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California Girl Sold Into Marriage

Cash, beer, meat part of deal

Posted to Relevant News by Maureen Dempsey on Fri, 01/16/2009 - 12:16pm

AOL News reports that a 36-year-old father has been taken into custody after plans to trade his 14-year-old daughter for marriage went awry. Greenfield, California, resident Marcelino de Jesus Martinez reported his daughter as a runaway; all the while she was residing with the man to whom Martinez sold his daughter for $16,000, 100 cases of beer, and several cases of meat.

Now, before we get all judgmental, we need to know the facts: Martinez and the soon-to-be-groom, 18-year-old Margarito de Jesus Galindo, are members of the indigenous Mexican Trique community.

The members of the once-tribe have remained close, even retaining their Trique language. (Many are employed by California's produce harvesting industry.) Arranged marriages of this sort are common within the community, with girls as young as 12. (Although money is rarely exchanged and looked down upon with the Trique community, says AOL.)

Obama and the Politics of Blended Families

Posted to Relevant News by Jill Brooke on Tue, 01/13/2009 - 7:32am

When Barack Obama is inaugurated next Tuesday, he will be both the first African-American and interracial president in our nation’s history. However, he is a product of another “blend” as well: A blended family. Obama is a child of divorce, and grew up with a step-parent and half-siblings. This experience, as it has for millions of other children of divorce, has colored the way he sees the world; now that Obama will be President, the perception of “non-traditional” families in our country is sure to undergo a change.

This change alone is worth celebrating.

Although divorce has become more and more commonplace over the years, there has only been one divorced president in our country’s history, Ronald Reagan (interestingly, there has been only one president to never marry: James Buchanan). Whether we realize it consciously or not, the marital status of our past presidents seems to be suggesting something about divorce and the nation’s most powerful position: They don’t go hand-in-hand. In other words, those whose family does not resemble a Norman Rockwell painting need not apply.

Winehouse's Husband Files for Divorce

Posted to Relevant News by Maureen Dempsey on Mon, 01/12/2009 - 12:49pm

Amy Winehouse and her husband are kaput. (We know, it's not that much of a surprise.) But it's Winehouse's husband that's doing the filing. Looks like Blake Civil-Fielder has the evidence that he's been waiting for to file from his estranged wife. Photographers snapped several pictures of the singer in St. Lucia getting cozy with another man.

According to the Daily Mail, Civil-Fielder is claiming adultery (from his jail cell) and rumors are swirling that he'll go for at least half of Grammy-winner Winehouse's $20 million bank account.

Winehouse and "inconspicuous" are kind of mutually exclusive, so it was really only a matter of time before her ex got a hold of some adultery-worthy photos. And Winehouse has been open about her marriage — and the fact that's it's over.

Could a Love Potion Save Your Marriage?

Scientists say it's possible...

Posted to Relevant News by Maureen Dempsey on Fri, 01/09/2009 - 2:36pm

A researcher at Emory University says it might. According to thehindi.com, scientists at the Atlanta college have identified the two love potions, er, hormones — oxytocin and vasopressin — that control amorous impulses and long-term love and are advising prescribing the hormones to cure troubled marriages.

The research, lead by Larry Young, suggests that marriage counselors who wish to play mad scientist could resurrect a couple's lost affection by administering synthetic versions of the hormones.

Says the thehindi.com:

"Young says scientists are close to reducing the mental state of love to a biochemical chain of events, paving the way for powerful new treatments for the lovelorn. Trials are already under way to see if offering hormones to warring couples improves on conventional marital therapy, he writes."

Divorcing Man Wants Kidney Back, Ex-Wife Resorts to "Spy Bear"

Pain of divorce often leads to rash actions

Posted to Relevant News by Jill Brooke on Thu, 01/08/2009 - 11:57am

Because pain makes you self-centered, we have divorce stories where a man wants his kidney back from his soon-to-be ex-wife and an ex-wife spikes her daughter’s teddy bear with a listening device to spy on her ex-husband.

Yes, folks, this is the reality of what happens in divorce — but not often to this extreme. While the media is delighting in these tantalizing morally depraved morsels of family splits and fits, and many divorced parents can privately say, “Well, I wasn’t that bad,” — these stories do serve the purpose of being a cautionary tale.

Patricia Arquette and Thomas Jane to Divorce

Posted to Relevant News by Jill Brooke on Wed, 01/07/2009 - 2:41pm

Patricia Arquette has filed for divorce from her husband, actor Thomas Jane. The two married in June of 2006 and have a daughter, Harlow Olivia, who was born in 2003. Turns out that their courtship lasted longer than their marriage. Though one doesn't want to believe that for Arquette marriage was "Flirting with Disaster," the name of one of her movies. More likely, they drifted apart as her career soared with the success of NBC's "Medium."

Arquette was married to Nicolas Cage in 1995, but they separated after only nine months. They didn’t divorce until 2000. She also has a son, Enzo, from her previous relationship with musician Paul Rossi.

Arquette filed for divorce from Jane on the grounds of "irreconciliable differences." Surely, her sister-in-law Courteney Cox must be saddened by the news. She recently declared that she would never divorce David Arquette, Patricia's brother, and do everything in her power to keep the marriage intact.

Divorces Set to Spike in January: Experts

Posted to Relevant News by Jill Brooke on Mon, 01/05/2009 - 10:16am

It has long been known that January is the month that most people divorce. With that in mind, lawyers in London actually picked a specific date for D-Day — as in, divorce day: The first Monday after children return to school. In England, that will be January 12th.

In the U.S., according to some experts, divorce filings will see a dramatic spike this week — the first full week of January.

Why wait until January vs earlier?

Logic is that no one wants to ruin a child's Christmas and if you divorce over the holidays, the holidays will then be always associated with a traumatic event.

Although some in the U.S. believe that the crumbling economy and falling housing prices will delay divorces, a lawyer in England thinks otherwise.

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