Would You Sign A Prenuptial Agreement?

In My Humble Opinion
62

Sounds like y’all got some rotten judges. I am not sure of my states divorce laws and since I dont have anything that division matters much I am not really looking into it. My sister is divorcing in Washington State, the judge offered to her soon to be ex all the stuff they had that was his mothers and my sister generously threw in the bed ( she hated it). But since her soon to be ex is a veritable wiennie who is terrified at the thought of driving a U-haul from Wa. to Utah she got the haul. Works for me.

I can see the point to sign one I just wouldn’t do it myself. If I felt I needed that protection I wouldn’t get married in the first place but each to his own.

63

Dangerosa, if it turned out I was dead wrong about my husband’s character, I would have divorced him. But I certainly entered the marriage with the intention that it was forever. I just have a hard time believing that people who ask for pre-nups have the same mindset. It’s like a weatherman saying there is absolutely zero chance of rain, but advising us to take an umbrella – just in case.

Your husband betrayed you and your children. He made a deliberate decision to screw you over, along with your children. Had you signed a pre-nup, he very well could have screwed you over TWICE.

64

I hit the send to soon.

The bimbo wouldn’t have got the china in my family. We would have :

  1. gone and got it. Have some VERY big cousins.

  2. I would have smashed it all and left it for her.:smiley:

65

Yes, especially if one of us were much wealthier than the other, or if at least one of us had a previous marriage under their belts, and/or if at least one of us had kids from a previous relationship–I’d absolutely insist upon having one. I’d also insist that we hash out an estate plan to take into account the distribution of assets in the event of a death, too, prior to the marriage. Better to get it all taken care of ahead of time.

66

JRDelirious, indeed things can go bad, I understand that, but to go back to my cake allegory; unless you mix it all up, it isn’t really a cake - you can decide that you might want to take the eggs back out later on and therefore put them whole with the shells on, but what you will have is something other than a cake.

Or to use your own flesh allegory; acknowledgement that things can go wrong with your body that need excision is one thing; applying a tourniquet as a precautionary measure would be quite another.

67

Why would a pre-nup be to my detriment? Had I signed a prenup, it would to be protect MY assets, not his, in the event that I had been a bad judge of character. So that he couldn’t screw me over any worse than he already had.

68

Ditto.

69

For the record, when I am talking about a pre-nup, I am talking about one whose terms are acceptable by both parties.

Also, for the record, I don’t think it would be fair either for one party to write up non-negotiable terms that screws the other party.

To take what seems to be the popular anti-pre-nup argument, that the introduction of a pre-nup is tantamount to a faithless marriage, what would a person think if their fiance refused to agree to not “take him to the cleaners” if they ever divorced? The pendulum swings both ways.

70

OK, I’ve been giving this a lot of thought.
FTR, I’m a guy, 35, who’s been screwed in the divorce.
I still won’t ask for a prenup should I get married again and I wouldn’t sign one if it were asked of me.
It’s an emotional decision on my part and not one that can be defended with reason.

71

**Although I have been argueing on the anti- side, I wouldn’t say that it creates an entirely faithless marriage, but I do believe it diverts the thing away from absolute faith, trust, union at least a little and potentially a significant amount.

Don’t really see a lot of difference - I’d (personally) find such a conversation cause for concern in its own right.
The minister will ask the congregation to stand and says to the groom:
“(…), will you take (…) to be your wife? Will you love her, comfort her, honour and protect her, and, forsaking all others, be faithful to her as long as you both shall live?”
The groom answers "I will (Well, I’ll give it a go) “.
The minister then says to the bride:
“(…), will you take (…) to be your husband? Will you love him, comfort him, honour and protect him, and, forsaking all others, be faithful to him as long as you both shall live?”
The bride answers “I will (Well, hopefully, anyway)”.
…
The bride and groom turn to face each other the groom takes the bride’s right hand and says to her:
“I, (…), take you,(…), to be my wife, to have and to hold from this day forward; for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, (or to love, cherish and worship) till death us do part (But hey, there are limits), according to God’s holy law; and this is my solemn vow.”
The bride takes the groom’s right hand and says:
“I, (…), take you, (…), to be my husband, to have and to hold from this day forward; for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, (or to love, cherish, and obey) till death us do part (yeah, right - there are limits, you know), according to God’s holy law; and this is my solemn vow.”.”
The groom places the ring on the bride’s fourth finger of her left hand. He holds it in place and then says:
“I give you this ring as a sign of our marriage. With my body I honour you, all that I am I give to you, and all that I have I share with you (Well, all except the boat, the offshore investments and the Spanish villa), within the love of God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.”
…

72

NOBODY can be 100% sure about anybody, not even themselves. Fairy tale notions of romance (“and they lived happily ever after to the end of their days)” to the contrary notwithstanding, one has to realistically admit that in 10 or 20 years, one or both parties may have a new outlook on life.

73

My hypothetical wife and I get in the car to go for a drive:

“Why are you putting on your seatbelt?”

“Huh?!”

“Just the thought of you wearing a seatbelt demonstrates that you think you might crash. I refuse to get into a car with someone who already has given up on this trip.”

I don’t understand the emotional/moral arguments against prenups. Just the fact that it might give peace of mind to the person you supposedly love and cherish should be enough.

Is insurance for wedding rings equally repugnant?

I think marriage licences should legally require a prenup before they can be issued. Then the emotional/moral stigma would evaporate. As an added bonus, the sobering realization of what exactly is being entered into might prevent a few ill-fated unions from taking place. (Las Vegas, this means you.)

74

xCept I don’t see the pre-nup as applying a preemptive tourniquet, but as having a good healthcare insurance and primary-care physician lined up. That’s just me.

75

Oh… and all those parenthetical caveats in the vows as revised by Mangetout? Excellent, IMO; I should write them into mine if only to see the faces of some of the guests!

Besides, nobody HAS to marry by the Church – the County Clerk or Justice of the Peace can do the job quite well. I guess that this is probably one of the axes around which all the controversy revolves. The Marriage License, which we may note is issued by the Civil Authorities, is about a Civil Contract that affects who will the State see as belonging to one family unit in regard to such things as estates, power of attorney, lineage of kinship, adoption, etc. (Which is why it is such a big deal for our Gay brothers and sisters to have access to it!!!) It does NOT mean “marriage” is “nothing but” that, but it IS that, AS WELL as the loving-joining-of-souls and/or the holy-sacrament aspect. The one does not exclude the other.

Of course, if you are a true believer that the only real marriage is the sacramental kind, with all that it implies, then you have to be faithful to your beliefs first and MUST reject the prenup. Doesn’t make your belief objectively right for the rest of us, though. I see PL continues to take the stand that the one and only explanation is one of premeditated “betrayal” on the part of a guilty party of “bad moral character”, who is “screwing” the woman and her children twice over and “breaking their hearts”, and needs punishment. Fine opinion. Good for you. Godspeed and much luck, may the wind be at your back and the trees shade your path, give my regards to B’way, etc. :rolleyes:

Which is not to say that if there IS a betrayal, you should not feel like some, as WhiteInk puts it, “blood and revenge”. But that is a judgement to pass WHEN and IF it happens. Not an a-priori assumption.

As other people have pointed out, the pre-nup has to be acceptable to BOTH parties, and can include whatever is acceptable to BOTH parties and no more nor less. Which is why I say I would have no problem signing one if presented to me – if the content is acceptable. Sure, if the content reveals unacceptable conditions I walk away, but any insult or offense would come from the content, not from the idea itself.

76

Mangetout,

Why do you think people get divorced?

77

But that’s my point JRD, if there is a betrayal, it’s payback time. An “equitable” prenup effectively nullifies that option.

One thing tho… and this is a call for other’s perceptions. So if a marriage is really about the joining of two people, their good and bad, strengths and weaknesses, assets and debts… to put a traditionalistic pragmatic spin on things… Usually the two parties bring different things to the table, and that is what makes it work. In many cases, the male party brings higher earning capacity and more assets. The female party brings non-monetary vaue to the table, such as (but not necessarily limited to or including) free labor in terms of housecleaning, meal preparation and child care.

How do you compensate for that non-monetary contribution at the time of a break up?

78

I’d like to respond to that…

  • My wife will have her own career. This is not a demand, just a comment on the type of person I am attracted to.
  • Housecleaning, meal preparation and child care are all SHARED responsibilities, and I do NOT shirk my responsibilities.

But to answer your question, the two people getting married can compensate for “old-fashioned women’s job” stuff any way they want to… by means of an written agreement created when they are in an positive state of mind rather than after a marriage has failed and negative feelings have distorted their thinking.

If the marriage lasts forever, any prenuptial agreement isn’t an issue. If the marriage doesn’t last forever, isn’t it better to agree upon things when you’re in a healthy frame of mind rather than when the love is lost?

79

No, because the ideal pre-nup would have provisions that would be equitable to both parties.

80

But what would be the point, those kind of agreements are not legally binding.

81

What, like there’s a single reason?

Look, I’ve admitted that people change and I’m not blind or stupid; I see divorce happening and that’s nasty, but the fact that x% of marriages end that way does not mean my marriage has x% chance of doing so - that is misapplication of statistics (also irrelevant to your question, but I wanted to say it). In those cases where divorce occurs, I can see that it is probably very handy to have a pre-agreed scheme of division, but I still maintain that (for me at least), drawing up that plan of division at the same time as earnestly entering into what is supposed to be a permanent union, creates tension. One way around this might be to regard marriage as by default something other than a permanent union.

But from where I sit:
‘All except’ is not ‘all’.
‘Hopefully forever’ is not ‘forever’
"I’ll try’ is not ‘I will’

An incisive and insightful analysis.

Indeed no and I have been at pains to make it clear that these are opinions applied only to myself, but then there are those who would impose their opinions on me by making a pre-nup mandatory (although in fact this would not directly affect me, as I am already married and applying it retrospectively would make it something other than ‘pre’)