>But California and New York, states where capitalism is very well
>developed and tertiary industries are dominant, have relatively low
>divorce rates. The south, which is in many ways our internal colony, with
>relatively low incomes and other social indicators, where tertiary
>industries still mostly take a back seat to the primary and secondary, has
>a high divorce rate. I'd guess that it's the infulence of religion, which
>forces people to marry whenever they feel like fucking.
>
>Doug
Or, maybe more likely: because they need two incomes. also, as numerous studies on why people turn to marriage/family early show, among the poorer it is the only way they have to become adults. for the more well-to-do, the path to manhood is through a career primarily. a wife and family for your thirties. women are really pressured to become mothers, especially if they're poor. the pressure to be married, at least, is huge. not because of the fucking outside the bonds of wedlock matters, no. it's about "maturity".
for the tow trucker driver who just picked up my car (i broke the %&)!@&%!@_) clamps when cleaning the battery terminals b/c the @(%^@)%^ heat is murderous on batteries), a wife and kid are what makes him feel like a man, what gives him the outward appearance of having attained it since his job sure as hell probably doesn't give him a sense social respectability per se. he may feel, subjectively, that being a tow truck driver or auto mechanic is a far more manly job than being BlockBuster Manager but it's the social respectability thing that counts for a lot. Especially in the hetmale status economy where what you do is who you are.
add to that the fact that, in order to attain other status symbols demonstrating you've 'achieved', Mr. Goodyear Auto Mechanic, who is making $7.50/hr to start, ain't gonna buy a big slice of the American Dream on that wage. He can buy a bigger slice if he hooks up with the woman who is manager of Taco Bell making $40k, albeit working 65 hrs a week to bring home that paycheck.
This is actually a real couple I know. Then there's the guy I know who's a crew chief for a lawn maintenance service. He's bringing home a whopping $9/hr to sweat both balls off 9 months a year and only one ball the other three months. The rest of the guys get $7.50 summer, $6.50 winter. He enjoys the manliness of the occupation. He's a body builder and he'd prefer this to working at Sam's Club stocking shelves. He's married to a woman who works as a office manager at a title agency. No kids, condo, two late model $25Kish vehicles. Lifestyles neither one of them could likely afford on their own.
For all the religious piousness, living in sin is perfectly acceptable as far as I can tell. As is fucking around. As some rightwinger pointed out on another list, recently, abstinence education efforts aren't really about making it so that no one fucks outside of marriage. It's what you say you stand for, publicly. So, running around saying people should use condoms or give and receive hummers (for, as one recent study indicated, girls should give blow jobs because blow job education apparently prevents fucking around AND teen pregnancy) is just wrong because it cops to human frailty and it's advocating immoral behavior. The key is not to publicly advocate it, even if you actually publicly do it. It's what you say you OUGHT to do. Never mind what we actually do. To get rid of the ought is to sink into the moral quagmire that is relativistic liberal humanism. BAD. BAD. EVIL. HEX> HEX.
This is why you'll have dry towns with a church on every corner. As soon as you hit the city limits, a big HYOOOOOOOOOOOOOOGE XXXXXXXXXXXXXX store.
As I've said before, watch Primary Colors and the Apostle back to back.
Returning from a fishing trip off the Skyway bridge a couple of years ago, we were driving through a section of Highway 19 just full of XXXX shops. My sons asks, "What are adult toys mommy?"
WEll, they're really, really big Tonka Trucks!
p.s. thanks a billion to Bill (WDK) for the best post response to my commentary on limpdick. I'm so glad to know that I'm not the only one interpreting the place this way. :) And gee, I've been calling it limpdick on this list for years! I even once photoshopped some "Welcome to Limpdick" tourist postcards! :)))
Kelley
"We're in a fucking stagmire."
--Little Carmine, 'The Sopranos'