Cool. Try the “there’s no objective meaning, I create my own” strategy in court when they tell you that the meaning of the law is that you have to pay up after a divorce and tell me how that went for you.

And that’s why the third panel says “present day”?

Oh wait, it doesn’t.

It certainly is if you don’t talk about it. There may be various middle grounds here but you won’t find them if you just get divorced.

But that’s not what this is about?

Should marriage be rethought and adapted to new realities? Yes. Good that we’re on the same page there.

What? You and your two boyfriends can live together all you want, but marriage is a legal construct that shares responsibility and burden between people and because of the responsibility part it’s by design hard to get out of. Don’t like how hard it is to get divorced? Easy: Don’t get married.

I didn’t criticise that this comic promotes getting in and out of relationships. I criticised that it suggests that a divorce has virtually no ramifications and boils down to two respecting adults separating on best terms, which is pretty fucking far from both, my personal experience and what’s written in the law.

Nice nihilism you got there. If “nothing matters and we’ll all die eventually” is your counterpoint to “marriage is a legal construct that goes beyond well meant promises and might result in severe financial issues so don’t lightheartedly get married or divorced”, then fine, yeah, in the grand scheme of things I guess you’re right.

Those that want to keep the small existence they built and don’t want to lose their house in the current economy might disagree though. The universe doesn’t care about their demise, true, but they themselves might just do.

y tho?

You’re making statements predicated on your beliefs that may not be shared by everyone.

This is not about my belief. You know a marriage is more than just a pinky promise? If you don’t want to take a relationship seriously, that’s fine, but marriage as a legal construct entails a lot of regulations that may screw up either partner and, with enough legal battles, both of them, so yeah, you kind of have to take it seriously and it doesn’t make much sense to just enter and exit it on a whim, unless you want to be paying for other people’s houses or cars.

I know and that’s also not what I said.

unsolvable problems

That’s the key word right here. Two panels of “you know, I’m feeling boyish” “and I kinda want to have kids” isn’t “trying to solve it and realizing it’s not possible”, that’s just “starting to share feelings and needs”. The way this story is told just suggests that this slight notion of plans no longer being aligned perfectly warrants a divorce, which is far from what that legal construct of “we’re a financial union now which means we can royally fuck up each other’s lives if we feel like it” should entail. This isn’t a story of unsolvable problems, this is the story of two people that don’t take the legal responsibility they got into seriously. It suggests a lighthearted approach to getting divorced that is so far from the possible legal fallout of it that I just think it’s absurd.

If this was a comic that told years of them trying to meet each other’s needs and not being able to, I’d be on the same page. But that’s not the story that was told here. There wasn’t a single panel where either person even just tried to suggest how things might still work for them or find some common ground. No panel about acknowledging the other person’s desires and trying to merge them with one’s own needs. The comic was “I feel this”, “I feel that”, “great, let’s just happily divorce”, which is absurd as soon as we’re talking about anything that’s beyond teenage finances.

I’m not sure that I fully agree. I mean, to each their own etc., but what you’re describing seems to be more suited for relationships without marriage. The whole idea of being married is that your discuss this stuff before your wedding and then don’t just get separated because you “don’t feel it anymore”. The idea is that, if you feel like you drifted apart, that your work on that and don’t just get out of that relationship on a whim. That’s the promise you give. And even if you agree with your partner to just go separate ways (yeah yeah, consenting adults can do whatever the fuck they want, sure), a divorce has the significant chance to screw you financially for decades. I mean, I don’t know how it is in the US, but I’ve seen too many people who got their finances completely fucked by partners that they consentingly parted ways with, who they swore would treat them fairly. Too many houses repossessed, too many careers ruined.

Is it okay to get separated? Sure. It’s obviously also okay to remain close and support each other, of course. But this comic promotes a lighthearted approach to something that deserves a much more careful and serious take that I don’t agree with. Those first few panels should have made them get counselling, not divorced.