We get only one life and of course we want
it to be good. The main thing we want is
not to be alone. So, the best solution is
in the traditional "We gather together to
join this man and this women together with
the bonds of Holy matrimony."

This is a somewhat bombastic version of
what it sounds like:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P6rX3wlDsVI

This is a lot of what it both looks like
and sounds like:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QBBL-t7CKbU

Then they are no longer two people but one
couple. They are co-founders, full
partners, of the one life they share.
These statements are necessarily true even
if a lot of people deny them and ruin the
joining, bonding, founding, and
partnership; these statements are true
because we only get one life and have room
for only one really good marriage. Then,
"A house divided against itself cannot
stand".

The central objective of the marriage is
family formation, being a strong limb on
the tree. Why? So we won't be alone.
So, we will have family as the bedrock
of the rest of our lives, e.g., for
connections with others with and via our
children, grandchildren, etc.

It's a lot of work to do well with family
formation, and the main reason for work is
just to support the family.

With the marriage, the couple gets
activities, accomplishments, memories, and
traditions they like a lot, don't want to
lose, can't get anywhere else, and that
bond them together. Traditions are really
important because they bring good promise
of some good times in the future, e.g., US
Thanksgiving, Christmas, big times at
birthdays, etc. E.g., a good start on a
Christmas tradition is

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LnoIZ_RzV9M

With a divorce, all those activities, ...,
are lost along with much of the life.
Doing well at family formation is so
difficult and the necessary stages of life
are so short that there's nearly no
opportunity to do well at family formation
a second time. So that one marriage is
essentially the only chance you get; get a
divorce and have failed at that one chance
and have destroyed so much that will
likely never catch up.

Yes, pop culture is awash in denigration,
minimization, etc. of marriage and family
formation. Dumb.

An enemy of the US, or any country, could
hardly do better in destroying the US than
to sabotage the US family. I rank The
Problem that Has No Name as at

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2920960/

as the single most effective Communist
attack on the US ever, done more damage
than a nuclear bomb. Right, it was
written by middle class Long Island wife,
mother, and accused Communist Betty
Friedan in her The Feminine Mystique.
Sabotage.

And it's worked, in the US and all the
more advanced countries: Too few couples
see the importance of building strong
families, and the birth rate is so low
those people are rapidly going extinct,
literally.

Or Betty didn't see, or wanted others not
to see, that there was anything important
to do for a wife and mother at home with
young children. Well, some of what there
is to do is

emotional, verbal, physical, rational,
psychological, athletic, social, literary,
artistic, mathematical, scientific,
technical, political, romantic development

(where doing well should keep her very
busy and productive) and continuing with
strong family formation.

Young parents are also missing something
crucial -- the ancestors back 1-3
generations close at hand helping out with
what they have learned being successful at
family formation.

E.g., A few days ago there was an
earthquake wave that went around the
world. The source was identified as the
poor island country Mayotte in the Indian
Ocean just east of Africa and near
Madagascar.

So, as at

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mayotte#2007_census

look at the growth in the population from
1958 to 2017:

23,364
32,607
47,246
67,205
94,410
131,320
160,265
186,452
212,645
256,518

So, poor island Mayotte is doing really
well at family formation while the US and
the most advanced countries are having so
few children they are going extinct.
That's an inconvenient truth.

Darwin is very actively on the case and
definitely will bring a solution.