I’ve seen this innumerable times. Women are, as a group, devious.
Edit: That probably sounds mysoginistic, so please differentiate it from evil. Perhaps it could be best phrased as “never straightforward”.
If you had read my previous posts you would know that I am intimately familiar with the body of law that deals with non-married people. I have spent more than a year of my life dealing with such, and it only served to convince me exactly why pre-nups are a bad idea indeed (for most people- there are a few exceptions that I have admitted already).
All this back and forth boils down to one thing: a pre-nup is intended to plan for what will occur in the event of a divorce.
Even if they worked exactly as they should, which they do not always because the laws governing marriage and separation will always trump a pre-nup. One cannot agree in a pre-nup that there will be no (or minimum) spousal support for example, then divorce 15 years later and expect that clause to hold up if one is divorcing in a state where spousal support is a right of the “injured party”, one cannot dictate custody and child support matters in a pre-nup and expect it to carry any weight at all- the family court laws will always supersede a pre-nup and child support is a right of the children that cannot be signed away (and have that signing-away enforced after they change their mind) by a parent, inheritance laws are covered in all states, absent extenuating circumstances those laws are going to override whatever was agreed to in a pre-nup if challenged. So really (and in my experience and opinion) pre-nups are just about worthless anyway, but it is a good indication that your partner is not really ready to be married if they suggest or demand a pre-nup. So in that aspect they are infinitely useful for weeding out bad prospective spouses.
I can only speak for myself of course, but going into a marriage with a plan for how it will end, should it end is exactly the same as going into a marriage planning it to end, and I could never enter a marriage under such circumstances.
So the people who are against prenuptial agreements believe that it addresses divorce. Interesting. In actuality, it can be anything you want it to be. Someone upthread made some comment about how marriage should be about sharing your belongings and money, etc. In the US, however, the default rule in most states is that money and belongings are not shared, but each person keeps their own money or belongings during marriage. We call these “separate property states” and they are to be viewed in contrast to the “community property states.”
In a separate property state, in the absence of a prenuptial (or postnuptial) agreement to do otherwise, each party retains all legal rights over their stuff acquired during the marriage. Oh, sure, they can trust each other and treat each other’s money and belongings as shared, but in actuality, it’s not.
What’s interesting is that I don’t see a huge outcry from people about how this dooms marriages to failure because people aren’t sharing during marriage. I find this amusing.
Me, I think the process of negotiating the prenuptial agreement could be very helpful. As a partnership, you need to define your goals, including deciding how to deal with current debts and assets going forward. You can address such things as vacations, or housekeeping, or pretty much anything you want. And, of course, you can agree to share your stuff. (I’m in a community property state, so the state’s decided for me that I’m going to share my stuff with my husband, unless he and I agree differently.)
Anyway, I don’t get the big hoo hah over prenuptial agreements. I don’t see them as an indication of lack of trust (indeed, in some places, it would seem that a prenup would actually be in indication of trust – i.e., converting separate property to community property), but just as good planning.
Even that is not so cut and dried. In a separate property state assets might become marital property if they are co-mingled for example, or used in a way to support the marital home (an example would be pre-marriage funds that were then placed in a joint bank account or used to pay household expenses) and in a community property state some property might remain separate- an inheritance or gift that was not co-mingled or property owned before marriage and kept entirely separate for example.
These are issue that keep divorce lawyers in all states busy and well-fed.
In the end if you divorce you can argue about property, assets, and support in divorce court if you cannot come to an agreement outside the courts or you can argue about the terms of the pre-nup that you no longer agree with and have them either enforced or overturned. In either scenario the lawyers are the only ones who come out ahead and the property laws of your state are likely to be the controlling factor.
The Default is a 50/50 split. That is not what is usually awarded. It is the baseline from which the judge awards assets to and from spouses until what he or she considers a fair and equitable split is. If children are involved the custodial parent often receives a great deal more at the expense of the other.
My financial situation is directly germane to the welfare of my (imaginary) child. Moving them to a smaller home, and being able to provide both support and a quality standard of life from both parents should be preferable to keeping them in a home at the ruin of one partner. A prenup allows both partners to consider their own well being as well as that of children in advance of bitterness; and prevents a judge from making a snap decision. Of course if you happen to be that parent that will make out like a bandit, by all means argue against it, but don’t pretend it’s anything more than greed and malice driving your intent.
Offhand, your post seems to have a bit of spite there:
It reads to me like you’ve already decided that poor Nashiitashii will be thrown out to wolves all due to my serpent-like calculations. That is exactly the type of thinking that a prenuptial agreement is designed to guard against. Not every relationship has a power earner, nor is the male always the better off financially. In our own example we have supported one another over the years equally, and both wanted to ensure that we could, (if necessary) part on the same terms, neither feeling robbed or taken advantage of.
No such thing as commonlaw marriage in my state.
And we needed to be legally married for three years to adopt our son from South Korea.
Doesn’t stop them from fighting over them. My husband and I paid for my brother in laws attorney when he divorced. Two people who had declared bankruptcy six months before, whose house was only saved from foreclosure by us loaning them the money to pay the mortgage to current. We spent $500 in lawyers fees fighting over two pair of snowshoes her father had given them as a gift (I about killed my brother in law). He figured she could only use one and the other set was his. She figured they’d come from her father, so both sets should be hers. That logic on her side didn’t stop her from wanting what he brought into the marriage as family heirlooms. (Or wanting their debt to us not to be included when distributing proceeds from the sale of the house we kept out of foreclosure for them - which explains in part why we were writing the checks to the attorney).
These were two people who married because they loved each other and thought they’d be together forever. They felt they had so much in common and shared values. (We thought she was a bitch from day one, but that’s a different story).
Now a pre-nup probably wouldn’t have saved them from fighting over the fucking snowshoes. But a pre-nup probably would have kept them from marrying to start with, because it would have exposed both of them to the other.
And that is, in my opinion, the absolute best benefit of pre-nups.
Speaking of, did you see my post about why your prior experience should have nothing to do with your negative opinions towards pre-nups? One has nothing to do with the other. If I understand your experience correctly, you legally bound yourself to your SO outside of marriage by entering into what basically amounted to a civil union or domestic partnership. You did this because he told you it was necessary for “protection.” This was a lie, however. By entering into a legal contracts as a way of “protecting” your assets without ever getting married (civil union), you created the very need for that protecton since neither one of you would’ve had a right to the other’s possessions without going out of your way to contractually obligate yourselves. Basically, the instrument you used for protection was the very thing that created the need for that protection in the first place.
Yes, I saw it and I disagree. We had what was essentially a pre-nup and it was treated as such and disected as such and overturned in parts just as if we had been married and it had been an actual pre-nup.
No, it wasn’t really like that at all.
We did enter into what was essentially a civil union, and the intention was to afford both some of the benefits of marriage as well as some of the protections of marriage- including what would happen re: assets and property and support if the relationship ended. The judge ruled that what we had was “for all intents and purposes a marriage” and that upon dissolution all of our contracts and legal bindings would be treated “as the dissolution of a marriage using the applicable statues and laws governing such a dissolution”. The judge applied all laws of marriage dissolution for our separate property state and the pre-nup (although it was not called that) was ruled to be “not keeping with state statutes” or some such and thus essentially thrown out at the first challenge of the document. Either of us could claim spousal support outside of what was delineated, and we each had some claims to property outside of what the document we had signed gave us. In the end I see no difference between that and an actual marriage with an actual pre-nup. What having the legal documentation accomplished was that it gave more to fight over, more to challenge and created more income for the lawyers handling the actual arguments.
Perhaps the judge acted in error and his rulings could have been overturned on appeal, but I had neither the money nor the fortitude to continue the fight any further than I did.
So IOW, using the term as shorthand for lack of a better word, what happened was that you were stuck with a BAD “pre-nup” not worth the paper it was printed upon. Still doesn’t hit me as an impugnation of the per se wisdom or desirability of a (real, valid) pre-nup.
The person honestly, sincerely considering a pre-nup a good, sensible, rational idea for the modern world; and the person honestly, sincerely thinking that it contradicts their very idea of what marrying is all about; can be BOTH honestly, sincerely good people with the best intentions, and wonderful marriage prospects who’ll both find lifelong happiness, just not with one another.
Sorry, MitzeKatze, but I had read your posts. You made a grossly incorrect statement, and your personal experience does not establish you as an authority.
My personal experience establishes my authority to hold my opinion, thanks. I never claimed any authority over anything else; if anything I have said indicated otherwise I will gladly retract the statement.
Sure they can. I would never marry such a person because it shows our utter lack of compatibility and different core values. That doesn’t mean they wouldn’t be compatible with someone else who is equally “wrong-headed” (IMO).
Wanting a pre-nup doesn’t make anyone a bad person or anything, but IMO it does make that person unmarriable (by me). I have my opinions and have explained what helped form such strong opinions, and believe that is enough.
This thread was asking for opinions on pre-nups not for why pre-nups are absolutely the right thing and anyone who thinks otherwise is grossly mistaken and doesn’t know what they are talking about.
Yes.
To me, not having a pre-nup is saying that I trust the state of ________ to make decisions about our marriage, instead of trusting my (theoretical) husband and myself.
As Muffin said above, it’s the most important contract I hope to ever sign. I want to be the one who decides the terms.
You’Ve never heard the term “palimony”? It doesn’t just apply to rich Hollywood types. See this Legal Guide for Unmarried Couples.
There will always be persons who do not need contracts or courts to determine what is, for them and those they love, fair and equitable treatment.
I don’t believe I could marry anyone who, a) proposes a contract to protect themselves from me, or b) so materialist as to suggest ‘things’ need protection.
Well, I really hope that I’m going to seek medical help for the personality-altering blow to the head I’ve apparently received. What you describe is utterly unconscionable, although I’ve seen people of both sexes do it. (Though they typically find the new partner(s) before setting up the divorce.) And it goes right back to Tamara’s Number One Rule of Marital Happiness: Don’t marry an asshole. The sort of person who would treat their spouse that way is, frankly, an asshole and there is no legal contract in this world that can keep them from being an asshole. An asshole is apt to make the process needlessly difficult with or without a pre-nup. If neither of you is an asshole, your odds of being able to split amicably skyrocket, and at the same time, your odds of splitting up go down.
Also, your commentary about women makes you sound remarkably like my brother circa his college years. Unlike the time he told me I was the least feminine woman he’d ever met, that’s really not meant to express admiration.
Maybe, maybe not. It depends on whether they were being honest with each other and more importantly, if they were being honest with themselves about what the other person’s behavior meant. Most of the people I’ve seen marry assholes have had plenty of advance warning the asshole was an asshole long before things got the point of discussing marriage, but they chose to convince themselves otherwise. And people like that can’t be saved from themselves by legal contracts, interventions by friends and family, or anything else.
Your initial posts created the impression that you were saying the existence itself of a (pseudo-)prenup is what creates trouble, not the actual defects of your specific legal arrangement in your specific case. Since clarified.
Y’know, adding that “IMO” and that “by me” in parentheses, makes it look like an oh-wait afterthought to a belief that people who seek pre-nups are wrong.
While we’re at that, I admit to earlier [del]implying[/del] (no, hell,) stating that the believers in no-prenup were not being realistic.
That was a gross injustice, they can be fully realistic but simply making an affirmative choice to commit to a specific value set, which is due respect.
I somehow don’t expect the same from the opposite direction.
Gee, ya think?