Divorce - Say it three times and you won't be at home

e-Divorces are a quarter of all marriage annulments in Dubai


Experts differ on legitimacy of divorce by e-mail or SMS



Staff Published
Sunday, July 03, 2011

Dubai recorded 555 divorce cases among its Muslim population in 2010 and 150 of them were done by e-mail of mobile phone text messages.

While some experts consider a divorce through such means is legal, others believe it is not legitimate or final under Islamic law on the grounds spouses could fake such a divorce for some reasons.

Under Islamic law, a Muslim man can divorce his wife by just saying “your are divorced” three times but a woman cannot do the same.

“Dubai had 555 divorce cases in 2010, including 150 divorces through electronic means such as mobile phone texts,” the Arabic language daily 'Emarat Al Youm' said, citing figures by the Dubai family consultative council.

It quoted Mohammed Abdul Rahman, head of the personal affairs division at Dubai’s courts, as saying e-divorces are legal but must be proved at court.

“The wife files a divorce case at court after she receives the divorce message while the court has to verify this by asking the husband,” he said.

But the paper quoted Dubai-based lawyer Rashid Tahluk as saying divorces by e-mail or mobile phone text should not be considered as final.

“Marriage is usually carried out by an Islamic contract and Maazoun (authorised person) and this means divorce should be carried out in the same way….I believe a divorce by e-mail or mobile text is doubtful and not a real divorce.”

Tahluk said a husband could deny that he had sent a mobile phone text divorcing his wife, adding that the court must not base its judgment on forensic results.

“The police laboratory can not prove that the husband himself pressed the button and sent a divorce text to his wife…it could his wife or a second or a third wife who sends a divorce text…e-mails also can be easily hacked and penetrated.”

The paper quoted another lawyer as saying he believes an e-divorce is enough for a husband to divorce his wife.

“In case a husband sends a message to his wife saying ‘you are divorced’ then these are clear and straight words that the man has divorced his wife…in such a case, the divorce is done and the court should support it.”














Islamic

Marriage

Perhaps Judge Walker and or the WSJ writer of the previous article should peruse these random marriage facts -



63 Interesting Facts About . . .


Marriage

1.The term “marriage” derives from the Latin word mas meaning “male” or “masculine.” The earliest known use of the word in English dates from the thirteenth century.a

2.Due to jobs, kids, TV, the Internet, hobbies, and home and family responsibilities, the average married couple spends just four minutes a day alone together.g

3.The Talmud is very strict about banning extramarital sex—but also enforcing marital sex. The Talmud even lays out a timetable for how often husbands should “rejoice” their wives. For men of independent means, every day; for laborers, twice a week; for ass-drivers, once a week; for camel-drivers, once in 30 days; and for sailors, once in six months.e

4.Over 75% of people who marry partners from an affair eventually divorce.h

5.The Oneida colony established in New York in 1848 advocated “complex” or group marriage in which every woman was married to every man. They also practiced “scientific breeding” where parents where matched by a committee according to physical and mental health.e

6.Traditionally, bridesmaids would be dressed in similar bride-like gowns to confuse rival suitors, evil spirits, and robbers.b

7.Marrying younger than age 25 dramatically raises the divorce risk. Also, the divorce risk is higher when the woman is much older than the man, though the reverse isn’t as a strong factor.l

On average, married couples have sex 58 times per year

8.The average married couple has sex 58 times per year, or slightly more than once a week.g

9.At Italian weddings, it is not unusual for both the bride and groom to break a glass. The number of shards will be equal to the number of happy years the couple will have.b

10.The word “wife” is likely from the Proto-Indo-European root weip (“to turn, twist, wrap”) or ghwibh, which has a root meaning “shame” or “pudenda.”o

11.The word “husband” is from the Old Norse husbondi or “master of the house” (literally, hus “house” + bondi “householder, dweller”).i

12.Some scholars trace the word “bride” to the Proto-Indo-European root bru, “to cook, brew, make broth.”b

13.The term “groom” is from the Old English guma, meaning “man.”f

14.In three states—Arkansas, Utah, and Oklahoma—women tend to marry younger, at an average age of 24. Men’s average age is 26. In the northeastern states of New York, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts, men and women wait about four years longer to marry. The U.S. average age for women is 25.6 and for men, 27.7.n

15.A person’s level of education influences the age at which they marry. Couples tend to marry later in states with higher numbers of college-educated adults, while the opposite is true for states with lower education levels.n

16.Nevada, Maine, and Oklahoma have the highest percentage of divorced adults. Arkansas and Oklahoma have the highest rates of people who have been married at least three times.n

17.The probability of a first marriage ending in a divorce within 5 years is 20%, but the probability of a premarital cohabitation breaking up within 5 years is 49%. After 10 years, the probability of a first marriage ending is 33%, compared with 62% for cohabitations.g

18.Hammurabi’s Code (ca. 1790 B.C.), an ancient Babylonian law code, contains some of the oldest known and recorded marriage laws. These early laws defined marriage as a contract that paradoxically served to protect women and restrict them. According to the Code, a man could divorce his wife if she could not bear children or of she was a “gadabout” who humiliated her husband in public and neglected her house. Additionally, she could be “pitched” in a river if she committed adultery.g

19.Washington, D.C., has the lowest marriage rate in the nation.c

20.Approximately $6 billion in revenue is lost by American businesses as a result of decreased worker productivity linked to marriage hardship. Employees in a happy marriage, in contrast, tend to increase a company’s bottom line.g

The Great Recession has been one of the greatest strains on marriage in decades

21.CNN reports that the current economy is the biggest stress on married couples in the past 60 years.j

22.A New Woman’s Day and AOL Living poll found that 72% of women surveyed have considered leaving their husbands at some point.g

23.Married couples tend to have fatter waistlines, which can lead to a decrease in sexual attraction and general health. Additionally, a spouse’s chances of becoming obese increase by 37% if his or her partner is obese.g

24.A 2008 study found that marital satisfaction improves once children leave home. However, if marital problems existed before, an empty nest often reveals those otherwise masked issues.g

25.People whose marriage has broken down at the time they are diagnosed with cancer do not live as long as cancer patients who are widowed, have strong marriages, or who have never been married.k

26.In ancient Greece, Solon (638-538 B.C.) once contemplated making marriage compulsory, and in Athens under Pericles (495-429 B.C.), bachelors were excluded from certain public positions. In Sparta, single and childless men were treated with scorn. In ancient Rome, Augustus (63 B.C.-A.D. 14) passed drastic laws compelling people to marry and penalized those who remained single.m

27.A marriage ceremony typically ends with a kiss because in ancient Rome, a kiss was a legal bond that sealed contracts, and marriage was seen as a contract.b

28.Adults who are childhood cancer survivors are 20-25% less likely to marry compared with their siblings and the general American population.k

29.Stress associated with divorce affects the body’s immune system and its ability to fend off the disease. The health benefits of remarriage are reduced the second and third times around.g

30.Throughout most of history, marriage was not necessarily based on mutual love, but an institution devoted to acquiring in-laws and property and to provide the family additional labor forces (by having children).e

31.A white New Orleans man in the late nineteenth century transfused himself with blood from a black woman he loved so he could overcome anti-discrimination laws by claiming he was black and marry her.n

32.One nineteenth-century New York legislator insisted that letting married women own their own property attacked both God and Nature.

33.Just two years after marriage, an estimated 20% of couples make love fewer than 10 times in a year.g

34.One in three American marriages is “low sex” or “no sex.”g

35.The number of marriage therapists in the United States has increased 50-fold between 1970 and 1990.g

36.In the United States, over 50% of first marriages end in divorce, 67% of second marriages end in divorce, and nearly 74% of third marriages end in divorce.g

37.Marriage does more to promote life satisfaction than money, sex, or even children, say Wake Forest University psychologists.g

38.Compared to singles, married people accumulate about four times more savings and assets. Those who divorced had assets 77% lower than singles.g

39.Married elderly people are more likely to maintain daily health-promoting habits, such as exercising, not smoking, eating breakfast, and having regular medical check-ups.g

40.More than friendship, laughter, forgiveness, compatiblility, and sex, spouses name trust as the element crucial for a happy marriage.g

41.Eighty-one percent of happily married couples said their partner’s friends and family rarely interfered with the relationship, compared to just 38% of unhappy couples.g

42.Eighty-five percent of couples have had premarital sex.g

Nearly 60 percent of couples have had an affair, with most affairs occurring within the 25-39 age bracket

43.Nearly 60% of married adults have had at least one affair.g

44.The cost of an average wedding is $20,000. The cost of an average divorce is $20,000.g

45.Words form only 7% of our communication with anyone, including spouses. Tone of voice accounts for 38% and body language is responsible for 55% of the messages spouses receive from each other.g

46.Women who report a fair division of housework were happier in their marriages than women who thought their husbands didn’t do their fair share. Wives also spent more quality time with their husbands when they thought the housework was divided fairly.d

47.A 15-year-long study found that a person’s happiness level before marriage was the best predictor of happiness after marriage. In other words, marriage won’t automatically make one happy.d

48.Researchers found a huge decline in happiness four years into a marriage with another decline in years seven to eight. In fact, half of all divorces occur in the first seven years of marriage, which gives rise to the popular term “the seven-year itch.”d

49.More than two in five Catholics marry outside their church, twice as many as in the 1960s. There are at least one million Jewish-Christian marriages in the U.S. Two in five Muslims in America have chosen non-Muslim spouses.d

50.Married people are twice as likely to go to church as unmarried people.g

51.Half of emotional affairs become sexual affairs.g

52.While couples with children are less likely to divorce than childless couples, the arrival of a new baby is more likely to bring more stress and emotional distance than new happiness. Nearly 90% of couples experienced decrease in martial satisfaction after the birth of their first child.g

53.Over 40% of married couples in the U.S. include at least one spouse who has been married before. As many as 60% of divorced women and men will marry again, many within just five years.g

Birth order is an important factor in determining the success of a marriage

54.Birth order can influence whether a marriage succeeds or fails. The most successful marriages are those where the oldest sister of brothers marries the youngest brother of sisters. Two firstborns, however, tend to be more aggressive and can create higher levels of tension. The highest divorce rates are when an only child marries another only child.j

55.The number of men and women age 65 and older cohabiting outside of marriage nearly doubled between 1990 and 2000.g

56.Because Virginia law required an ex-slave to leave the state once freed, one freed woman petitioned the legislature in 1815 to become a slave again so she could stay married to her still-enslaved husband.e

57.For many centuries, the Catholic Church argued that contraception was a sin and made the wife no better “than a harlot.” Up until 1930, many Protestant churches agreed.e

58.One seventeenth-century Massachusetts husband was put in stocks alongside his adulterous wife and her lover because the community reasoned she wouldn’t have strayed if her husband had been fulfilling is marital obligations.e

59.Research points to certain characteristics that are most often linked to infidelity, such as being raised in a family where having affairs is considered normal, having a personality that values excitement and risk taking over marital stability, having coworkers and friends who believe affairs are acceptable, and feeling emotionally distant from one’s spouse.l

60.No sex in a marriage has a much more powerful negative impact on a marriage than good sex has a positive impact.d

61.Modern Western marriage traditions have long been shaped by Roman, Hebrew, and Germanic cultures as well as by doctrines and traditions of the Medieval Christian church, the Protestant Reformation, and the Industrial Revolution.a

62.Levirate marriage, where a man is obligated to marry his brother’s widow if she had no sons to care for her, is sometimes required in the Bible (as in Deuteronomy) and sometimes prohibited (as in Leviticus).e

63.The first recorded mention of same-sex marriage occurs in Ancient Rome and seems to have occurred without too much debate until Christianity became the official religion. In 1989, Denmark was the first post-Christianity nation to legally recognize same-sex marriage.a

-- Posted November 18, 2009


References

a Boswell, John. 1995. Same-Sex Unions in Pre-Modern Europe. New York, NY: Random House.

b Bride’s Book of Etiquette. 2002. New York, NY: Perigee Books.

c Connolly, Katie. “Why So Few D.C. Residents Are Married.” Newsweek.com. October 20, 2009. Accessed: October 28, 2009.

d Gottman, John M. and Julie Schwartz Gottman. 2006. 10 Lessons to Transform Your Marriage. New York, NY: Three Rivers Press.

e Graff, E.J. 1999. What Is Marriage For: The Strange Social History of Our Most Intimate Institution. Boston, MA: Beacon Press.

f “Groom.” Online Etymological Dictionary. Accessed: October 27, 2009.

g Harrar, Sari and Rita DeMaria. 2007. The 7 Stages of Marriage: Laughter, Intimacy, and Passion. Pleasantville, NY: Reader’s Digest Books.

h Hein, Holly. Sexual Detours: Infidelity and Intimacy at the Crossroads. 2000. New York, NY: St. Martin's Press.

i “Husband.” Online Etymological Dictionary. Accessed: October 27, 2009.

j Mannes, George. “Is the Economy Ruining Your Marriage?” CNN.com. August 21, 2009. Accessed: October 27, 2009.

k Moore, Matthew. “Divorce Damages Your Health—and Getting Remarried Barely Helps.” Telegraph.co.uk. July 27, 2009. Accessed: October 28, 2009.

l Neal, Rome. “Signs of Divorce Ahead?: New Study Tries to Predict Which Marriages Will Last.” CBSNEWS.com. August 7, 2002. Accessed: October 29, 2009.

m Squire, Susan. 2008. I Don’t: A Contrarian History of Marriage. New York, NY: Bloomsbury Press.

n “Where You Live May Affect When You Get Married.” CNN.com. October 20, 2009. Accessed: October 28, 2009.

o “Wife.” Online Etymological Dictionary. Accessed: October 27, 2009.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
marriage

The Fantasy of the 50% Divorce Rate

Opinion: Al and Tipper and the 'Good Divorce' Myth



AOL News (June 15) -- The separation of Al and Tipper Gore after 40 years as husband and wife produced a flood of commentary concerning what's purportedly impossible, and possible, in modern marriage.

According to rapidly calcifying conventional wisdom, the Gore breakup shows it's impossible to uphold the old ideal of "til death do us part," while their dignity and discretion demonstrate the real possibility of a "good divorce."

Actually, both conclusions contradict reality.

Statistics show that loving, lifetime marriage isn't just possible, it's prevalent. And common sense and sad experience expose the notion of the good divorce as a destructive myth, since the end of every marriage brings pain, problems and damage to society.

Concerning assumptions that marriages all go stale or sour over time, The New York Times recently reported a major study by neuroscientists at the University of California, Santa Barbara, who monitored brain function in long-term couples to check survivability of romantic love. To their surprise, a full 40 percent of these veteran partners showed intensely romantic neural reactions to each other, resembling the excitement of newly formed relationships. The other 60 percent displayed less spark and heat, but most of them still expressed satisfaction with their spouses, reflecting frequent surveys showing 75 percent of couples registering high contentment levels.

Why, then, do 50 percent of all marriages end in divorce?

The simple answer is, they don't. The 50 percent divorce rate is a pernicious myth that's never been true and grossly misstates the current situation. The divorce rate (measured as number of divorces per population) peaked in 1981 and has gone down dramatically ever since.

Rates of marital failure remain notoriously hard to gauge since no one knows which current marriages will last and which will fail. But the Census Bureau still provides the most authoritative information, listing in the latest available data (2004) the percentage of American adults who've ever married (72 percent) and the percentage ever divorced (22 percent). This means that 70 percent of those who ever married remain with their first spouse, or stayed in that first marriage until the spouse died.

While loving, lasting marriages are, in fact, common, "good divorces" are not. There's an elusive ideal of the amiable, painless dissolution of a dysfunctional relationship that every separating couple says they want but very few actually achieve.

Al and Tipper, for example, may display no public signs of strife, but their broken relationship is already connected to real-world damage: Shortly after they announced their separation, their daughter, Karenna Gore Schiff, announced her own breakup from her husband of 13 years. Failed marriages produce children themselves more likely to divorce, and though causation may be arguable, correlation is not.

My own family exemplifies that reality: My late parents split after 28 years of marriage, and three of their four sons (including me) have also experienced marital breakup.

In my case, I worked closely with my ex-wife to make our divorce as painless as possible. We had no children, and our assets were modest enough to avoid big fights over money. Still, our separation brought discomfort and sadness to everyone we knew, and we failed in our determination to maintain a long-term "friendship."

I've been married to my wife, Diane (the mother of our three children), for 25 years now, and I've had no contact at all with my ex (who's also remarried) for at least 15 years --- other than the wistful exchange of condolence notes at the death of our respective fathers.

Not every divorce must become a nightmare, but they all bring some sense of failure and they all cost money. Aside from legal bills, there's the added expense of setting up two separate households to replace one, plus unavoidable awkwardness at holidays, birthdays or other family occasions.

No one has written better about the "ruinous ripples" of divorce than my wife, Dr. Diane Medved, in her 1990 best seller, "The Case Against Divorce." Those closest to the couple feel the impact most -- particularly children and parents, who often see the abrupt end of relationships they once valued. The negativity spreads from there, affecting friends (perplexed by conflicted loyalties), communities (divorces can devastate a church, for instance) and society at large, with costs in lost savings, stability and even health.

The problem with platitudes about the good divorce is that they inevitably encourage marital breakup, just as the myth that most marriages are bound to fail discourages wedlock.

If we kept the situation in honest perspective, high-profile separations like Al and Tipper's shouldn't reassure potentially divorcing couples, or in any way alarm the American majority who strive to sustain their long-term marriages.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
divorce

Divorce: Bad for the Planet

So now you can say you are staying together for the children and the planet.



Divorce pains the planet

by Elsa Wenzel
December 3, 2007 10:30 PM PST


As if the burden of divorce weren't bad enough, people with failed marriages can be blamed for global warming, according to a study by Michigan State University.

Divorced couples use up more space in their respective homes, which amounts to to 38 million more rooms worldwide to light, heat and cool, noted the report.



And people who divorced used 73 billion kilowatt-hours more of electricity and 627 billion gallons of water than they would otherwise in 2005.

Dissolving a marriage also means doubling possessions, from the lowly can opener to the SUV. The report, however, did not estimate how many more natural resources the children of shared-custody parents consume by getting birthday and holiday gifts twice.

Nor did it count the greenhouse gases spent to shuttle kids between their pair of energy-hogging households. (Tip for carbon offsetting services: the domain name OffsetMyDivorce.com is available.).

The research suggests that singletons who shack up with someone again can undo the ecological damage. Although it might be inferred that "living in sin" is also eco-friendly, the findings did not necessarily endorse the practice of unmarried couples living together.

Rates of divorce are rising around the world, while dropping in North America along with those of marriage, according to the National Marriage Project at Rutgers University.

Divorce ends 46 percent of marriages in the United States, the seventh highest rate in the world, according to Divorce Magazine. The top world record is held by Sweden, where 55 percent of marriages end by divorce. On the other end is Guatemala, with a mere .13 percent divorce rate.

The study was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and funded partly by the National Institutes of Health.















global warming

Saudi Women: RIghts and Divorce

Saudi women speak publicly about divorce
At a divorce forum, the first of its kind, women debated reforms to ensure better legal protections for women and children.


By Caryle Murphy Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor
from the December 12, 2008 edition


Dammam, Saudi Arabia - Unlike many Saudi women her age, Maha did not have an arranged marriage. Instead, she wed a young man she'd known and liked since they played together as children.


"Really, it's a love story," added the attractive, 40-something woman with short curly hair, who asked to be identified only by her first name.


That's why the divorce, and the way she found out, was a shock.


Maya was at her parents' home for a short vacation when her husband's brother came to the door and delivered the court decree: She and her husband of 10 years were no longer married.


"They don't ask the woman if she wants to be divorced," Maha said of the courts. "It was a very bad day for me. I didn't expect that. I knew there were problems but, I thought, we can solve it, especially as we were living together and we understood each other."


Maya's experience, not unusual, is just one of the inequities surrounding divorce that Saudi women have endured for decades. But if a recent gathering in the country's Eastern Province is any indicator, their patience with such inequalities is growing thin.


About 150 Saudi women filed into the auditorium of the local Chamber of Commerce in the city of Dammam to attend the Saudi Divorce Initiative Forum – the first privately organized, public discussion of problems faced by women during and after divorce.


The aim, organizers said, was to spark debate that would lead to reforms to ensure enforcement of existing, but often ignored, legal protections for women and children.


"We're doing something historic here," said Thuraya Arrayed, a women's rights activist who spoke at the forum. "For the first time, we are meeting together to look for a solution for a problem. It's a worldwide problem, and we're trying to find a solution."


Expanded public space for women


Like the first public conference on domestic violence last spring, the divorce forum was another example of the expanded public space that Saudi women have been given to speak about societal problems under the rule of King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz, whose picture was prominently displayed at the gathering.


"He's supporting women.... He gives us the right to talk," said Hind al-Zahid, manager of the Business Women Center, an affiliate of the local chamber of commerce that helped organize the forum.


The conference was also another sign of the concern about Saudi Arabia's rising divorce rate. The Ministry of Social Affairs reported earlier this year that it stood at 30 percent, although some experts say it might be as high as 60 percent, according to press reports.


The Nov. 25 forum, held to coincide with International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, had an array of impressive backers: the Chambers of Commerce in Dammam and Jeddah, the Ministry of Social Affairs, a Saudi human rights group, and the Shura Council, the country's top advisory body. The women were encouraged that these organizations had openly supported their efforts.


Many of the attendees – married, divorced, and single – had taken off their coatlike abayas since only women were present. For several hours, they listened and applauded as a dozen-plus speakers, on a stage festooned with flowers, addressed the legal, psychological, financial, and family problems faced by divorced women.


Judges often won't consider a woman's divorce pleadings unless she is accompanied by a male relative. In addition, Miss Zahid said, ex-husbands often face no legal penalty if they stop child support, snatch children from their mother, or fail to obtain the necessary papers for a child to attend school, a problem particularly acute in low-income communities.

She called it "wrong" that judges do not require wives to be present when husbands seek divorce, adding, "Sometimes a woman gets divorced and no one tells her! Imagine!"

"This is not in our religion. Ours is a very peaceful religion … we are not against religion," Zahid added. But "we need a law to stop this violence against women. It's as simple as that."

Legal problems are compounded by society's attitudes towards divorced women, who are often viewed with disdain, and blamed, even by their own families, for their marriages' failure.

Luluah al-Shammari, an educator from Dammam, said the mere fact of holding an event whose title included the word "divorce" would advance public awareness. "It's the first step to bring ... the divorce issue up," she said.

Like other women at the forum, Mrs. Shammari said part of the reason for the rising divorce rate is that young men are raised to believe they should totally control their wives.

They are taught that "you are the man, you have the power, you have the authority," Shammari said. "In the end, the man wants to take over this girl and not give her space. He deals with me as if I'm an employee, as if he has the remote control: 'Stand up!' 'Sit down!' Women can't take it."

The forum was proposed by Dammam-based journalist Haifa al-Khalid, who started the kingdom's first website devoted to divorce last spring: www.saudidivorce.org. At the end of the meeting, Khalid read aloud the forum's 70-plus recommendations that organizers said will be presented to relevant official agencies.

The recommendations cited a need for marriage counseling services, and included demands that women's national identification cards be recognized in courts as a sufficient form of identification; that original copies of marriage contracts be given to both partners, not just the man; that DNA results be relied on if a husband denies paternity of a child; that official documents state "single," not "divorced," for women, as is the case with men, and that women be able to hire female lawyers to represent them.

Remove divorce's stigma

Another suggestion was for a national awareness campaign to remove the stigma of being a divorced woman. It is a stigma that Maha, training to be a human development officer, believes is sometimes self-inflicted. "So many women live in a box … [as if] it's written on their heads: 'This is a divorced woman.' They blame themselves because society blames them," she said.

After the shock of her divorce wore off, Maha determined that she would not "live in a box" and as a result, she became a different woman.

"I feel I became stronger than the Maha I knew before," she said. "I'm independent in my mind, in my decisions. I can put my mind before my feelings."






Islam