This article was also published on my Substack.

Marriage doesn’t make sense to me anymore.

It gets framed as the greatest gesture of love, but when you think about it, it’s one of the strongest legal binding contracts you can sign, second only to actual death.

I read this book, If You’re in My Office, Then It’s Too Late by James J. Sexton. He’s a divorce lawyer, and the book laid out things I already felt but couldn’t put into words. It pushed me to look at marriage without the romance filter on.

People keep saying there are tax advantages. I still don’t know what they all are, so here’s what I found:

Married couples who file jointly get a bigger standard deduction, which lowers taxable income. Some credits get easier. Estate stuff gets neater.

But none of this stands alone. If one partner has heavy debt or a long list of bills, filing jointly means you share the weight. Double edged sword.

Which leaves me with the same question I keep circling back to:

What can I not do single that I can only do married?

And the answer is, not much.

Keep in mind, I don’t want kids, nor do I have dependents so this opinion is formed based on that.

Almost everything people point to can be created through non marriage paperwork. Medical directives. Powers of attorney. A will. A financial agreement that actually fits the two people in it. You can build the structure yourself instead of letting the state hand you one.

The book made this clear too. Everyone gets a prenup. It’s either the one you write, or the one the state gives you by default. People say they don’t want one because it feels like planning for failure, but skipping a prenup just means choosing the default written by the government.

If I’m marrying someone, I’m marrying who they are now and whoever they might become in ten or twenty or thirty plus years. The same goes for me. I might change. I might fall apart. I might end up in a situation that hurts both of us. I’d want to protect the person I love from the fallout of my worst moments. And I’d want the same back.

When you strip the romance off marriage, you’re left with a heavy legal contract most people don’t understand. If marriage ever happens for me, I’d need to understand every consequence before stepping into it. I’d need my partner to care about that too.

I know this reads cold to some people. I know the nuance here isn’t common. I’ve had moments where I wondered if something’s wrong with me because I look at marriage this way. But then I remember I’m not trying to attract people who’d be bothered by the fact that I think things through. I have to be okay with that.

I’m willing to change my mind someday. I’m open to the idea that the right person could shift the whole picture. Marriage is a powerful cultural technology. The author of that book still loves marriage despite being a divorce lawyer. The advantages seem more cultural than contractual.

I’m also suspicious of the pedigree of marriage and how it historically benefited only specific groups of people, but we’re not ready for that conversation. People might think I’m the least romantic person ever, but this is where I am.

If it lowers my chances of marriage, then so be it. I’d rather be clear about who I am than walk into something this serious pretending I’m someone else.

I don't want to get married, and here's why

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