[9530jh9054ven]

Please forgive my ignorance as I don't have any real experience with any form of positive relationships with people. But what is the appeal of being in a romantic relationship in today's day and age? Except for the potential of shared income, most aspects that I can see save for dual income can be mostly fulfilled by technology (digital, pharmaceutical, entertainment, etc), and these options do seem to carry far less risk.

[q1w2]

Dual income is probably one of the last things I would list as reasons I enjoy being married.

Even without children, companionship, intimacy, and yeah, love, have tangible emotional rewards.

If you have never felt these feelings because you're young and haven't met anyone interesting yet, that's one thing. If you're older and just don't feel these feelings towards others, then you might want to talk to a professional about that.

[sytelus]

> If you have never felt these feelings because you're young and haven't met anyone interesting yet

If you have never felt feeling of being disillusioned then it is because you are not old and haven't really found out true nature of your relationship.

Highly recommended experience: Go to your local family court on a nice afternoon and sit back and relax for few hours. One of those people there is your neighbor who was just until yesterday happily married and now losing his home and worried about how he would pay alimony and see his children more than twice a month.

No one gets married thinking they would ever divorce. 50% of them divorce nonetheless.

[q1w2]

> Go to your local family court on a nice afternoon...

Or I could just spend the day with my wife and kids in the park...

[bm3719]

Even if someone wanted all those things, it would still be rational to weigh them against the negatives. That would include both realized downsides, like incompatibilities and conflicting life goals, and potential ones, like all of the negatives involved in divorce.

Doing such an analysis and coming up with a different conclusion than the (current) norm shouldn't be grounds for him needing mental health services.

[sytelus]

> Except for the potential of shared income

Kick here is that there is no such thing. More than 50% marriages end in divorces. And when it does, person who earned the most, loses the most. In states like CA, if you are married to someone for 10 years, you may be held liable o provide lifetime of alimony which can be as much as 50% of your income. It may not happen but there are no guarantees because there are no real laws and judges do whatever the hell they want. One of the lucrative business is divorce lawyer claiming abuses to extract lifetime alimony in states like CA. To that person "shared income" would be a joke.