Why Do People Get Divorced

Student: Claudia Oviedo Meléndez
Professor: Viviana Cartín
Course: LLM 408 Essay
Essay #5: Cause and Effect
Date: November 4th, 2010
Why Do People Get Divorced?
Since ancient times, people from the whole world have decided to spend the rest of their lives together, which is called to “tie the knot,” or in other words, to get married. However, the divorce rate tends to grow steadily at thepresent time since marriage is not taken as seriously as it used to be taken before. Some couples cannot maintain their relationship intact through the years; consequently, they choose to break up, which is the solution that most people rely to face problems between husband and wife. There are many reasons that can cause a divorce, but we can highlight three of the most common ones: changingwomen’s social function, stress of contemporary life styles, and deficiencies in communication; equally, the multiple effects of a divorce seem insuperable and sad for some people, but very favorable and happy for some others.
The first significant cause of divorce is that women’s role in society has given a 180 degree turn with respect to some decades ago. In the past, men had been the only providers,earning all the money to pay for the necessities of their families, while women only did houseshores and took care of their children, which made them completely dependent on their husbands to survive. Because of that situation, it was so hard for most women to separate from their husbands. Nonetheless, this bitter past for women has entirely changed today. The equality between men and women hasgiven a special break; as a result, women can work outside to earn money, while men share the household tasks such as cooking, cleaning, washing, as well as taking care of their children. It can be clearly seen that women are more independent if they can earn money by themselves to support their living cost. Accordingly, the divorce rates increase because women hardly need their husbands like theyused to.
Another recurrent cause for couples to put an end to their marriages is stress of contemporary life styles. Many people have considerable pressures to earn money and be someone in life. For instance, in many developed countries, students generally want to go to famous schools, so that they can take advantage to go to well-known universities. Studying in laureate universities typicallycauses having a good chance to find a respected profession or earn excessive amounts of money. The biggest problem with this situation is that, even if some people have a good degree from a prestigious institution of higher learning, many of them are laid off from their companies; consequently, lots of stress take place in their families, which leads to divorce. Some families can earn money, but it isnot enough for covering their expenses; for that reason, it becomes very easy to contemplate divorce as a good solution to their financial problems. Unemployment rates continue rising with the economic crisis; as a result, divorce rates raise too. There are no doubts: stress of contemporary life styles may contribute to intensify the importance that couples give to the economic situation, whichcontributes significantly to divorces.
The last cause of divorces in most of marriages to be analyzed is deficiencies in communication. Due to the fast-paced lifestyle that most of people have on these days, many men and women are equally busy. For this reason, they do not have sufficient time to talk about all the problems with their partners, which produces significant distance between them,deterioration in the relationship and the subsequent rupture. Some couples often remain quiet when they have personal or marital problems; as a consequence, little complications can be expanded to become huge problems, which can detonate a divorce. It is clear that more assertive communication in couples results in fewer divorces.
As we could see, the above issues can cause a significant rise in...