I’m sorry this is a nice sounding and romantic, but useless answer. It was Valentines day yesterday, I was bombarded with enough relationship related cached thoughts as it is.
Or are you saying the other person will literally die or refuse to ever interact with you if you don’t “marry” them? Also do you expect US government granted 21st century marriages to remain enforced then? Indeed do you have any evidence whatsoever that a stable relationship can last that long or is likley to without significant self-modification? In addition why this crazy notion of honouring exactly one person with such a honour? Isn’t it better to wait until group marriages are legalized?
If you don’t feel like discussing the issue please acknowledge it directly.
You’re being kind of a jerk. Your questions aren’t relevant to the information I wanted; you’re just picking on me because I brought up something vaguely related.
That having been said:
Yeah, I know about Valentine’s day. That’s why this was on my mind.
I don’t think singlehood will kill my partner or cause him to shun me. (Although if I didn’t poke him about cryo, he might cryocrastinate himself to room-temperatureness.) I’m not hoping that anyone will “enforce” anything about my prospective marriage.
My culture encourages permanent and public-facing relationships to be solidified with a party and thereafter called by a different name. In particular, it has caused me to assign value to producing children in this context rather than outside of it. I believe that getting married will affect my primate brain and the primate brains of my and my partner’s families and friends in various ways, mostly positive. It will entitle me to use different words, which I want, and entitle me to wear certain jewelry, which I want, and allow me to summarize my inextricability from my partner very concisely to people in general, which I want. It will also allow me to get on my partner’s health insurance.
Edit in response to edit: I’m poly, but my style of poly involves a primary relationship (this one). It doesn’t seem at all unreasonable to go ahead and promote it to a new set of terms.
It seems cultural and perhaps even value differences are the root of how this conversation proceeded. Ok I think I understand now. I should have suspected this earlier, I was way too stuck in my local cultural context where among the young basically only the religious still marry and it is generally seen as an “old fashioned” thing to do.
As I said I didn’t mean to be. I am genuinely curious why in the world someone would do this because I haven’t heard any good reasons in favour of it except that it is “tradition” or that else they’d be living in sin and fear of punishment by a supernatural entity.
But I do apologize for any personal offence I may have inadvertently caused. I did not meant to imply either you or your partner (about whom I know nothing!) where particularly unsuited for this arrangement. I was questioning its necessity or desirability in general. I generally have been pretty consistent at questioning the value of this particular legally binding institution so it seems unlikely that I wouldn’t have posed the exact same question in response to anyone else making such a request.
I will not apologize for posing uncomfortable questions. I don’t want other people respecting my own ugh fields so I generally on LessWrong don’t bother avoiding poking into those of others.
Your incredulity has been noted. With contempt. I’m allowed to want things.
But I do apologize for any personal offence I may have inadvertently caused.
Have you considered reacting to the need to apologize by ceasing to produce it? It can’t be very inadvertent. It looks awfully advertent, or at least not like an evitandum of any kind.
I am somewhat surprised that you chew Konkvistador out over this, whereas you react quite tolerantly to my repeated bewilderment that you want to live with humans from your uterus.
Of course you are. I just wanted to hear why. You are naturally under no obligation explicit or implicit to give reasons that apply generally or personally.
I’m dismayed that I have apparently offended you. Please accept a sincere apology. I genuinely didn’t realize the topic might create resentment here.
What does the outside view say about when during the course of a relationship it is wisest to get engaged (in terms of subsequent marital longevity/quality)? Data that doesn’t just turn up obvious correlations with religious groups who forbid divorce is especially useful.
I assumed from the wording of the above request for data that you weren’t seeking for congratulations or the like but information on the general desirability of the arrangement, and when it is most appropriate. I was simply trying to elicit what information and thoughts you’ve come up on your own so far because I too was interested in the question. And I too have a personal stake in it as well since I’ve had discussions on the topic with one of my partners.
Edit: To respond to the addition of this:
Have you considered reacting to the need to apologize by ceasing to produce it? It can’t be very inadvertent. It looks awfully advertent, or at least not like an evitandum of any kind.
I was apologizing because you where sending strong signals but I wasn’t sure what exactly I was doing wrong. I mean I could have cut off all further communication but that would have left me very confused.
I proceeded as I normally do in such circumstances, by apologizing for any inadvertent offence and asking for clarifications, that would hopefully let me figure out what exactly caused the negative response. If you note above, you see that I basically made a guess at what might have offended you and proceeded to apologize for that.
I do not consider you to be at fault for your initial comments; I fault you for subsequent failure to take a hint. Your apology is accepted.
I see nothing about the wording of my original comment that should have led you to conclude that I wanted information about the “general desirability of the arrangement”. I did want information about “when it was most appropriate”—in a purely temporal sense.
I see nothing about the wording of my original comment that should have led you to conclude that I wanted information about the “general desirability of the arrangement”. I did want information about “when it was most appropriate”—in a purely temporal sense.
Now that I’ve reread your question, I see that you where indeed.
If you’re referring to the other occasion when I asked for advice and people ignored all non-keywords I had uttered instead of answering my actual, specific question, yeah, I probably must get at least somewhat offended when that happens. I value my ability to react emotionally to my environment. I don’t get offended when I ask for advice and get advice that corresponds to what I asked for.
I wouldn’t have chosen the word “offended” to describe my emotional state in the first place, but I didn’t think going “I’m not offended!” would have been a very credible response; it never is.
Picking on you? You responded to him. You’re going out of your way to be offended. You can feel free to not explain your viewpoints, but when someone poses a question don’t respond with a throw-away comment and then get annoyed it gets responded to.
Watching the stars burn down won’t be as much fun without him.
ETA: We’re American, so Amerocentric advice is likely to be useful to us.
I’m sorry this is a nice sounding and romantic, but useless answer. It was Valentines day yesterday, I was bombarded with enough relationship related cached thoughts as it is.
Or are you saying the other person will literally die or refuse to ever interact with you if you don’t “marry” them? Also do you expect US government granted 21st century marriages to remain enforced then? Indeed do you have any evidence whatsoever that a stable relationship can last that long or is likley to without significant self-modification? In addition why this crazy notion of honouring exactly one person with such a honour? Isn’t it better to wait until group marriages are legalized?
If you don’t feel like discussing the issue please acknowledge it directly.
You’re being kind of a jerk. Your questions aren’t relevant to the information I wanted; you’re just picking on me because I brought up something vaguely related.
That having been said:
Yeah, I know about Valentine’s day. That’s why this was on my mind.
I don’t think singlehood will kill my partner or cause him to shun me. (Although if I didn’t poke him about cryo, he might cryocrastinate himself to room-temperatureness.) I’m not hoping that anyone will “enforce” anything about my prospective marriage.
My culture encourages permanent and public-facing relationships to be solidified with a party and thereafter called by a different name. In particular, it has caused me to assign value to producing children in this context rather than outside of it. I believe that getting married will affect my primate brain and the primate brains of my and my partner’s families and friends in various ways, mostly positive. It will entitle me to use different words, which I want, and entitle me to wear certain jewelry, which I want, and allow me to summarize my inextricability from my partner very concisely to people in general, which I want. It will also allow me to get on my partner’s health insurance.
Edit in response to edit: I’m poly, but my style of poly involves a primary relationship (this one). It doesn’t seem at all unreasonable to go ahead and promote it to a new set of terms.
It seems cultural and perhaps even value differences are the root of how this conversation proceeded. Ok I think I understand now. I should have suspected this earlier, I was way too stuck in my local cultural context where among the young basically only the religious still marry and it is generally seen as an “old fashioned” thing to do.
As I said I didn’t mean to be. I am genuinely curious why in the world someone would do this because I haven’t heard any good reasons in favour of it except that it is “tradition” or that else they’d be living in sin and fear of punishment by a supernatural entity.
But I do apologize for any personal offence I may have inadvertently caused. I did not meant to imply either you or your partner (about whom I know nothing!) where particularly unsuited for this arrangement. I was questioning its necessity or desirability in general. I generally have been pretty consistent at questioning the value of this particular legally binding institution so it seems unlikely that I wouldn’t have posed the exact same question in response to anyone else making such a request.
I will not apologize for posing uncomfortable questions. I don’t want other people respecting my own ugh fields so I generally on LessWrong don’t bother avoiding poking into those of others.
Your incredulity has been noted. With contempt. I’m allowed to want things.
Have you considered reacting to the need to apologize by ceasing to produce it? It can’t be very inadvertent. It looks awfully advertent, or at least not like an evitandum of any kind.
I am somewhat surprised that you chew Konkvistador out over this, whereas you react quite tolerantly to my repeated bewilderment that you want to live with humans from your uterus.
You have earned social leeway, and I believe that if I told you to drop it, you would.
Of course you are. I just wanted to hear why. You are naturally under no obligation explicit or implicit to give reasons that apply generally or personally.
I’m dismayed that I have apparently offended you. Please accept a sincere apology. I genuinely didn’t realize the topic might create resentment here.
I assumed from the wording of the above request for data that you weren’t seeking for congratulations or the like but information on the general desirability of the arrangement, and when it is most appropriate. I was simply trying to elicit what information and thoughts you’ve come up on your own so far because I too was interested in the question. And I too have a personal stake in it as well since I’ve had discussions on the topic with one of my partners.
Edit: To respond to the addition of this:
I was apologizing because you where sending strong signals but I wasn’t sure what exactly I was doing wrong. I mean I could have cut off all further communication but that would have left me very confused.
I proceeded as I normally do in such circumstances, by apologizing for any inadvertent offence and asking for clarifications, that would hopefully let me figure out what exactly caused the negative response. If you note above, you see that I basically made a guess at what might have offended you and proceeded to apologize for that.
I do not consider you to be at fault for your initial comments; I fault you for subsequent failure to take a hint. Your apology is accepted.
I see nothing about the wording of my original comment that should have led you to conclude that I wanted information about the “general desirability of the arrangement”. I did want information about “when it was most appropriate”—in a purely temporal sense.
Now that I’ve reread your question, I see that you where indeed.
Must you get offended every time you ask for advice and get it?
If you’re referring to the other occasion when I asked for advice and people ignored all non-keywords I had uttered instead of answering my actual, specific question, yeah, I probably must get at least somewhat offended when that happens. I value my ability to react emotionally to my environment. I don’t get offended when I ask for advice and get advice that corresponds to what I asked for.
Might I suggest exasperation? It’s tastier and healthier than offense!
I wouldn’t have chosen the word “offended” to describe my emotional state in the first place, but I didn’t think going “I’m not offended!” would have been a very credible response; it never is.
And people are allowed to not want gays to marry. Should this also go unquestioned? People are allowed to want things!
Picking on you? You responded to him. You’re going out of your way to be offended. You can feel free to not explain your viewpoints, but when someone poses a question don’t respond with a throw-away comment and then get annoyed it gets responded to.