Quite often I see mentions about previous relationships here that can pretty much be summarised as wife took everything.

What I can't get is why so many seem to still get married in the first place. I have had all kinds of relationships, the longest over ten years, but I never entered into marriage, so when it was time to split up, it was not that complicated, usually the arguments was about more costly items being bought together, with no clear paper trail who it belonged to. But the costs were never anything of major importance compared to the pain of the breakup, so regardless of who got what, it was not something I would think about long afterwards as a life effecting loss. Houses were either bought by one party, so nothing to fight about or formally shared, so easy to split, either the leaving party selling its half to the one who stays, or selling it and splitting the cash when the value and thus how much half of it would be could not be agreed upon. What was mine is mine, what was hers is hers, and only the undefined items would be up for negotiations, in most cases a peaceful agreement could be reached, the one case where it couldn't. I let her have most of it and moved on in life, she had bought the farm, and I all the cars, the horses and all random tools and equipment needed for the place. In the end I just drove of with the station wagons keeping most of the computer equipment, and left the horses, the pickup and everything thing else farm related for her. I didn't have much need for it anyways since I was moving to a city in another country. So yes a bit of a loss from a financial point of view, but not something that keeps me up at nights. And believe it or not we are still in touch every now on then on FB 15 years later

So at least for me I have never had a split up, where I felt that it had a major hit to my economy.

I guess one thing that made it easier was that I have always avoided having kids. Some of my partners had previous kids, but I was never expected to take any responsibility for them after the split up. Either they were cared for solely by the mother, or the father was already paying child support.

So at least when there are no shared kids involved, marriage seems to be counter intuitive, and opening you up to financial ruin.

Don't take it the wrong way, I am not trying to mock people that got married and then burned, Im more curious as to why so many people still get married especially when there are no kids involved. Not saying it is wrong, more curious about the why?

And to show how crazy people are,,, the LGBT community insist in having equal rights to get married. They want to be different but want the same rules as everyone else .

After a devorce and a 50/50 split you move on but now that you have got older another 50/50 split would be financially ruin for most and don't be mistaken women think they are untitled to half of whatever you bring into a marriage

Well, maybe those who are happy never bother to post. I am very happily married to a Cambodian bride for 11 years, and we have two beautiful children. I love my wife, I like being married, and I love being a father. I did not get married for the first time until I was 41. It was never a priority to me. But, for those who have never had children...you will never know how great life can be with them. I have seen many sad stories here of love gone wrong, but my friends who chose their mates wisely...have a great track record of success.

As stated before losing 50% of your assets can leave a bitter taste in one's mouth and the older one is the less likely it is those lost assets can be regained. The overwhelming male membership of the forum who statistically earned more than the partner who obtained an equal share of the assets. The strong undercurrent of misogyny that permeates the forum with the attitude a woman is lucky to enjoy the benefit of their company however unpleasant that company my be. Perhaps if you were on a female-dominated forum of 50 plus divorcees who now have younger and more nubile partners you would be asking " why are there so many women that claim divorce was the greatest accomplishment of their life.

I guess then that another differentiator was that I never had a long term relationship with a woman earning significantly less than me, so whatever was put in the nest was more or less a shared expense, thus in a split you typically end up with more or less the amount that you put into it. In Scandinavia it's unheard of with a stay at home mum, in fact, I don't think I have ever met one in my generation or younger, me being in my fifties. In my parent's generation there were some, but usually when the guy was making serious money.

This question was not at all intended to diss on other people's life choices, it was triggered by so often seeing harsh comments such as my western partner skinned me, sometimes referring to multiple occurrences of it, thus I will never have a relationship with a western woman again. It was not intended to question who you should partner up with, just curious as to why so man seems to have gone through such bad experiences in their previous lives.

In Cambodia, I only once dated a woman with significantly less income than me, and that did not last long for other reasons.

I think that if she gets half your money you get to superglue her fanny shut

Isn't there a law in a few asian countries, stipulating that, to be officially processed for both nationalities involved, in both countries, the marriage has to be concluded only in separation of goods, so each parties keeps it goods, and nobody can claim other party's stuff ?

So it is in Indonesia for example, so the inherited land of the Indonesian one doesn't benefit to the foreign one, therefore getting ownership after the Indonesian one in case he disappear first. I assume it's not the only country with protectionist laws like this ? What about Cambodia and neighbors ?

Foreigners cannot own land, but can lease it. What will be built upon will get back to the land owner, wife or else. I've seen people dismantling everything of a locally-built house except wall and roof in bad separations cases. Wires, plumbing, tiling, windows, doors....