The M.Guy Tweet, Week of August 18, 2013

1. Relationship Footprint [Visual], Fatherhood Channel
How deep is your relationship footprint? [Click on visual]

2. Money To Matrimony: Talking About The Black Experience, National Public Radio
[T]hey make their own money, they live their own life, they own their own home. They don't necessarily see where you need a man for that, but what they do need a man for is for the companionship, for the partnership, for the fact that they might want a family. So that was an interesting aspect of the survey to me.

3. Has Marriage Gotten Too Expensive?, The Washington Post
“They found that as the American workforce and the American marriage have destabilized over the past half-century, marriage has become an increasingly inaccessible option for working-class Americans. . ."

4. The Soft Break-Up, Sliding vs. Deciding
As is so often the case, technology brings a vast number of options but this also makes choices more important (and more difficult). Friends are great to have, but a gallery of past loves is a pretty complicated audience for a new stage of life.

5. Marriage Advice: If You Remarry, Make Sure It Is For The Right Reason -- Love, News-Sentinel
Marrying to escape a bad situation or a boring life is “a terrible basis for marriage.” The Parrotts describe this as “perhaps the most damaging motivation for remarriage.” Strong marriages are based on loving bonds that pull people together, not on an effort to escape something else.

6. HRC Marriage and Children, Healthy Relationships California
“[I]ncreasing marital stability to the same level as in 1980 is associated with a decline of nearly one- half million children suspended from school, about two hundred thousand fewer children engaging in delinquency or violence, a quarter of a million fewer children receiving therapy, about a quarter of a million fewer smokers, about 80,000 fewer children thinking about suicide, and about 28,000 fewer children attempting suicide.”

7. Is Marriage Becoming A Status Symbol in America, The Week
Their findings suggest that instead of a major moral or cultural shift (like growing acceptance of unmarried couples living together), it might be a general lack of job security that is the big dissuader. Today, there are fewer stable, well-paying jobs for those without a college degree than in the past — take manufacturing or union jobs, for an example. 

For more, see here.