My family is... Not a healthy or happy one. I imagine most people know this by now. Yet, for reasons that I honestly do not understand, my parents are still together. Toxic, painful, continuously arguing, but still together...
The same cannot be said for extended family. Divorces everywhere. A number of children out of wedlock. Painful intergenerational relations on both side. Lots of "not talking". Lost of... Honestly, relationships that are far more negative than they are positive. As the black sheep "loser" of the family, I can't tell you how shit my relationship with nearly all my cousins is, right now. I could, I suppose, blame myself for that, but I really don't think it is that simple...
I actually don't think this is that uncommon, where I live. Sure, most people don't have family quite as toxic as my own, however divorce is utterly ubiquitous. Siblings not getting along is probably more common than not. And honestly, it feels like people almost expect families to behave like this - not communicating, not really talking, and generally... Not behaving like civilised adults. At least amongst the majority "white" population, in addition to the "blak" population (among whom it is most definitely even worse, lol), this is... All too common.
Thoughts? What's it like for you lot, where you live? Do you get along with your extended family? Are you close to them? I realise that I am almost certainly an outlier, where my family are fucking shit, in addition to being the "black sheep loser to end all black sheep losers", but... I'm just curious.
I like the idea that "family is the people you choose to include in it", but I am yet to find my... "One". I'm honestly yet to really find anyone. So I don't have that to have as my "core". I'm sure it's very different for those that do. Unfortunately, though, I'm not sure I will ever even find that...
So yeah. Pretty blackpilled about "family", at the moment, after mounting betrayals, I have to be honest. Would appreciate some... Alternative insights, if your life experience differs in that way.
This is why you fail.
If you are a good man, you have authority over your lover because she relies on you to be her rock. Doubting that is the first failure.
authority is maintained through patriarchy such as the mosaic law, a man alone in a post modern world has 0 authority over a woman, its just his turn until she gets bored
Again, this is a statement about your relationship with other people, more than it is about societal structure.
Your relationship with your intimate partner is literally the closest relationship you will ever have. The fact that she's willing to "trade up" may be a condemnation of her, but it is also a condemnation of you. If you honestly think that bureaucracy and institutional procedures denote power, you are dangerously naive. Authority is maintained through individual relationships and other individual's deference to you. Everything else is just a persuasion mechanism, even loaded guns.
If your friends will disown you for not wearing a mask, it is because they were never close enough to you to trust you. If your woman is prepared to "trade up" and abandon the relationship she had with you, it is because she didn't ever love you. Genuine social and emotional bonds are always more important and powerful than bureaucratic incentive.
Trading up is female hypergamy, and this is restrained through patriarchy like it is currently in the Muslim world. Waiting for "the one" is a social construct created by movies and tv shows.
Losing a friend is easy to get over, but losing a wife can ruin you since the government will now force you to compensate for her flakiness via backed child support and alimony.
You're worried about a structural issue. Well, you're not gonna be able to do shit about that one way or another. It's like a conservative talking about creating a culture that doesn't engage in pre-marital sex: fantastic, we don't live in that world, the only thing you can do is carry yourself as a vanguard of that principle.
Cultural change happens at the individual level. You not only can't, but shouldn't, rely on those cultural structures to maintain the loyalty of your spouse. That's on you first, and last. If you chose to assert that your female companion will leave you, you have guaranteed it. If you chose to build a relationship where leaving you is a nonsensical decision, then it doesn't matter what the social incentives are.