Transcription
We men like to think of ourselves as being really good risk takers. We're really good at mitigating risk or identifying potential for loss in most cases. For example, if you're going to invest in the stock market, you get an idea for what your potential for loss is because you only have so much capital. It's not like they can come and take your house, you know, unless you bet your whole house on something.
If you're uh walking in an icy uh forest and the snow looks like snow, but it's not. It's ice. It's solid ice. I'm walking on top of the snow, not even sinking in anymore. Um well, the worst thing that can happen to me is I fall and split my head open, or probably more likely my ass. Shelby did pull a muscle the other day, which is sort of interesting, but limited risk. Kind of know what I'm up against here. jumping out of airplanes. I guess you could technically die.
But for some reason, we fail to recognize the potential risks associated in relationships, especially when it comes to marriage. For some reason, that risk-taking meter, that that ability to judge and determine exactly what we're up against, kind of shuts down. Maybe it's because all the blood's rushing to the wrong brain. >> [laughter] >> But yeah, we we can't figure that [ __ ] out. So today we're going to have a little conversation about the financial risks and maybe the overall risks associated with getting married in 2026. This is life 2.0. Let's talk about it.
At the end of every single video, I say stay healthy and if you can stay single. Yet, I still talk about having relationships with women. And for some reason, many of you guys can't seem to negotiate this [laughter] these two issues. Like, how can you possibly say stay single if you're talking about having relationships with women? like, well, I didn't say I was going to get married to anybody. I'm not recommending anybody get married. I mean, come on, you guys. Use your brains. It's shocking to me that you guys can't wrap your mind around the idea that uh you can date somebody and not marry them. And I think that's part of the problem is that we're all sort of socialized to believe that if we're in a relationship that it has a goal. Like there's an intention associated with it. And I think that the relationship itself can absolutely be the goal. Like you don't need to move anywhere. You don't need to go anywhere. It can just be. Do you know what I mean? You don't dance to get to the end of the song. You dance to dance. Same thing goes with relationships. You don't need to get to some pentimate climax at the end. It's not like you're going to get an award. [laughter] Quite the contrary.
So, I think that too many guys immediately associate that if they're going to get into a relationship with a woman that it's a goal. It's like we're playing football. We got to score. We got to get to the end. We got to get in the end zone here. We got to put a ring on it. No. Stop. It's not like that. That's not what we're talking about here at all. No. And we are talking about just enjoying the company of a woman. Maybe taking her out to dinner, having someone to hang out with, someone to fool around with. Everybody loves a little intimacy, even women. But that doesn't mean you need to put a ring on it. It just means that you enjoy her company.
So, let's talk about what it [snorts] means to you financially. I'm going to start off with a story because I like telling stories and you guys like listening to them. So, my friend Mike, he uh was um he married his his girlfriend Jill and she and he had been together for a few years before they got married and then they were married for 12 years. So, they were together all together for about 15 years. Mike was really good at investing money and saving. Bought a house and had lots of cash and made had a good salary. He had a really good life overall. until one day just sort of out of the blue, Jill says that she's not happy. [laughter] And I don't mean to laugh, but this is so oftenimes the story. This is what I heard. I'm not happy. Like, h what am I supposed to do with that? Like, where's my happy pill? What do I got to do to make you happy, honey? But anyway, so Jill's not happy. Jill's leaving and she's taken like half of everything, you know? I mean, she had literally just rad him over the coals. And he said to me one day after this was over, I think it actually was costing him cuz he made a lot of money between child support and alimony. Over $8,000 a month. Wrap your brain around that one. That's a h 100k a year. He said, you know, John and also she got half of his stuff. half his investments, half of the house, half of I think she gets like half his pension, too, if I'm not mistaken, but I could be wrong there. But anyway, so John, you know, if I had taken all my money and put it in a pile and burned half of it every year, I would have come out ahead. [laughter] That's the truth of what many men are dealing with. Depending on the state that you live in or the country you live in, that's what we're up against. That's the potential loss is half of all your stuff.
Now, the story behind the story with Mike and Jill is Jill hardly worked at all. She was like a part-timer, you know, she had a hobby, like a jobby hobby, and she did not actually earn a lot of money. She didn't contribute anything to the value of the house. She didn't contribute anything to his his investments. She didn't contribute to his pension. Didn't put a dime into any of that [ __ ] Not a dime. and she walks away with half of all of his stuff. Okay, so let's just wrap our brains around that. The current legal system that we have does not promote marriage. It's not an equal playing field. It's not an area where men should be participating. This is a game that excludes men. This is a system and a game that was, I think, created to protect women against us predatory terrible men back in the 1800s or something, you know. But uh we still use it today, you know, and um of course that's not the case anymore, is it? Women are completely capable of earning a living all on their own. In fact, they we could even call them fully grown adults. I think that we're at the place where we could actually identify women as adult human beings and they are capable of earning a living and they don't need to be supported by a man. And that it is no longer a man's job, if you will, to provide and protect a woman. I'm just said it. It's not our job anymore. You know, societyy's taken that over. Uh the government does it. Oh, they don't need us at all. You know, the government will provide and protect for a woman. You don't need us. Um they got all kinds of programs for him.
So with that in mind, the question is why would a man enter into a situation where he would be committing his assets and his reputation to the ups and downs, the emotional turmoil that exists inside a woman's head? Why would he just gamble that away? What's the upside? What's the return on that investment? You know, now what we think we're going to get is we're going to get a friend, someone that we can hang out with, which you could have if you just dated her. Someone we can have sex with, which you can still do that when you're dating. Um, someone that we can live with. You can do that. At least in the US, in a lot of places, you don't have to get, you know, into any special um arrangements. I mean, I know they do have Commonwealth laws or common law marriages in some places, but here in Virginia, we don't. So, I I don't need to worry about that. But, you should check your own laws. Um, I know that in God bless you guys in Australia. I think if you even have a woman deliver your pizza, you could be married to her. So, you got to be really careful about opening your door. It's like a vampire. Like, if you invite them in, [laughter] they can take everything. So, you got to be really careful in some countries. I realize that. But, um, here in America, generally speaking, unless you live with some woman for a period of time, and usually it's like five or seven years or something like that, you're probably not going to have any problems. But but we also have other possibilities like we have cohabitation laws and stuff like that that we can we can write a contract to prevent a lot of the downsides. But in any event, there is no upside for a man in 2026 to enter into matrimony given the current legal landscape. There's nothing that you're going to get from it that you can't get from just having a healthy romantic relationship outside of marriage. And quite frankly, I don't even know if cohabitation is a good idea on any circumstance. I mean, when you get down to what's it like to wake up with the same person every single day and to smell their breath and deal with their farts and deal with their bathroom habits and whatever, you know, and you like privacy. I like privacy. I don't want to have somebody in my [ __ ] all the time, you know? I don't want to have someone there looking over my shoulder. Ah, Du, come on back here, pal. Come on back this way. Du's searching for the thin ice. He's He's finding it.
So most of you guys know the cold hard facts for first marriages about half fail. Second marriage is like 60 plus percent, third marriage is 70%. And if you're still getting married after number three, I think you need to be committed. I think you're you you've got a an obsessive compulsive disorder that needs immediate help. Maybe some medication. But um women are the ones who will initiate between 70 and 80% of the divorces. And of course now we live in a world where we have the no fault divorce which of course who wouldn't want that right? So that any reason for any reason at any time if she's not happy which like my friend Mike and my own wife she's not happy she can choose option two and option two is a really attractive option because she gets half of all your stuff whether she contributed to it or not and usually it takes about 10 years to get there. So you generally don't get the the lotto option until you get to about 10 years into marriage. Once you get to 10 years into marriage, then she has earned the option to choose the the lever that gives her half your stuff, half your income, and um alimony oftentimes for the rest of her life. And what's interesting sometimes about this alimony is it's not dependent on how she um her current status. So, she has someone living with her, a guy living with her, yeah, you still got to pay. So, you could be paying for their trip to Paris. You can't be paying for somebody else to knock the bottom out of your old wife. Yeah, think about that. That's not good. That's not a good thing, right?
Um, when it comes to child support, oh, this is a calculation they do based on the amount of money you make at the time of your divorce. So, it's not anything to do with how much it actually cost to raise a child. No, that is not a factor in this. Like, you think about it. If you paid a thousand bucks a month to raise a child, that would be a lot, you know, for especially like a kid, you know, was, you know, out of, you know, going to school. Um, but they're going to say, "All right, well, you made $200,000." So, that's um let's just say about $18,000 a month or so in that ballpark. Um, we're going to do 20% of that for your kid. All right, that's $3,600. Now, they're not taking out taxes before they figure this math out. That $3,600 is going to her, you know, and she doesn't have to account for it. Like, she doesn't have to say, "Oh, and I spent this on bread and that on milk and I put in I bought him some clothes." Nope. Nope. Nope. Nope. Nope. This is just a like a cash cow for her. You know, it's just an extra $3,600 a month on top of say the $600 to $8,000 a month you're paying her now. So now you're paying her like 11 or 12,000 a month out of that $18,000 a month that you were bringing home or you were making. Now [laughter] none of this is taxdeductible. So you're going to be left with like about three or $4,000. I swear to God, you're going to be left like three or $4,000 a month for yourself. You might, if you're lucky, you might have 5,000. So now what are you going to be doing? You're going to be renting a room in someone's basement, [laughter] pirating someone's Netflix just so you don't kill yourself. I swear. I swear this is this is the way it actually happens and this is legal. Like this isn't even a crime. This is the way they actually have built the system so that you become this povertyridden guy. Like you and there's not even a program for you. Like there's no one out there trying to help you out financially. Like you are just completely [ __ ] And she is living high on the hog and she's not accountable to anybody for how she spends any of this money. I mean, so she's got like [snorts] really 2/3 to 3/4 of your money [laughter] every month. And she's living the best life ever. Like she can have guys coming and going at all day all the time. She can have a living. And hell, even with the child support, even if she has a guy who who she marries, let's say she let's say she's dumb enough to remarry. You might get out of the alimony there, but the child support, nah, man. That's still that's still getting paid. Yeah, that is still getting paid.
Anyway, I'm just pointing out that most guys don't recognize just how huge the financial risk is when you sign on that bottom line. You say, "I do." Yeah. You don't know what you're going to be doing because you could be doing a lot of paying. Okay? Because at any time after year 10, she's feeling a little un dissatisfied with the way you're behaving. Like the, you know, the hype isn't coming true. like she's not living the the big life that she wants or she's looking on Instagram and someone's doing a lot better than her and a lot better than you. Guess what? She's got a second option. She's got a golden parachute and she can jump from that plane anytime she wants, leaving you in a burning wreckage [laughter] plummeting toward Earth [snorts] with no parachute. Yeah, that is the harsh reality that we live in today.
Now, some of these laws are starting to change, so I'm not going to go, you know, into all the details, but before any man in 2026 says I do, you better go talk to a lawyer. And I am I am not kidding. It cost you maybe 400 bucks to sit with a lawyer for an hour, hour and a half, and just find out what you're getting into and what your options are and how you might be able to protect yourself. Now, I can guarantee that that lawyer is going to recommend that you get a prenup, and that certainly is a reasonable course of action given, you know, the circumstances and what you're up against here. But what that lawyer may not tell you is that a judge in a courtroom can nullify your prenup almost on a whim. I mean, they can come up with a whole slew of possible reasons why your prenup would be invalid, and then you are just ready to get raked over the coals. So even though you might have a prenup, it is not necessarily a guarantee that you are going to avoid all of the potential shortfalls. Like if there's any potential for duress in the signing of that prenup, if she claims that she was being forced into it, um then that could nullify it. If um circumstances change, that's always a good one. Circumstances change all the time, but circumstances change. Um there is a a justification that the judge can use to nullify your prenup. So have that in mind. A prenup is not going to necessarily save you. It's not going to be your your parachute. No, a prenup, especially if it's written in such a manner that um puts her at a financial disadvantage. Yeah. You you may just find that you have very very little options. You may just be um opening up your bank account. Debb, come back, pal. Doo, come. Debb, come. God dang it. Come on. That's a good boy. Come on. What you doing over there, man? Where you going? What's happening? That's a good dog.
So, those are just the financial risks you're up against. Now, the emotional risks are every bit as devastating and just as high. So, it is um very likely that when you show up there in family court, you're going to get an interesting lesson in civics. Yes, we're going to go back to civics class here. You're going to think, "Oh, I I understand the courts. This is all about lady liberty or lady justice and she's going to balance the scales and she's going to make sure that everything is right and fair for everybody." And uh yeah, I'm afraid that in a lot of cases that is not necessarily so. So, the financial loss is a gut punch. No question about it. And um but you think, okay, I'll just get another job. I'll make more money. I'll find a way through this. You know, you can maybe justify that. But in about 3/4 of the cases, women end up being the primary custodian of the children. Now, there are some states these days where they courts are pushing for 50-50 custody. That's their primary objective. Unless one of you is a criminal, it's very likely that there will be a 50-50 agreement. But in a lot of states, they still go by this whole tender years sort of doctrine which has been invalidated like decades ago. But for some reason, a lot of these old judges, they haven't heard the story that that doesn't apply anymore. And in fact, psychologists have shown that parents by parenting men and women generally about the same. Like women aren't that much better at parenting than than men are. So, the fact that this tender years doctrine is still a thing is just a an example of the kind of um family court prejudice that you're going to run into against men. Men are considered uh like like family court was designed for women and children, but it was not designed with men in mind. And I and I say that completely seriously. I'm not being sarcastic here. family court. When they say family, they're thinking women and children. They're not thinking about fathers. They're not thinking about men. Generally speaking, now I know that is starting to change. And thank God it is because that way of thinking has destroyed more men than any war we've ever fought, than any disease we've ever fought against, any epidemic, pandemic, whatever. Family court does more damage to men than any single force on earth. I stand by that. It is without question the most devastating experience that a man can have.
Only about 25% of men get full custody of their children where they are the custodial parent. Um I was very very very lucky that my the girl that I um was with that was the mother of my son was a complete nimrod. She was a complete [ __ ] She was young and stupid and she made a lot of bad mistakes and I was able to capitalize on those mistakes and prove it to the court that she was not a fit parent and so I got full custody of my son. But that was a um a unique set of circumstances and I put up a video recently or you'll see it soon if I haven't um on that topic and you can kind of get a sense for just how difficult that process was. But it cost me a fortune to do it. It cost me enormous emotional loss. I mean, it's just a even when you win, it's it sucks. Do you know what I mean? For the nine months that I went where I did not have physical access to my son fighting in court, that is a 9-month hell. Like that is nine months of pure absolute hell where every morning you are waking up with this heavy dark cloud over your head and you can't think straight. I mean, your entire life is completely turned upside down as you're fighting through that and there's this constant not knowing what's going to happen next. You know, it is one of the, if not the most stressful experience you can go through. So, try to avoid getting into family court. And the only way you can truly stay out of family court is to not get married. The minute you get married in a state where the laws favor that tender years doctrine, you are setting yourself up for the possibility that not only will she take all your money, but you will take your children, too. And that is a priceless like it's a it's an infinite loss. It's a loss that is very difficult to quantify. And if your wife is a [ __ ] if she's one of those women that's vindictive and she holds a grudge and she's going to make you pay because she's going to make you pay, then she will poison those children against you. And I swear to God, you will have a real tough time getting through that. That is a very difficult thing to overcome.
Now, I can kind of understand how a lot of guys get confused on this topic about marriage because if you just observe our culture from the outside, it seems like we have this equal rights thing going on. You know, it feels like women are equal to men. And so the unschooled man might believe that the court systems had adapted this idea to the laws that they would now be um responsible in the same way that a man would be responsible. Obviously I mean in the course of a marriage when you're actually married to someone these days most people are splitting duties. You're splitting chores. You're splitting finances. You're splitting child care. I mean you're doing it all. It's not like guys are just coming home like father knows best and you know in his suit and he's sitting there and she's got the slippers and the cigarette and you're sitting there watching the news and she's running around doing all that stuff raising the kids and [ __ ] No, that's not the way life is anymore. [laughter] Trust me, that is not the case. That is not the case. Men are just as involved in everything else. Now, for a stay-at-home mom, she probably does do a little bit more than he does, but still, he is actively involved in raising those children and doing chores around that house. I guarantee it. So, it's not like there is this um sacrifice that women are making to have a family.
The irony of ironies for me is that the vast majority of men when it comes to children, now I know there's a lot of guys who really want kids, for the vast majority of men, it's a take it or leave it. You It's like, yeah, if it happens, it happens. If it doesn't, it doesn't. I'll be happy either way. You know, we're very easily pleased. Like, if you have a kid, great. If not, I'll get a dog. You know what I mean? I don't mean to belittle the idea of having children. I think children are great. I have some and I love them. I love them a lot. But if I didn't have them, but I really miss them. I got three great dogs, you know, and they all just got their haircut today, so they're all very happy. But uh women on the other hand, oh man, that children thing, that's a big deal. That's a big deal. There's some kind of a like a force inside them that's compelling them to have children. That's a big part of the reason they get married to begin with. I think if it wasn't for that, I don't they didn't marry us at all. You know, with all this uh in vitro stuff happening, eventually we won't be necessary at all. In fact, I think a lot of them have come to that conclusion. They're just going to opt out of the whole marriage thing because they don't want to live with our stinky asses. So, they can just have the babies on their own. They don't need us. But most women in most cases want to have children. and they want to have children with a man and this is the dream that they have been living all their lives and they have this preconceived idea of what this is going to be and they're driven to it. They're driven to it. And the irony here is that when they get their families, they get their children, they get everything they want, um they'll even quit their job so they can be a stay-at-home mom and live that whole life. And then when they get to that step when the kids are starting to grow up and they desire for them to do something new or different, it starts to pop into their heads and they look around them and they think, "Oh, I'm not as happy as I should be. I feel like I'm missing something. Like I missed out on something cuz I was a mom all this time. I sacrificed I sacrificed myself." Yes. That's what I sacrificed myself for you. It's like [ __ ] a no you didn't. You sacrificed yourself for yourself. You wanted this whole thing. I was good with kids or not have kids. I could have gotten a dog. I would have been just as happy. But no, they had to have them. And they sacrificed it for you. And now the courts are going to make you pay because she despite being your equal, despite all that stuff, despite being a fully grown adult, she had to sacrifice her career in order to have children. God bless her, man. These women, they are just ah they're just martyrs, you know, and we just don't appreciate them enough. I don't know how it is they put up with us, quite honestly. But I digress.
The sense of fairness about two adults living together and making joint decisions about having a family is not seen in the court's eyes as a joint venture. No, it's seen as um a venture that you as a man have, I don't know, impressed upon her, pushed her into this service. You've enslaved her in some way to have these children and to raise them. You forced her to give up her job and her career so that this could happen. And then you uh made her life miserable and she's poor thing. She's so unhappy. How on earth could she continue living under these circumstances? And now you are going to have to pay her for the rest of her life so she can recover from this traumatic experience of being a mom. I'm serious.
Anyway, guys, it's really, really cold out here. I was gonna go into a whole thing on asset protection, but it's just too cold and I need to fly this drone around a bit. Let me just say this. There are some asset protection strategies that you can use prior to committing that um you can perhaps hide some of your assets. Um, I would talk to a uh um a uh CPA, you know, or a uh a tax attorney about that so you can get a sense for what kind of strategies that you could use that aren't too crazy expensive. I mean, if you're a million billionaire, you can do offshore accounts and [ __ ] like that. But if you're just the average Joe like you and me and you're just trying to um keep uh you your house on, you know, in your name, there there are ways you can do that. You don't have to, you know, give up everything.
Anyway, if you're considering getting married in 2026 or you know someone who is considering getting married in 2026, [sighs] share this video with them. Um, if you yourself are going to consider it, I suggest you watch this video every single day until you get that idea out of your head and you decide to do something different. Because I am telling you, this is not a good time or place to do it. Hopefully sometime in our lifetime, all these stupid laws will be changed and women will finally get their equal rights and they can be treated just like men. [laughter] That would be the best, wouldn't it? Wouldn't that be the best if they were treated just like us? They get the same kind of shaft in court that we do. Anyway, till next time, stay healthy and if you can stay single.