It seems like everywhere you turn, you are supposed to produce a gift these days. Now there is a new service for couples who are separating--a divorce gift list, kind of like a wedding gift registry except the honeymoon is over instead of beginning:
Would you register for a divorce gift list or give a gift to a friend or family member who is getting divorced?
A UK retailer launched a divorce gift list service Monday to cater for the growing number of people saying "I don't" rather than "I do," various British newspapers reported.
The new service offered by department store Debenhams follows rising popularity of "congratulations on your divorce" greeting cards and divorce celebration parties made famous by celebrities like Heather Mills.
The group said its Divorce Gift List service stemmed from a noted spike in couples deciding to divorce over the festive period....
"Divorcing can be an expensive time and registering for a Divorce Gift List means that family and friends can help the newly separated begin their new life," Moore said.
Would you register for a divorce gift list or give a gift to a friend or family member who is getting divorced?
Labels: divorce
posted by Helen at 11:45 AM
24 Comments:
The very concept is tacky.
If for the sake of ensuring the continuation of society we should promote marriage and families, and penalize divorce, then this concept which further incentivizes divorce makes no sense.
I'm in favor of anything made popular or endorsed by Heather Mills. It's gotta be good.
hell no.
"I do", then "I don't"...how about, "I didn't"? Gifts for those who never got married and do not intend to. Or for some of us, "I did, but I shouldn't have". This could be a big continuation of a trend.
How about they just return all their original wedding gifts?
How about those of us Single and loving it?
Hey, I'm registered at Electron Hut.
The consumer commercialization of divorce? Yeesh. The old joke is that divorce attorneys cost so much because they are worth every penny.
Trey
If one of the partners cheating was behind the divorce I might send them a box of condoms and some antibiotics.
No and no.
it`s typical of the re-tribalisation of society. much like borat taking a dump in the bushes in front of an office building.....everything our culture held valuable will be desicrated as this process evolves.
the family (husband,wife and children) was the repository of the cultural values of the old society, and what better way to expediate the destruction of that culture than to devalue that which holds it together.
it isn`t that men or women are to blame for this, so much as an outside agency has set us at odds, so that we haven`t a chance to reconcile in large enough numbers to maintain the status quo.
welcome to the global village, where the lowest common denominator is the new average....and every taste, behaviour and personal right will be promoted.
we have spent the last few hundred years building modern society...and as kevin costner said, "if we build it, they will come".
This is a strictly commercial idea. It should be shunned completely.
Divorce is a sad time and needs to be recognized as such. Even if one, or both, of the divorcing parties is relieved to be getting out of the marriage, it is important that they recognize their failure to create a life together, something that they had pledged to do. The failure to do so is a major failure and says some pretty significant things about both of them. It should be a time for self examination and reflection, and it most certainly is not a time for gift giving.
shunned? wouldn`t it be nice if it were that easy....
...putting one`s head in the sand isn`t going to stop the destruction of family and societal values in general.
some serious players have a vested interest in men and women being at odds with eachother.
Actually, shunning the gift giving idea is really quite easy. All that is necessary is to decline to participate and to refuse to feel guilty for not giving a gift under such circumstances.
The very idea of divorce gifts is tacky beyond words.
Since I've never married, the question of registering for a divorce gift doesn't arise. If a male friend of mine married to an American woman were getting divorced, I'd figure that I didn't need to get him a gift, because anything that I got him wouldn't match up to the joy of no longer being married.
dr.d, i shun the entire social ritual of gifting, for the most part...as well as celebrating at the drop of a hat.
my children won`t be getting a limousine and a tux for graduating grade eight, for instance. they have to do something immportant first.
but the point that you side-stepped is that the whole of our culture is under attack. the very underpinnings of what we hold dear will be gone in a very short period of time to make way for secular consumers with little regard for the values of the family.
i call it the pornographication of society.
maybe my point goes further than commenting directly of gifts for divorce, but the issue can be accessed by many of the shifts in values held by people in our society.
it could be said that anyone who would socially celebrate divorce would take a cynical view to just about anything that our society values morally and ethically.
I gave gifts to my brother when he went through a painful divorce: the gift of listening, the gift of dinner at my table, the gift of laughter, the gift of love.
Guys don't do registries and gift showers as a matter of course, so something tells me this is marketed to women who, after she jettisons the provider male she's gotten bored with, feel the need to have a "you go girl" party where they play "I Will Survive" and celebrate what a "strong independent woman" she is. Other women will carp about their husbands and speculate on divorcing in a circle-jerk of victimization.
That being said, whether I gave a gift would depend...if a close friend was a cad or a ho, I wouldn't go near the divorce situation at all. If they were a victim of their spouse I would help them with material needs -
but I sure as hell wouldn't buy stuff off a registry of chotchkie crap, I'd help them procure meals, outfit their new living space and set up their life again.
By the way, I've gotten some funny looks from friends about my feeling on wedding gifts. Recently I attending three weddings on the other side of the country, weddings I was thrilled to attend. But since I had to fly to the other coast and take time off work, I declined to get gifts.
I got so much static..."But that's ETIQUETTE!" and "you can't just say you've spent enough and be a cheapo!" Most of the etiquette arguments came from women whose idea of etiquette always seems to include men spending money on women just because.
If I had just driven across town to attend, I totally would have bought a gift; I hate to sound selfish, but there's a point at which I've done enough to help them celebrate.
The only reply I cared to proffer was "look, I'm not made of money. If this couple is shallow enough to be upset at me that I decided to share their special day instead of getting them a materialistic bauble they can show off, then I made a mistake going to the wedding, and the marriage is built on shaky ground to boot."
The whole measuring yourself by the things other people give you is a failing game, and I don't care to encourage it.
BTW, I never heard anything negative from the couples or their emissaries. The weddings were great fun, too!
(Keep in mind that two of these couples were already cohabitating, so I didn't really see how the original purpose of weddings gifts - to outfit the wedded household - really applied.)
Gods no, nor would I want one. One takes enough away from a divorce without a friggin' momento.
Earth Girl,
Your brother sounds very lucky. I think that is what most people need when they get divorced.
Hell no. Very inappropriate. Every divorce is an occasion to mourn. While it may be best and both parties are happy with the decision, it is, even at its best, the death of something that was once cherished and celebrated. Such things should pass quietly and with dignity.
Expecting not just a gift, but such a collective deluge of gifting that registration is needed to keep track of it all, is strange and tacky and inappropriate in a way that I have insufficient words to describe. I will make up a word, prostitactition, to describe it.
It is prostitactition.
When did we start rewarding failure?
Cham,
In the 60's with ever increasing welfare.
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