
Marry Him: The case for settling for Mr. Good Enough - jseliger
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/print/2008/03/marry-him/6651/
======
rajat
From the vantage point of a 20-year marriage: it's always about compromising,
about settling. My wife and I had, I suppose, one of those romantic, instant
connections. She's from Sweden, my parents are from India and I grew up in the
Bronx. We ran into each other at IBM Research, and we moved in together on our
second date. Instant chemistry, very romantic.

But during the 20 years of marriage, the way we met didn't matter. Marriage is
something else than about that initial burst of lust, or gushing romance or
whatever. When you get woken up at 4 in the morning by your soulmate because
the dog needs to go outside to pee and she certainly isn't about to leave the
warm bed, believe me, romantic love is not what makes you jump out of bed.

I think we have unrealistic expectations about romance. Living together is
freaking hard; giving up one's independence and having to be ready to
compromise about every damned last thing in life (except maybe what you do in
the potty) is hard. And once you compromise, if you're smart and want to stay
happy, you have to be enthusiastic about the compromise, or you get bitter. Be
happy, even when you didn't get what you want.

Still, despite all the compromises, all the things we had to work out, here I
am 20 years later, and the love I had for her on that first day we met seems
like a pale imitation to what I feel today. You have to work at it, and you
end up with something a lot more. I don't know about settling, but instant
love connection or not, making the marriage work is the hard part, and the
real love in life comes from that work.

~~~
impeachgod
I suppose this is why I don't ever want to marry. I realize that I do not want
to give up the independence I have; to have to compromise anything. I want to
be like Richard Stallman with his iron stubbornness. I think some people are
built for marriage, some are not.

~~~
Tichy
"I realize that I do not want to give up the independence I have; to have to
compromise anything"

But you are compromising: your compromise is that you can't experience
marriage.

~~~
impeachgod
That would be like saying that "my compromise is that I couldn't experience
prison."

~~~
Tichy
How is marriage like prison? It's mainly meant to save taxes and to enable you
to see your spouse in the hospital.

------
ardit33
It might sound awful, but this is one of the reasons I avoid dating 28+ girls
(I am 29 myself). 1\. Too much pressure. (even if it is not explicit, given
her standing, it is implicit) 2\. I don't know if she likes me for me, or just
because her clock is ticking.

On the flip side, girls it have really really easy on their early 20s. That
might create an "suply is infinite" kind of thinking in girls, and maybe
perhaps even a degree of narcisism sets in (I am demanded, I deserver x, and
y, and of course z qualities on a bf/ideal partner). Some girls just fail to
realise that past 26 (maybe 28 for asian girls), looks tend to fade.
(fertility peak is 22).

So, absent a family presure, it is easy to get comfortable thinking this
attention they get is normal, and will last for a long time.

Hence, they hit their late 20s/early 30s with extremely high expectations, yet
their perceived value has diminished with time (at least looks wise).

Many girls realize this, and end up being in "settling mode", which honestly,
if you are a guy sucks. She will not love you for what you really are.

To be honest if I had a daughter, my advice would be find a good one between
25-28. That's where your should be wise enough to know what you want, but
still have time to change your mind if you feel it is not the right thing.

~~~
kingkawn
The desire to systematize every aspect of life is why you're still just
dating.

~~~
philk
I'm really not sure why you're using "just dating" pejoratively. The GP might
feel no desire to settle down or might enjoy repeating the initial rush
through serial monogamy.

Alternatively, he may be open to the prospect of marriage but not be
sufficiently dedicated to it to be marrying someone who feels that they're
just settling for him.

------
elptacek
This article is long and makes me want to throw something at Lori Gottlieb.
Not that I'm advocating violence or would commit it... it's just written in
that sort of smug, grating style that makes me browse away after the first 10
paragraphs. All she has done is rebranded the concept of "compromise"
(important in all sorts of relationships) as "settling." Nothing new or
fascinating, there.

The deconstruction is hilarious. Thanks for posting it. I read all of it.

The civil contract idea is intriguing and creepy at the same time. Part of me
thinks, "...or just don't get married in the first place?" That the government
is involved with what is, effectively, a religious sacrament, boggles me a
little. But that's a whole 'nother discussion.

After 11.5 years (and yes, that .5 is important), I'm starting to feel like a
veteran on marriage. Like Gottlieb, my perspective on what 'Mr Right' is has
changed significantly. To wit, if I had advice to give to young women, it
wouldn't be to "settle," but to find someone young, intelligent and not too
hard to look at and train him.* By way of example, tptacek is currently in the
kitchen making a chicken caesar salad.

* What this really means: grow together. It's difficult, but better than turning 40 and "settling."

~~~
btilly
I think your advice for young women is good. That is what my wife did 20 years
ago. Of course as a result she has to put up with me. While I claim this is a
good outcome, it is hardly a perfect one...

However as a married atheist I have to point out that marriage is a legal and
social construct and not strictly a religious one. I have no trouble pointing
to past societies where it was very religious, and ones where it was not
religious at all. In short marriage has meaning, and it has meaning for non-
religious people as well.

In _fact_ , the divorce rate among atheists is lower than the general public.
So one could make a case that marriage matters _more_ to atheists than to the
general public!

~~~
elptacek
When I said religious, I didn't mean one of any organized religion that begins
with a capital letter. I meant it in the sense of social construct. By my
definition, atheism is a belief construct and falls into the subcategory under
philosophy as a 'religion.' This is a pretty unpopular assertion, so I don't
make it often, but it helps for clarification. To wit, legal constructs should
be as abstracted from a single belief system as functionally possible, since
beliefs vary so widely from one individual to the next. And because any legal
system based on ideology is fraught with bugs. The description of a ship with
no captain, in Plato's Republic, describes this in a way that is still
disturbingly applicable to our modern political and social dynamic.

A more simple way of putting it would be, "if you believe marriage has
meaning, then it has meaning." True for anything, right? Now if we could only
agree on what is meaningful, and what is not...

------
andreyf
_Lori Gottlieb, in The Atlantic, writes "Marry Him!", and describes a problem
so pervasive and urgent it's hard to imagine Obama hasn't cleared his desk:
what's an "independent," "feminist," "heterosexual" 40-something "woman" with
a sperm-donor child to do when she can't find a man to marry her?_

I found this analysis of the author much more interesting than the original
article:
[http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2010/02/dont_settle_for_the_m...](http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2010/02/dont_settle_for_the_man_you_wa.html)

~~~
rglullis
This is just an analysis of the author, in no point it addresses the issue
that she mentions. The "psych" just calls her ideas "dangerous" in the end,
and sticks to an ad-hominem.

I'd like to read someone who can actually find a counter-argument to her
thesis and convince me that the best thing women can do is to hold on to their
ideal all the way to the end.

~~~
jriddycuz
Ad hominem isn't always a fallacy. Now, I don't know if this analysis of the
author is necessarily _accurate_ , but it smacks of plausibility to me because
I've seen it before. As people, both men and women, remain single as they get
older, they grow more and more accustomed to thinking almost entirely about
their own concerns. This kind of self-focus makes it harder and harder to
establish and maintain relationships. If you can't get your focus off yourself
and off "the relationship" and onto the other person, you're going to have a
hard time finding any lasting relationship at all.

~~~
ewjordan
_Ad hominem isn't always a fallacy._

Indeed: it's only a fallacy if you try to use it as proof of a claim.

As a probability indicator, it's fantastically useful: if person A is right
80% of the time when they make a claim, and person B is right only 20% of the
time (assuming all else is equal), then you'd be a damn fool not to
incorporate that information into your estimate as to whether something is
true: person A is four times as likely to be right, so in a disagreement
between the two you should _always_ side with A.

I'm getting a little tired of people shouting "ad hominem" every time the
credibility of the author is challenged. The fact that someone doesn't believe
in evolution absolutely _should_ make me take their thoughts on global warming
less seriously; similarly, if someone has displayed an extremely immature,
counterproductive, or selfish approach to relationships, you should probably
take any relationship advice they give with a serious grain of salt.

------
owinebarger
First, "settling" is a highly offensive term. Anyone using that term is living
in a fantasy world. I read the author as using it facetiously, though, since
that is pretty much the point of the article.

Second, she soundly observes that marriage is basically a business
partnership, except she considers it nonprofit (I do not). Assuming you aren't
somehow committed to the single life, you should evaluate marriage opportunity
based on your appetite for risk and a frank assessment of the opportunity at
hand. Just as you shouldn't base decisions on sunk costs, you should ignore
illusory opportunity costs. Physical capital decays, if you want a return on
it you'll have to take a risk before it loses all of its production capacity.
Of course, the older you get without taking a plunge, the easier it becomes to
see the illusory nature of the opportunity cost you might have been using.

This all assumes you have a marriage opportunity that you can see having a
profitable return (profit measured in happiness here). I would go so far as to
say that it's impossible to judge marriage as an institution to be inherently
profitable for you personally; it will always depend on the particulars. You
might think marriage sounds like the place you want to be, but if you don't
find a good partner for yourself in particular, marriage isn't for you.

As long as you don't have kids and both spouses have careers, getting out of
the marriage is relatively easy. On the other hand, you only get one life,
don't waste it avoiding risks whose most catastrophic downsides are not that
bad.

I have assumed you aren't marrying a black widow or having kids with an
affinity for patricide/matricide. But worrying about the latter is like
worrying about being hit by lightning while not batting an eyelash over
driving a car regularly. Avoiding the former is a matter of due diligence.

------
pvg
The Cosmo-ification of HN continues apace. Next week, esr's sex tips FAQ.

I know someone will very earnestly explain to me how this is on topic but
really, it isn't.

~~~
codexon
I personally don't find these types of articles interesting either, but the HN
guidelines say this:

 _On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes
more than hacking and startups._

So if this story has upvotes, I presume some "good hackers" here have found it
interesting.

~~~
derefr
You presume wrongly. Communities begin with a "primary demographic"—people who
are there for what it says on the tin. Over time, though, these communities
start to lure in "secondary demographics" that are interested in both the
community topic and other topics, but then those people in turn lure in
"tertiary demographics," who aren't interested in the stated purpose of the
community at all, only about the hybrid on-/off-topic stuff the secondary
demographic posts. The tertiary demographic then posts stories like this one,
which the secondary demographic upvotes, and the primary tolerates because
they value the participation of the secondary demographic. Before you know it,
the tertiary utterly dominates the community, and there is no more topic to be
"on topic" about (especially in communities where "on topic" is small and
static, but the community allows growth despite this.)

~~~
jseliger
To me, "on topic" means an article that is a) not conventional/obvious, b)
deep, in the sense that it provides greater analysis than most
newspapers/magazines/blog posts, and c) makes me think of some process, idea,
trend, method, or ideology in a new way (which ties back into a). All three of
those could be further developed as points, but I think they nonetheless help
describe what HN is about.

I think "Marry Him!" matches those criteria (since I submitted it): few if any
sources covering mating markets and their incentives in as much depth; the
stories match some of the data, as developed in books like Tim Harford's _The
Logic of Life_ ; I hadn't realized the extent to which sexual politics change
as one ages. Consequently, "Marry Him!" seems like it would be interesting to
the HN crowd. So does the article on Haskell first impression, with its
discussion of monads. To me, both belong.

~~~
billswift
You might find David Friedman's chapter "The Economics of Love and Marriage"
interesting
[http://www.daviddfriedman.com/Academic/Price_Theory/PThy_Cha...](http://www.daviddfriedman.com/Academic/Price_Theory/PThy_Chapter_21/PThy_Chap_21.html)

------
Tichy
Couldn't there be a third way: make demands less strict in society? I remember
reading that women in Iceland are among the happiest on the planet, because
they are not under so much strain to sustain a relationship forever. It is not
frowned upon to break up. Women just move back with families and date again.

Since > 50% of marriages seem to break anyway (if I remember correctly), maybe
it would be better to approach things in a more relaxed way to begin with.
Maybe then men also wouldn't be so afraid to settle - for a while.

~~~
nfnaaron
Someone in the marriage breakup industry told me that 75% of all _second_
marriages fail.

I think we should have five and ten year civil contracts, with options to
renew. What you do religiously is your own business.

~~~
brc
Well, out of 4 siblings in my family there are two divorces. Except that only
one sibling has been divorced : twice.

Divorce statistics are very much a case of lies, damn lies and statistics and
are of no use in assessing the likelihood of a successful marriage.

For the record, the 'love' concept of marriage is very much a modern day
invention. For most of human history it's been a partly arranged affair to
provide a solid foundation with which to bring up children. It's still mostly
that (about bringing up children) though the wedding industry likes to
convince you it's all about finding the right person and having a romantic
time.

------
cliveholloway
Here's a rational approach that may be appreciated here :)

Make a concious decision to try and settle down with one of the first 6 girls
you date. Here's the rules:

1) don't settle for the first one you date.

2) the next one you date that is better than the first one you dated is the
one you settle for.

Why? Do the math. Let's label them 123456.

If you date 1 first, you have 1 in 5 chance of ending up with any of the
others (1 in 30 for each)

If you date 2 first, you end up with 1 (1 in 6)

If you date 3 first, you can end up with 1 or 2 (1 in 12 each)

If you date 4 first, you can end up with 1, 2 or 3 (1 in 18 each)

If you date 5 first, you end up with 1, 2, 3 or 4 (1 in 24 each)

If you date 6 first, you end up with 1,2 .. 5 (1 in 30 each).

Add that up, and the odds of you settling for each woman are:

1 - 38.1%, 2 - 24.7%, 3 - 16.4%, 4 - 10.1%, 5 - 6.7%, 6 - 3.3%

So, 79.2% of the time you "settle" for someone above average. And, for the
other 20.8%? You can always split up before it's too late :)

~~~
fizx
You should look at <http://www.parabola.unsw.edu.au/vol45_no2/node2.html>
which derives that the best strategy is to use the first 1/e of your potential
dating life to set a baseline, and then choose the best partner that exceeds
it.

~~~
huherto
Very interesting. The example for a young man that wants to get married
between 20-39 is to date until 27 and then marry the best partner that exceeds
it.

In the case of a woman is different. Assuming her prime is between 20-33; her
strategy should be to date until 24 and then marry the best man that exceeds
it. right? edit: grammar

------
maxharris
Women are people too - they are not just bags of meat that must have babies to
be happy.

Don't ever settle, because doing that is always a certain path to endless
misery and longing for what you could have had. Yes, life is short, but that's
all the more reason to stick to your ideals, and make sure that you choose
your ideals carefully (so that you're successful!)

Just think about how settling would ruin your honesty. Imagine what it would
be like if you were to see your spouse and think, "I thought I could do better
than you, but I gave up trying to find someone decent. You're okay, I guess."
Settling requires you to take these thoughts and "set them aside" - evade them
- constantly. Doing this does _not_ result in love, or a happy life for anyone
(including the children of divorced parents).

------
mklg1266
I hate being a 20-something women. Everybody on the planet, from doctors to
HN, feels the need to comment on the apparently glaring biological clock
ticking over my head, and make assumptions about A) my happiness and B) my
nefarious ulterior dating motives.

I will posit that there exist women who don't base their self-worth and
happiness entirely on the approval and acceptance of a man. I will further
posit that there are women who aren't married by 30 because they haven't met
someone they want to marry yet and are totally OK with that.

Later first marriages are more likely to last anyway.

(And do men really want to be settled for? Like "sure I'll marry you; you're
not totally horrible"?)

~~~
arojahn
I'm a female entrepreneur aged 32, happily unmarried. Yes, there are women out
there 'who aren't married by 30 because they haven't met someone they want to
marry yet and are totally OK with that.' - I'm one of them. But this kind of
article is the reason why it's sometimes hard - because no-one will ever
believe you if you claim that you are not set on getting married and you're
not keen on having kids. I've even heard the theory that I founded two
startups because I didn't find the right guy to marry and have kids with.

~~~
alnayyir
>heard the theory that I founded two startups because I didn't find the right
guy to marry and have kids with.

I generally flinch in the presence of feminist rhetoric (not saying that you
were engaging in rhetoric, demonstrating my leaning), but that is crass and
offensive. Why can't people just do what works for them?

Yeeeesh.

------
etherael
Western social marriage patterns confuse the hell out of me. It appears to me
that the vast majority of men are literally looking to marry a supermodel,
beyond that very little beside if she'll laugh at his jokes and be nice
appears to matter.

Women on the other hand appear to have all manner of weird neuroses about what
constitutes "Mr Right.", so vast is the span of options it is not possible to
really outline them all, they even conflict in many cases "Works hard,
financially secure, can take the kids to soccer practice and let me focus on
my career".

At any rate, I don't understand why from a man's perspective marrying a woman
from abroad isn't the obvious option. They tend not to have the lifestyle that
contributes to what is fundamentally the definition of "average human
appearance" being skewed wildly with weight or the long term effects of
cosmetics on skin quality etc etc etc.

For what it's worth for me personally, I think all you humans are crazy and
I'm perfectly happy to not be codependent, but whatever blows your hair back.

------
teach
This is an interesting article; thanks for posting it.

However, I enjoyed The Last Psychiatrist's deconstruction of it more:
[http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2010/02/dont_settle_for_the_m...](http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2010/02/dont_settle_for_the_man_you_wa.html)

------
donaq
This article could be mapped readily into "Get a real job: The case for
settling for a steady paycheck."

~~~
rajat
Don't you think the lesson could be applied to startups? Do you try to work
with the co-founders you have, or do you search incessantly for the perfect
one (ie. Bill Gates, or Wozniak)? Do you wait for the perfect, home-run idea,
or do you pick one you have and make it work?

I've heard so many people in real jobs moan about how they would do a startup
if only they had the right idea. Or that they didn't think they and their
potential partners could learn enough about business to make it. They're
waiting for the perfect opportunity and circumstances, as if such things fall
out of the sky magically, instead of being built and molded by hard work.

------
tome
I found this fascinating link about Lori Gottlieb:

[http://jezebel.com/5467630/email-interview-with-lori-
gottlie...](http://jezebel.com/5467630/email-interview-with-lori-gottliebs-ex-
tim)

------
Agile_Cyborg
In the long run marriage should be a last resort. The vector from mama's
vagina to the pine box may not be straight but it IS very short. Heaven is a
fantasy so do your best to live peacefully and passionately.

Marriage contains a bit of wonder surrounded by pitfalls aplenty. It is best
engaged in by the simplistic and rigid.

