Our goal should be to develop work-life policies that enable people to put their gender values into practice. So let's stop arguing about the hard choices women make and help more women and men avoid such hard choices.
Stephanie CoontzRead
As soon as love became the driving force behind marriage, people began to demand the right to remain single if they had not found love or to divorce if they fell out of love.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote highlights how love has redefined the expectations of marriage, leading to a demand for personal fulfillment over traditional commitments.
Stephanie Coontz's quote explores the evolution of marriage from a contractual agreement to a partnership driven by love. As romantic love became the primary reason for marriage, societal expectations shifted, allowing individuals the autonomy to choose to remain single if they have not found love, or to seek divorce if love has faded. This reflects a significant change in the perception of relationships, prioritizing emotional connections over mere obligation.
Themes
LoveMarriageRelationshipsDivorceSingleCommitment
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion about modern relationships at a seminar.
More from Stephanie Coontz
All quotes →It no longer makes sense to see singlehood and marriage as two distinct and stable social categories that should be accorded different legal rights and social esteem.
Stephanie CoontzRead
Economically as well as emotionally, modern marriage has become like an affluent gated community. It has become harder for low-income Americans to enter and sustain.
Stephanie CoontzRead
In my work as a historian and in my relationships as a friend, teacher, wife, and mother, I have come to think that the most useful way to understand the past and make it work for you is to look at the trade-offs and contradictions that, however deeply buried, can be uncovered in every memory, good or bad.
Stephanie CoontzRead
Labeling people single parents, for example, when they may in fact be co-parenting - either with an unmarried other parent in the home or with an ex-spouse in a joint custody situation - stigmatizes their children as the products of 'single parenthood' and makes the uncounted parent invisible to society.
Stephanie CoontzRead
We must recognize that there are healthy as well as unhealthy ways to be single or to be divorced, just as there are healthy and unhealthy ways to be married.
Stephanie CoontzRead
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