Vice: JD Vance Suggests People in ‘Violent’ Marriages Shouldn’t Get Divorced
July 26, 2022
Columbus, OH – According to a new bombshell report from Vice, J.D. Vance said that people in violent marriages should not get divorced for the sake of the children. Vance also claimed that divorce makes it easier for people to “shift spouses like they change their underwear.”
“J.D. Vance does not trust women to make decisions about their own bodies and believes women should put themselves in danger and stay in violent marriages. Vance’s comments are beyond the pale, and he is too dangerous to be in the U.S. Senate,” said Michael Beyer, a spokesperson for the Ohio Democratic Party.
Vice: JD Vance Suggests People in ‘Violent’ Marriages Shouldn’t Get Divorced
Cameron Joseph
July 25, 2022
- JD Vance said people need to be more willing to stay in unhappy marriages for the sake of their kids—and seemed to suggest that in some cases, “even violent” marriages should continue.
- The Ohio Republican Senate nominee, talking to Pacifica Christian High School in Southern California last September, gave an extended answer that claimed that people now “shift spouses like they change their underwear,” and that it had done long-term damage to a generation of children.
- “This is one of the great tricks that I think the sexual revolution pulled on the American populace, which is the idea that like, ‘well, OK, these marriages were fundamentally, you know, they were maybe even violent, but certainly they were unhappy. And so getting rid of them and making it easier for people to shift spouses like they change their underwear, that’s going to make people happier in the long term,’” Vance said.
- “And maybe it worked out for the moms and dads, though I’m skeptical. But it really didn’t work out for the kids of those marriages,” Vance continued. “And that’s what I think all of us should be honest about, is we’ve run this experiment in real time. And what we have is a lot of very, very real family dysfunction that’s making our kids unhappy.”
- “Culturally, something has clearly shifted. I think it’s easy but also probably true to blame the sexual revolution of the 1960s. My grandparents had an incredibly chaotic marriage in a lot of ways, but they never got divorced, right? They were together to the end, ’til death do us part. That was a really important thing to my grandmother and my grandfather. That was clearly not true by the 70s or 80s,” he said.
- “And I think that probably, I was personally and a lot of kids in my community, who grew up in my generation, personally suffered from the fact that a lot of moms and dads saw marriage as a basic contract, right? Like any other business deal, once it becomes no longer good for one of the parties or both of the parties, you just dissolve it and go onto a new business relationship. But that recognition that marriage was sacred I think was a really powerful thing that held a lot of families together. And when it disappeared, unfortunately I think a lot of kids suffered,” Vance said.
- VICE News asked Vance’s campaign why he thought “it would be better for children if their parents stayed in violent marriages than if they divorced,” as well as whether he wanted local or federal law changed to make it harder for couples to divorce.
- Vance sent the following statement in response, via a campaign staffer:
- “I reject the premise of your bogus question. As anyone who studies these issues knows: domestic violence has skyrocketed in recent years, and is much higher among non-married couples. That’s the ‘trick’ I reference: that domestic violence would somehow go down if progressives got what they want, when in fact modern society’s war on families has made our domestic violence situation much worse. Any fair person would recognize I was criticizing the progressive frame on this issue, not embracing it.
- But I can see that you are not a fair person, so rather than answer your loaded and baseless question, let me offer the following: I’m an actual victim of domestic violence. In my life, I have seen siblings, wives, daughters, and myself abused by men. It’s disgusting for you to argue that I was defending those men.”
- Vance’s campaign declined to make him available for an interview to clarify his comments. When asked follow-up question of whether “he thinks people in violent marriages should generally stay together or get divorced,” a Vance spokesperson said they felt Vance’s statement already answered this question.
- This isn’t the only time Vance has tied divorce rates to societal instability.
- When he was asked about gay marriage at a March candidate forum hosted by Toledo Right to Life, Vance said that he doesn’t like the “cafeteria Christianity” of people selecting their own beliefs and said he believed that “marriage is a lifelong union between a man and a woman,” before pivoting into a criticism of how divorce has become more societally acceptable.
- “The entire idea that you can discard your husband or your wife like a piece of clothing is one of the most dangerous assaults that we’ve ever seen on the family in this country,” he said. “If we want children to grow up with healthy, happy lives, we should be reminding them that the most important thing that we can do for our kids is make sure they grow up with a mom and dad at home. The assault on the institution of marriage has been a profound evil. It hasn’t just affected our adults, it’s affected our children in big ways.”
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