Women Oddly Un-Panicked By Declining Marriage Rates

By Anna North | December 21, 2011 | 12:00am

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Now that the percentage of married Americans has dropped to a dire 51%, reporters are talking to women about their shriveling ovaries and dim marriage prospects and finding them … strangely unconcerned.

In response to a new Pew report showing the percentage of married folks has sunk to a record low, the AP interviewed several single women. One Erin Turner “feels she made all the right moves dating wise.” Yet her relationship with a live-in boyfriend recently ended, and she’s single on the eve of her 30th birthday. Naturally, Turner is completely panicked, and blames feminism, hookup culture, and the End of Men for her plight. Oh wait:

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While Turner hopes to marry one day, she’s not sweating it at the moment. Her parents divorced when she was young and she doesn’t want marriage badly enough to settle. She’d be sad if she never married, but she wouldn’t “implode.”

Then there’s 30-year-old Grace Bello, who “loves kids” and whose mom was 30 when she had Grace. Surely she’s despairing at her chances of ever achieving any sort of happiness. Well, actually:

“Not getting married wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world,” Bello said. “I think the worst-case scenario would be a loveless marriage that ends in divorce and to be a single mom supporting several kids. I’d rather be single for the rest of my life.”

Unaccountably, the only woman who expresses real fear to the AP does so indirectly — 31-year-old Keisha Pickett says, “In my circle of friends, they haven’t necessarily given up on it but they’re scared. You give it your all and it could all blow up in your face one day.” But it’s not actually clear if her friends are scared of not getting married at all or of entering a marriage that will one day fail. And Pickett herself recently broke up with a boyfriend because he wasn’t the right fit for her. That frivolous strumpet!

Who are these women who are so blithely continuing their lives as their only shot at anything approaching fulfillment — young marriage and immediate childbearing — slips inexorably through their fingers? Surely they must be a minority. And yet! Marketer Ann Mack tells the AP that the numbers of these deluded hags may be increasing: “A growing number of women are taking an alternate life route that doesn’t include marriage as an essential checkpoint.” Women seem to think they can somehow lead full lives without being legally bound to a person of the opposite sex. Someone should really talk some sense into them — perhaps a strongly-worded editorial about how miserable they’ll be should they fail to marry would do the trick. I’m pretty sure no one has tried that before.

Staying Out Of The Ring: Barely Half Of Adults Wed [AP]

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