Best quotes by Stephanie Coontz on Marriage

Checkout quotes by Stephanie Coontz on Marriage

• ‟ Marriage is no longer the main way in which societies regulate sexuality and parenting or organize the division of labor between men and women.

  - Stephanie Coontz
  

• ‟ The real gender inequality in marriage stems from the tendency to regard women as the default parent, the one who, in the absence of family-friendly work policies, is expected to adjust her paid work to shoulder the brunt of domestic responsibilities.

  - Stephanie Coontz
  

• ‟ The origins of modern marital instability lie largely in the triumph of what many people believe to be marriage's traditional role - providing love, intimacy, fidelity, and mutual fulfillment. The truth is that for centuries, marriage was stable precisely because it was not expected to provide such benefits.

  - Stephanie Coontz
  

• ‟ Especially around Valentine's Day, it's easy to find advice about sustaining a successful marriage, with suggestions for 'date nights' and romantic dinners for two. But as we spend more and more of our lives outside marriage, it's equally important to cultivate the skills of successful singlehood.

  - Stephanie Coontz
  

• ‟ Heterosexuals were the upstarts who turned marriage into a voluntary love relationship rather than a mandatory economic and political institution.

  - Stephanie Coontz
  

• ‟ Marriage can provide a bounty of emotional, practical, and financial support. But finding the right mate is no substitute for having friends and other interests.

  - Stephanie Coontz
  

• ‟ Marriage is no longer the only place where people make major life transitions and decisions, enter into commitments, or incur obligations.

  - Stephanie Coontz
  

• ‟ Many alternatives to traditional marriage have emerged. People feel free to shop around, experimenting with several living arrangements in succession. And when people do marry, they have different expectations and goals.

  - Stephanie Coontz
  

• ‟ Giving married women an independent legal existence did not destroy heterosexual marriage. And allowing husbands and wives to construct their marriages around reciprocal duties and negotiated roles - where a wife can choose to be the main breadwinner and a husband can stay home with the children - was an immense boon to many couples.

  - Stephanie Coontz
  

• ‟ Marriage has been in a constant state of evolution since the dawn of the Stone Age. In the process, it has become more flexible - but also more optional.

  - Stephanie Coontz
  

• ‟ Why do people - gay or straight - need the state's permission to marry? For most of Western history, they didn't, because marriage was a private contract between two families. The parents' agreement to the match, not the approval of church or state, was what confirmed its validity.

  - Stephanie Coontz
  

• ‟ Using the existence of a marriage license to determine when the state should protect interpersonal relationships is increasingly impractical.

  - Stephanie Coontz
  

• ‟ Deciding together to have a child and sharing in child-rearing do not immunize a marriage. Indeed, collaborative couples can face other problems. They often embark on such an intense style of parenting that they end up paying less attention to each other.

  - Stephanie Coontz
  

• ‟ Unilateral divorce has decreased the bargaining power of the person who wants the marriage to last and has not engaged in behavior that meets the legal definition of fault. On the other hand, it has increased the bargaining power of the person who is willing to leave.

  - Stephanie Coontz
  

• ‟ To my mind, it is better to have regrets about the good aspects of your former marriage because you were able to work past some of your accumulated resentments than to have no regrets because you had to ratchet up the hostility to get out in the first place.

  - Stephanie Coontz
  

• ‟ Usually, Valentine's Day comes and goes with just a day or two of news media attention to courtship and marriage.

  - Stephanie Coontz