To divorce or not?- A painful decision

By Paula Taylor (JIN Magazine)
Updated: 2012-12-12

Just recently I read a salutary tale of a husband and wife, both lawyers, who went through such a messy divorce and resulting custody battle for their three children, that their £3.2 million pound house had to be sold to fund the legal costs and all they were left with was £90,000 between them. The house that represented their life’s work disappeared into the black hole that was their lawyer’s pockets. The Judge in the trial criticised the couple for hating each other so much that they rushed headlong into mutual financial destruction. He said that they had effectively destroyed the ship of marriage and then wrecked the lifeboats too. The wife said she did it to stop her husband getting custody of the children, and blamed their lawyers for encouraging them to go to litigation. The question was asked how a couple who once loved each other enough to get married and have three children together,could end up in such a hate filled situation.

Whilst no-one can sit in judgement on somebody’s else’s marriage, it is a sad truth that often it is the lawyers who benefit from divorce the most, so it is in their interests to urge their clients to go down this route, rather than encourage them to try to salvage their marriage, divorce means income for the lawyers.

In England it is relatively easy to get a divorce, the husband or wife can just cite unreasonable behaviour or irreconcilable differences. I have never understood what unreasonable behaviour means, after all what I think is unreasonable is not what you may think is unreasonable and vice versa. In America it is even easier to get divorced and the internet has lots of advice as to the easiest ways.

Once upon a time in China a failed marriage was a thing of shame, usually the blame was laid squarely at the door of the woman. Even if the husband had a mistress it was deemed that he, because of his wife’s inadequacies, had no choice but to turn to another woman. Times change however and in modern China divorce is not frowned on so much. Indeed the numbers of divorced people are growing amongst both the younger and older generation. Pressure to marry surely must be a factor, as many marry those whom they do not love. Usually when I ask my friends about changing attitudes in China, if it is something that is perceived as bad they always say “Oh it is because we see it on western TV programmes, so we copy”. Still I wanted to know how Chinese people really feel about divorce so I interviewed four people and essentially asked 9 questions, namely:-

1. How do you feel about divorce?

2. Do you have any divorced friends, if so what is their situation?

3. Before in China divorce was rare but now there are more and more people getting divorced, why do you think there has been a change?

4. In the west in most cases it is relatively simple to get divorced, is it that easy to get divorced here?

5.If a couple decide to get divorced do you think friends ought to offer advice? (Remember many Chinese people listen to what their friends have to say).

6. If your friends want to divorce what advice would you give them?

7. Do you think some people decide too quickly to divorce?

8. After divorce whose life do you think will be easier, the man or the woman’s?

9. In the west divorce is not shameful for parents or their children. Do the children of divorced parents here experience any prejudice?

View of Chinese Women

Li Li who has been married for three years said that she feels divorce is quite normal and not at all surprising. She has friends that are divorced, some of them are enjoying being single, the others, after a period of letting the dust of divorce settle, look around for someone new. She does agree that although there were far fewer divorced people in China before, now there are more and more couples deciding to get divorced. She said “I feel that there has been a change because of several things.

1. Before Chinese society became more open, people would absolutely not tolerate couples living together before marriage, or even pre-marital sex, but now most people accept these things. The old idea of being faithful unto death hardly exists anymore. People can accept divorce and remarriage.

2. People today have many more pressures than people in the past had. Rising prices, the need to buy a house, school fees for the children, meeting the medical expenses of elderly family members, the problem of trying to keep up with the neighbours, it all makes a person feel as if there is such heavy pressure on them that they cannot breathe. It is difficult to find the balance that makes for a happy family life. People have started to look outside their marriages for happiness.

3. These days there are many more ways to communicate with people and this unfortunately has brought negative influences. QQ and Weibo amongst others have closed the distances between people, consequently sometimes they are enticed by others. Marriages are under threat from all the things I have mentioned.

It is not as easy in China to get divorced as it is in the west, especially if there are children involved. There is the problem of dividing up the assets in a family, deciding what happens to the children and who will bring them up, friends and family will oppose a divorce so there is their view to be considered. If somebody asked my advice as to whether or not they should divorce, I would give them my opinion, but at the end of the day the people involved have to decide whether to stay in the marriage or to walk away from it. I would give them advice such as to think carefully about it, and tell them to ask themselves what caused them to want to get divorced in the first place. Maybe they need to think about the fundamental issues they have and really make sure that their situation truly is irredeemable before deciding to divorce. They should not make such a drastic decision because they are temporarily angry. If they have children, I would ask them if they had already agreed on how to raise the child. Divorce should be done in such a way so as to result in the least harm to the child. Before making a final decision both sides should be given time and space to think about it very carefully.

Many people decide to get divorced too quickly, there are no “good reasons” to get divorced, but many people decide to do it because their love has died. Also of course some people have extramarital affairs that lead to a marriage being broken up. If a couple decide to get divorced I don’t think the man necessarily finds it easier to adapt than a woman, but if there are children involved, naturally this will complicate matters, especially in a financial sense. I know that in the west if a couple get divorced it is viewed as nothing and their children will not suffer prejudice. Chinese society is much more tolerant now so divorce in itself may not carry so much stigma, however some traditional views are still held so there are bound to be some people whose thinking and attitudes will have an influence on the child”.

Li Li’s opinion is very balanced and she does have good advice to give to her friends. She has also mentioned the downside of internet communication, this is a familiar story, someone falls in love with someone who they are communicating with via the internet and suddenly want to leave their families for their new ‘love’. Sometimes before they have even met in person they are willing to give up everything for the new relationship. In China they use QQ to chat with friends and also to network with strangers.

Yu Yu, who has been married 5 years, told me “I feel that women should not agree to divorce, they will be lonely, pitiful and helpless, after all this world is still dominated by men. I do have friends that are divorced, outwardly they seem to be doing ok, but I think that the reality is that looks are deceiving and maybe they are not doing as well as people assume. I think one of the problems is that many girls are the only child of the family and the divorce rate amongst them is particularly high. I feel that these women are especially helpless. I imagine there are several reasons why the divorce rate is increasing:-

1. Many people have attitude problems, they think the grass always looks greener on the other side.

2. Different habits, for instance some girls that are the only child have a high opinion of themselves, this is because their family members treat like them like princesses. We all make mistakes, but they are not taught this, so when they get married and experience difficulties they will not admit any fault on their part. They have their own rules of behaviour.

3. Parents are also part of the problem, they think that their child will suffer when they get married and they are blind to the faults of their own child. They interfere in the marriage, also blaming the other party, problems are never the fault of their child.

4. Years ago when people got married they shared everything, money and other assets became the property of both of them. In my father’s time a couple would strive together to go in the same direction to make the marriage work, but these days couples still have their own separate property, separate money. There is a very clear distinction about what belongs to who. The attitude seems to be what’s mine is mine and what’s yours is yours.

5. There is also media interference, nowadays there are many programmes offering advice to married couples, sometimes it is bad advice but people still follow it as it is deemed to be given by “experts”.

For a lot of people children are not their first priority, they are more concerned with dividing up the family assets. If they can do that smoothly then the divorce proceedings are relatively straight-forward, probably the methods here are in line with the rest of the world.

I don’t think friends necessarily need to get involved, the problem should for the couple to handle. Most people will stand on the side of their own friend and will take their standpoint on issues. I would tell my friends that they should listen to their own heart, if they want to get divorced then get divorced, if they don’t want to get divorced then don’t. I think unless there is someone else involved, or they cannot have children, any other reason for getting divorced is not really a good reason.

Of course divorced men have it easier than women. I know divorced men who very quickly found new partners who were women that had never been married. These days there is definitely something wrong with people’s values, as long as the man has money, status and position, the women will not care about anything else.

I think today’s children will quickly become used to the “fast food” style of marriage. Some divorced parents get along together very well. Maybe when children are small they suffer more, but as they get older they realise that if their parents are really not happy, they will come to the conclusion themselves that it is better for the parents to separate”.