BEFORE YOU GO PRO, JUST A THOUGHT:
1. Guys would LOVE it.
They can divorce their baby mamas and remarry again anytime. They can divorce a handful of times like changing their phones.
NOTE: It is easier for divorced men to remarry than single mothers to remarry only because many men do not want the burden of taking care of other kids who are not his own unless the woman was really worth it.
Then again, this happens anyway without divorce.
2. Legitimate born children loses —- both in status and in inheritance.
In other countries where divorce is legal, it is common to have kids with multiple mothers and fathers. Who then is the legal child?
Because all illegitimate children can now be legitimate due to the divorce law.
If your husband has a mistress and divorces you and marries her, then all the children is legitimate. No crying of foul.
I as the legitimate wife at least have my pride that MY child is legitimate and the mistress’ child is not. So my child gets more than the illegitimate’s when the husband dies.
With divorce, we remove that limitation. And everyone gets equal share because no child is legitimate. Sucks if you’re the original legitimate wife and have legitimate children.
3. Sucks to be the child of parents with multiple wives and husbands.
You can romanticize the single parent household all you want, but if given a choice, kids would prefer a two parent household.
But divorce allows a single parent household to promulgate. You see, you can love a person, marry, have kids before and after and dump them indefinitely, leaving in your wake with a lot of single mothers and fathers —- with children the ultimate losers.
I feel that a child has a better chance to feel whole, loved and supported if they are in a 2-parent home.
Financially most importantly, their lives are more secure vs. a solo parent home, especially if both parents work.
Now remove that limitation – and everyone can freely procreate and remarry again. That leaves a lot of kids with only one parent growing up. An ideal situation for the parents, but NOT IDEAL for the many children produced.
4. Men here are promiscuous.
You completely remove that stigma because women can justifiably say they too can be promiscuous and find other men. Fact is, guys here stray and divorce gives them the easy way out to a marriage and their childcare (sans a bit of child support).
If I was rich and powerful and a man, I would LOVE LOVE LOVE the divorce law. It’s akin to getting pets in your eyes. Once you’re tired of the woman, just find another one and pay the last one a token of something.
So before you go completely pro, think about the consequences first. It’s not all girl power because it’s not just about us, the mothers, but all the children we leave behind. They are the most damaged and losers with the divorce law.
Yes I agree —- some marriages need to be disintegrated.
If you pick the wrong guy, yes I know guys can be crap. But the institution of marriage is there for GOOD REASON. When it works, it protects the children, and does not give men an easy way out whenever they want to.
I am a wife of an annuled man —- He married at 26, realized they made a mistake and annuled within the year. It took a lawyer, hundreds of thousands of professsional fees, a psychiatric assessment and good reason for the annulment to be granted.
For 10 years, he carried the stigma of being annuled. Nobody wanted him because he was broken or separated. Yes, there were ladies but it was not an easy out for him.
Even when we dated, my family gave him a hard time because he was annuled. Even the church gave us a hard time before we got married.
So yes, while I agree with your points, remember, the divorce law is very pro-man than woman. So please be careful what you wish for.
Because you just might get it, and then find out later, you end up to be bigger losers because it normalizes illict affairs, single parent children, and marriage without consequences because hey, we can always get divorced.
Thank you for your insights. I so totally agree!
OK, let’s look at your points one at a time.
1. Guys would love it?
Maybe, maybe not. Who knows? SOME guys will relish the idea that a marriage is not for life anymore, and it will further reduce the validity of the institution of marriage being “blessed by god”, as the church would have you believe. But, since a civil marriage is not actually “blessed by god”, that validity of the institution marriage as being sacred has already gone, long ago.
Coming from a western country where divorce has been allowed for centuries, the option of remarriage for single mothers as opposed to divorced men is roughly equal. Maybe even lower on the part of the divorced man. While a single mother was once looked on with disdain and disgust, being a “divorced” single mother has less stigma attached. The first thing people wonder is “why are you divorced?” And since most divorce is “thought” to stem from infidelity (where in fact it usually stems from incompatibility), it is the norm for people to think of the divorced wife as the victim, even if she was not. And most divorces are blamed on the man, so when you tell your next girlfriend you are divorced, she will start to ask those questions in her head of “why is he divorced? What did he do?” Because the norm is to blame all divorce on the guy. So, the social stigma attached to divorce is actually harder for men than women. And I know this, because I AM divorced. Twice. And unless I told people why, they would automatically think it is because I cheated on my wives.
2. Legitimate children loses?
I doubt that the divorce bill will change the Family Code, especially since there is nothing in the bill that does so already. Which means the legitimacy of the child is not in question. Divorce is not like annulment, wherein the marriage is considered to have never happened. In a divorce, the marriage happened, but it ended. Which means that any child of the marriage would remain legitimate, since they were “born within wedlock”, as the Family Code states.
Yes, if the man gets divorced and marries another woman, any children they have AFTER the wedding are legitimate. But any that he already has with her are not automatically legitimized by the marriage. The Family Code still applies, and they are still illegitimate. As with any children sired outside of wedlock, those of the mistress he later marries remain illegitimate.
What divorce does is merely remove that whole “legitimate wife” crap by removing it once the couple are no longer married. And there are some cases whereby it is the better option.
3. Sucks to be the child of parents with multiple wives and husbands.
Wow, does it really? I asked all 7 of my kids from my three wives, and none of them agree with you on that score. Another misconception of Filipino women about the idea of divorce. Probably taken from 1980s American movies where they considered the kids of “broken homes” to be disadvantaged and less fortunate than those from “whole” families. Kids from these so-called broken homes are usually more well-adjusted to life in the real world than those from “typical” All-American God-Fearing Christian families with mom, dad, and 2.4 kids. And it is a fact that most of the schoolyard snipers and massacres are committed by kids from these so-called “normal” homes with loving families. Go figure.
4. Men here are promiscuous.
Can’t argue with that one, but it is not going to change because of divorce. Men will always be promiscuous, whether there is divorce or not. At least with divorce the women that are affected can kick the bastards out and divorce them, taking them to court for HALF of everything they own and half of their future incomes until their child(ren) turn 18. The bill just needs to ensure that child support is more strictly enforceable, and failure to pay results in prison sentences, as well as having to pay the back payments on top.
And then you do have he fact that some marriages NEED to be ended. Not merely dissolved. Since the laws changed on annulment, whereby it can only be done for certain grounds, all of which must have been existing at the time of the marriage (the grounds for annulment are: lack of parental consent; insanity/psychological incapacity; fraud; duress (forced marriage); impotence; and sexually transmissible diseases), then there is a need for a means of ending a marriage that is detrimental to one or both parties whereby the grounds did NOT exist at the time of the marriage. You cannot get annulled for adultery or concubinage. You cannot get annulled for physical or mental abuse, abandonment, and anything else other than those grounds given that existed when you got married.
So, what if, for example, your husband left home and never came back? Do you continue to remain married to this man, despite never seeing him or getting help from him to look after his children? Or how about the man who constantly beats his wife, for no other reason than he is a vicious and vindictive bastard? Seen plenty of men (and women) like that. How about the drunken husband who comes home and rapes his wife? Or the pedophile husband who is molesting his own kids? Should a woman stay married to that kind of man forever? Or should she have the right in law to remove him from her life for good?
You are lucky, you have a good and honorable husband, it seems. But not everyone is as lucky as you. And I have seen all of the things I have put here in reality. Battered wives who cannot get away from the husband because culture here says they should try and make it work. Battered husbands too, who cannot get out because of the stigma attached to being a guy whose wife beats him up. Molested kids who suffered repeatedly until they either ran away or committed suicide, forever damning their eternal souls, because their mother could not get out of the marriage. The disappearance of one of the couple, without reason or notice, just vanishing without a trace because they were taken or they just decided to leave. And some of these scenarios have been realities for me too.
Divorce is coming, and it SHOULD come here. It should be made legal here in the Philippines. This is not the dark ages. Civil marriage is not done in the eyes of any god, yet it is the Church that condemns people to an eternity of suffering because of its outdated and archaic beliefs.
Now there should be a REAL separation of Church and State, whereby the Church has NO say in ANYTHING that is written in law, and has NO ABILITY to influence decisions made by our statesmen because of their religious beliefs.
Thank you so much for this comment! I think the author is way out of touch on what is actually happening with most of married couples here in the Philippines (getting educated abroad is NOT an excuse for that). She did not even mentioned anything about battered spouses & abused partners, I don’t think she even has sympathy to those people (she’ll probably think that they chose to be like that anyway), so much for her being a Christian.
Tina, you’d better not remove the comment above as those are all valid points. I remember you mentioned writing about good points on a certain topic here in your blog but it never happened – instead, you just closed the comments section and not wrote anything about that. You have good posts, but you also have to be open to criticisms and opinions from the other side like this and not just live in your bubble and tell everyone that what you’re thinking is the ONLY right thing!
Martin is a friend and makes good point. He answers my statements line by line logically. I would NOT delete his pinagisipan comments as it is healthy for others to read too with what he writes. Martin is a smart man and his smartness should shine.
I disagree with one of his points though —- He is correct that legitimate kids do not become illegitimate kids due to a divorce. My point is, Illegitimate kids from the succeeding wives do become legitimate via marriage, thus earning him the same rank as the legitimate child. Currently, this is not allowed.
As the illegitimate child only gets half of what a legitimate child gets. When divorce happens, you get a whole lot of legitimate children, not really good news to the first and legal wife and her kids.
Logistically though, most first wives do not know where the husband’s money is, making it hard to habol. But theoretically, the Family Code protects the first wife and her kids when it comes to inheritances.
Two, the fact that Martin’s kids are well rounded do not make kids from blended families similarly rounded too. Following his logic, he is lucky to have wives and children who are well adjusted. And for every Martin, there’s another family and kids who is crying because daddy’s not there, and his moving to his next marriages are legitimized. My case is for the first wives whose rights are significantly diminished due to the Divorce Bill.
He made a good case though that instead of a Divorce Bill, maybe a Child Support Bill may be better and helpful for all. This makes baby daddies more accountable to their offsprings and a Child Support Bill systematizes the way fathers must support the kids regardless of marriage.
The problem now is the law is quiet about the child support aspect. Making it very arbitrary – only through filing a case and fighting for a piece can mothers gain minute child support. It would be good if child support is based on father’s income —- similar to a tax which is already set. If so, this would be beneficial, and will produce less unwanted and uncared for children who are forgotten by their fathers.