be safe to assume that the respondant was providing honest answers, which I'm not sure how you get people to go there, even with anonymity.

I would just like to see religious/non-religious compared as opposed to evangelical Christian/atheist compared. I think that might be easier to narrow down than evangelicals/Methodists/Presbyterians/Catholics vs agnostics/atheists/just don't care.

I am not an atheist, but I know a lot of non-religious people (and getting to know more and more all the time). They don't seem to give less, to serve in their communities less, be less kind and compassionate, or to gossip or cheat or steal or lie more. Since the fundie/evangelical positon seems to be that the only wellspring of morality is God, it would be interesting to see what the results would be.

[Shina]

Okay, I brought this study up to my husband, and his fundy response,

"First, not everyone who says they're Christian, really is, and second, most atheists don't get married anyway. They just live together or have some kind of pagan ceremony." That was the end of the conversation.

Yes, I have lived with this for 19 3/4 years. Yes, I am divorcing him.

The entire coffeeshop is now wondering why that crazy girl is laughing hysterically into her keyboard. Thank you Evie :clap:

[Kelsey]

I've been thinking about this and I have a question.

Can it be that atheists are more tolerent of differing views/opinions than Christians?

I'm not trying to simplify matters, but if the wife in a fundy marriage decided to become Catholic, for instance, that marriage is probably over, but if that happened in an atheist marriage, would there be discussion and tolerance? This is the feeling I get from lurking here, at least.

It could be.

Personally, I think it's because there are only two people in an atheist's marriage. You know, kind of like the old saying, two's company but three's a crowd. Even if the third person is supernatural, he can cause problems :lol:

[Austin]

Personally, I think it's because there are only two people in an atheist's marriage. You know, kind of like the old saying, two's company but three's a crowd. Even if the third person is supernatural, he can cause problems :lol:

My BFF is a nominal Christian and her husband is an atheist, but not of the militant variety. More like "I don't believe in anything but don't really care enough to discuss it or ruminate about it".

Anyhoo, it does not seem to be any issue in their marriage. I don't think she loses sleep over his mortal soul and I doubt he think she's silly or whatever for having Christian beliefs.

[browngrl]

Okay, I brought this study up to my husband, and his fundy response,

"First, not everyone who says they're Christian, really is, and second, most atheists don't get married anyway. They just live together or have some kind of pagan ceremony." That was the end of the conversation.

Yes, I have lived with this for 19 3/4 years. Yes, I am divorcing him.

Well, I did get married at the Little White Chapel in Vegas by an Elvis imitator so I guess I did have a pagan-ish ceremony. :)

[Black Aliss]

Agnostic, left pieces of my heart scattered over three continents (that I know of), shacked up before marriage, and as far as I'm concerned, I'm married for life. There's this crazy thing I have about vows.

[LynnKaboom]

My mom's Christian, my dad's agnostic, and they've been married for 20-something years. Of course, they act more like business partners or distant roommates than a married couple, and have done so since I can remember, but yeah. There you go.