Institution of marriage in flames

October has been the month of cheating exposés… and we cannot but continue to watch, as if our daily lives are not riddled with the same traumas.

Divorce is ugly, break-ups are horrific; now, imagine it all amplified for a country to chime in.

If anything, 2024 has shown the institution of marriage is in flames – the dissolution or the rumours doing the rounds of the imminent splits and confirmed divorces of celebrity couples, often in which infidelity is paramount among the reasons for the not-so-happy endings of these marriages.

We celebrate these unions. We set them as goals because they were breaking the moulds of what we understood the marriage to be.

These are young and gifted individuals who came and complimented each other.

We continued to have hope and to want to sweep under the carpet the whispers of cheating husbands.

Many mornings’ silences broken by the screams of arguments of such blatant and now public infidelities.

This week, we were left breathless about the beauty of a celebrity “wedding of the century”.

Now, we are exchanging conversation at the water cooler… a fairy-tale has ended, abruptly so.

ALSO READ: Siya and Rachel Kolisi announce the end of their marriage

It would be false to say that men are not themselves victims.

We have seen women reach out to contract killers for monetary gain, the husband being the target; women, too, have become vile marriage partners – marriages, when they rot, without a doubt, involve discrimination.

Yet we continue to shame more and more single women for their inability to secure a husband.

I am more inclined to celebrate their ability to reject the calibre of men that society has been producing in high numbers.

Why is there a culture that the woman must first be baptised by fire before she can be celebrated?

Why must we experience love only once we have suffered? Why should our children share fathers with children made and kept in secret?

Why has the institution of marriage lost all credibility, leading to more and more couples filling the waiting areas of divorce courts – why?

And now, with children and extended families involved, this new chapter of pain and uncertainty is amplified for all and sundry to participate in, with very little insight, and compassion.

Honestly, living and just being is so much harder in the digital age; having to balance life’s challenges?

ALSO READ: A government that only reacts