That thing I said last week 'is this the next thing'? -
- Lo, this thing is the next thing.
[T]he joy of divorce parties.
Okay, rites de passages, they are a thing, and the article cites cultural traditions which have rituals to mark the transition from married life to singledom. In Judaism, a divorce document called a get is presented from husband to wife, in the presence of rabbis and witnesses, to spiritually dissolve the union. Divorcing couples in Japan smash a wedding ring with a mallet. Members of the north African Beidane ethnic group hold divorce parties to welcome women back into the community and signal to potential suitors that they are available to remarry.
In present-day society in this culture, they seem to fulfil various different roles: getting back at the ex, a way to thank the loved ones who were a source of support during the process, a celebration of the end of the horrendous process, a reclamation of singleness.
And it does seem to be about the individuals, rather than the couple parting their ways: in Kate Millett's Flying (1974) there's a description of a divorce party involving two artist friends of hers which was perhaps more a form of performance art in a New York loft and included, as I recall, taking a chainsaw to the matrimonial bed.
And another thing which evoked my 'flashback to the 70s!' feels, the news story about the couple raising a genderfree child. Though I'm not entirely sure if anybody actually emulated Lois Gould's 1972 X: A Fabulous Child's Story, even if it did inspire some experimentation with not identifying children by their gender. This entry was originally posted at https://oursin.dreamwidth.org/2980233.html. Please comment there using OpenID. View
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