Category: the Rant Board
Oh, the frivolity of it all:
It is with an unusual mix of sadness and anger, cemented together with more than a little societal regret, that I put pen to paper this time. There are many precipitating factors that collectively have resulted in what I hope is to be a thought-provoking bit of writing. I do hope that someone understands what I’m addressing here, can relate to it and can use the ideas herein in their own lives. I am no visionary, but I have experienced and it angers me when I see the superfluousness with which many people nowadays are treating relationships.
Let me state first and foremost, I’m not a sanctity of marriage kind of guy, nor am I going to launch into a tirade about the youth of today.” As it happens, I am one of them, so doing that would be completely illogical. Even so, how can people truly dare to call a one-month or two-month fling a relationship of profound dimensions, worthy of the term love?
Honestly, it makes me ill to see the trite, ill-suited phrases of romantic bombast that clogs the facebook statuses and screen names of so many people these days, only for the names to change three months later, with no supposed decrease in the inherent sentiment expressed. Truly, what could be more hollow?
It is a given, nowadays, that people will have relationships, but I believe that many have forgotten just why relationships really exist. It is ones duty to go out into the world and find the one you are to spend your life with, in whom you can take a satisfaction that lingers beyond the vacuousness of a single moment. Ok, many may consider that an overromanticisation of the idea, and I accept that, but someone has to stand up for deeper meanings sometimes. The truth is that many people nowadays seem unprepared to work at love, or work to make a relationship succeed. They believe that maintaining a relationship only implies that you see each other and satisfy your mutual physical desire every now and then. The idea of effort in a relationship is such a foreign concept. The old saying about, “many other fish in the sea” has its place, but there is also something to be said for the idea that nothing is gained for nothing!
I'll admit, this particular idea has a special significance for me. I know what it takes for a relationship to truly work. I believe that my very recently-concluded relationship which has had cause to resurface in my mental musings, was the hardest thing I have ever attempted. It failed, as these things sometimes do, but more than two and a half years of gruelling effort were expended before the final blow. We were separated by family, culture, religion and space and yet, we dared the odds. So as many might reasonably imagine, when I hear statements like, oh, we broke up, we just were too different, or, we just couldn't get along, I become somewhat irate. Hence it seems perfectly comprehensible to me that divorce is higher than it has ever been, yet we are living in the most highly sexually charged culture to ever exist. When fugacity takes precedence over meaning, when the needs of the moment outweigh those of the future, this society begets nothing more than shallow matrimonial vows that mean nothing and cliché relationships that end with as little fanfare as they began. The overall integrity of what we are suffers as a direct result.
As such, the way I see it, we are faced with several options. We can either accept the status of boyfriend/girlfriend relations or treat them with as little care as we do such small words as, "I do" or "I love you." That would mean that we accept that we are too cowardly to even try committing to one person, and use get-out-clauses like "open relationships" as a means of exculpating ourselves.
Or we admit that a relationship, a true, honest to God commitment means risking almost all that we are, in the hope of finding someone who will do the same and with whom we can coalesce to form one unified entity.
So finally, I will say simply this:
Loneliness is no excuse for vacuousness and your sexual erges are no substitute for your brain. We all crave to be loved and to feal complete in the most intimate way possible, that is, with another human being. A thousand month-long flings will not quell that desire, but one real relationship will, so wait for it, work for it and value it above all else.
"apreciate them to the fullest extent and then beyond, because you never really know what you have, until its gone." immortal technique
Have you ever considered discussing your friends' Facebook statuses about their relationships with them? Have you commented on their statuses expressing your views? If not, you should. Then you can all develop a better understanding of each other's thoughts, beliefs and feelings.
I think you make some valid points, but I also think these month-long flings you speak of have their place, as long as one person doesn't get too emotionally invested, or think that it's ok to keep jumping back and forth between meaningless sexual relationships, and is aware that this relationship may not end in marriage. I think that having some shorter, even shallower relationships, especially in your teens, is a learning process, and teaches you how to truly love another. When you enter into a relationship that you know, or think you know at the time is a keeper, you have the experiences of your past relationships to go on. Some of them may be silly, immature, whatever you want to call them, but you've hopefully picked up some wisdom from them. You know what mistakes not to make. You know not to give your heart away just because the initial passion or infatuation makes you think you should. If you've had your heart broken in this way before, you air on the side of caution, which is a good thing, as love develops slowly over time.
I think I get what Bermuda is talking about. Those kind of relationships where you have people pledging forever to each other ,and very publicly, when they've only known each other for a day or two? Or, in many cases, never even met each other at all? It does kind of cheapen the whole idea of a true relationship.
Sorry about your breakup, Bermuda, but at least you have the adult level satisfaction of knowing you put your best foot forward & gave it your all. I think it's ten times worse when these shallow, month or so long relationships beget kids...yeesh. Nicholas Cage and his former wife, Patricia Arquette, had met only once when he pledged to marry her. Cage for his own reasons is a very bizarre man, and a bicostal relationship and three kids later, they divorced.
I see your point. The nature of the terms "intimate relationship" and "marriage" and "love" has been cheapened, reduced to a child like status. My four year old tells me she loves me. Does that mean she is aware of what that fully means?
Your ideas, I hope you don't take offense to this, remind me of some conservative commentators' ideas. One was a call to Dr. Laura Schlessinger by one of her male listeners, a man who had a wife & baby, yet had a crush on a co-worker. He said he just didn't get a sexual charge from his wife like he did with this woman, yet he had a baby who needed a father. Dr. Laura replied that, hey, you're 40, you can't just go through life getting a series of "heartthumps", and at least you acknowledged the adult concept of "This baby needs a father."
Another was a column by commentator Dennis Prager on why men today seemed so much more like much older boys, and one of his reasons was they weren't even expected to marry. Male/female relationships, as you pointed out, are more shallow, immature by their nature.
Personally I understand divorce when people have tried everything they can to work together and can't. I even understand concepts like "friends with benefits" when you're dealing with older adults who have already been widowed or divorced, perhaps multiple times, yet haven't lost interest in the opposite sex. When you remarry, if you already have kids from your previous, it can change the terms of your will to include your new spouse in some states, so I understand divorced parents or people with specific ideas about their last will & testament not wanting to remarry. Divorced parents face the additional risk of the volatility of some child/stepparent relations, so I understand having a "friend with benefits" when any children are with their other parent or a babysitter. But I think for the young, especially those who wish to become parents, the current significant other, domestic partner, bff type relationships are less than adult for this life long committment, and think anyone wanting to parent should be looking to committ to marriage.
I can see how these people who pledge their undying love for each other after a month might annoy you, but I don't think it's anybody else's business but theirs. Somewhere in the back of their minds they have to know that they're being unreasonable, so it's nobody's fault but their own when they break up. Or, if you believe in fate as I do, you think that each feeling, experience etc. teaches us something. Every action has a reaction.
I don't think it really is any of our business, on that Turtle I agree. I also agree whole-heartedly with you Bermuta. I wouldn't go so far as to say the nature of dating relationships has changed completely, but I thin, I would go so far as to say it is a problem more than a solution. It's true that having a few shallow relationships can certainly help. It's always good to casually date to see what you're into. I'm not saying the first person you fall for can't be "the one" because it can. But I think the idea of "casually dating" has really changed. People "hang out" a lot more now than I think they "date". There are so many reasons for this, I can't even name them all. It's difficult to see people who have just met one another think they've found the one, when they obviously haven't. The whole thing is just sad.
Post 1 and Post 3, I 100 percent, wholeheartedly agree with the both of you. But I do think some of it is partially our business, because the cheapening status of relationships could possibly affect us. Just imagine putting your heart and soul into searching for a life partner, and only finding those who want shallow month-long affairs. Not saying we should go out and try to make everyone else see things the same way, but it’s a concern I have.
Something else I really hate is how relationships are portrayed on daytime TV. I mean Jesus! Need I say more?
People are so quick to make some sort of kinship to a blood oath just because somebody cared about that person. This shows us how sad we as a people are. We are such an unhappy sort deep down. Is it society? I think so!
Sure it is, but live and let live, I say.
Yup, you can't change it, so role with it.
The thing about social media such as facebook and twitter is that whatever you post on there is public, and will continue to remain public. That's what makes it "our business", as you say. People make pledges of undying love publicly on facebook, therefore it is assumed, and downright encouraged, to comment on the whole thing.
But do you have to comment? You could just choose to ignore the whole thing. It only bothers you if you let it. I wouldn't be affected by such matters unless it was a close friend or family member, in which case I'd tell them once how ridiculous they're being, and then leave it at that, because in the end it's their life, not mine.
Fair enough, but the fact that people make it public makes it fair game to comment on... that doesn't mean one should, just that one can.
i think that people get bein in love confused with loving someone. When we are in love we view the person with rose colored glasses. they are lovely and perfect. Sex just enhances the in love relationship. then when we wake up and find out that our truly beloeved is a blithering idiot, our relationship dies a natural death. it's a big step to transition from being in love to loving someone. to me this means supporting them through the rough and the good times. acepting the for what they are etc. etc. etc.
Wow I never thought of it that way. Something for us all to keep in mind.