I’m not sure that I fully agree. I mean, to each their own etc., but what you’re describing seems to be more suited for relationships without marriage. The whole idea of being married is that your discuss this stuff before your wedding and then don’t just get separated because you “don’t feel it anymore”. The idea is that, if you feel like you drifted apart, that your work on that and don’t just get out of that relationship on a whim. That’s the promise you give. And even if you agree with your partner to just go separate ways (yeah yeah, consenting adults can do whatever the fuck they want, sure), a divorce has the significant chance to screw you financially for decades. I mean, I don’t know how it is in the US, but I’ve seen too many people who got their finances completely fucked by partners that they consentingly parted ways with, who they swore would treat them fairly. Too many houses repossessed, too many careers ruined.
Is it okay to get separated? Sure. It’s obviously also okay to remain close and support each other, of course. But this comic promotes a lighthearted approach to something that deserves a much more careful and serious take that I don’t agree with. Those first few panels should have made them get counselling, not divorced.
I know and that’s also not what I said.
That’s the key word right here. Two panels of “you know, I’m feeling boyish” “and I kinda want to have kids” isn’t “trying to solve it and realizing it’s not possible”, that’s just “starting to share feelings and needs”. The way this story is told just suggests that this slight notion of plans no longer being aligned perfectly warrants a divorce, which is far from what that legal construct of “we’re a financial union now which means we can royally fuck up each other’s lives if we feel like it” should entail. This isn’t a story of unsolvable problems, this is the story of two people that don’t take the legal responsibility they got into seriously. It suggests a lighthearted approach to getting divorced that is so far from the possible legal fallout of it that I just think it’s absurd.
If this was a comic that told years of them trying to meet each other’s needs and not being able to, I’d be on the same page. But that’s not the story that was told here. There wasn’t a single panel where either person even just tried to suggest how things might still work for them or find some common ground. No panel about acknowledging the other person’s desires and trying to merge them with one’s own needs. The comic was “I feel this”, “I feel that”, “great, let’s just happily divorce”, which is absurd as soon as we’re talking about anything that’s beyond teenage finances.