on this — fair points, and I do agree plenty of people get married for the wrong reasons. there is another, contrarian reason to get married, not necessarily profound, but here it is:
Marriage forces a couple, especially a couple that has been together a while and is prone to breaking up & getting back together, to deal with their relationship issues in more mature ways. why? because of the higher barriers to entry/exit (economist term, but it fits). you can no longer break up on a whim, it will set you back at least a couple of hundred dollars and a stack of paperwork — so you will be forced to sit down & communicate more as you hit a new road block.
ps: my wife & I got married early, we were 24 apiece, and that was over a decade ago 😉 . so, I speak the above from experience.
pps: if above sounds too cynical, that’s partly because neither of us view the world with bullshit glasses on, we are not rooted in work/social/church groups, nor neighborhood — we moved 1/2way around the globe 2 months after our marriage. but in hindsight, I am extremely lucky to have found and held on to her, especially seeing plenty of friends who haven’t been as fortunate
- Joe
