Brooklyn, NY – All our exes live in … Brooklyn? Yes, divorce cases are soaring in Kings County — up a whopping 30 percent since 2003.
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The surge covers uncontested divorces — which numbered 5,489 in 2004 and jumped to 7,035 last year. Contested divorces — the ones that get ugly — are up five percent, according to Tom Kilfoyle, the clerk at the Adams Street courthouse.
And no one knows why. It’s certainly not Brooklyn’s population increase — which is only up two percent so far this decade.
“I really don’t think it’s because Brooklynites are hating each other more than before,” said Jeffrey Sunshine, the supervising judge for matrimonial matters in Kings County.
Instead, he credited his own courtroom for doing a better job than ever, right down to providing excellent service for couples who don’t have lawyers.
“We have a very active pro-se office and the word is getting out,” said Sunshine. “They don’t even take lunch most days.”
Couples can file uncontested divorces in any county, so if there’s a backlog in Manhattan or Queens, many may choose Brooklyn, Sunshine added.
Perhaps we’re in a more disposable world than we were before.
Leider leider this is also true by the heimishe yidden. Divorce rates are up like crazy
is it because we r mushpa from the goyim
its all because of the internet. people take their body joy… from surfing the web in places that they should not be. (v’hamaven yovin)
to anon4511 ..also? why are heimish yidden less prone to divorce than any other group?
because overall better middos.
a major cause of the awfully high divorce rates is because people in this day and age are extremely spoiled!! everyone expects their spouce to be PERFECT and their life to be PERFECT! People are not willing to work out simple problems which many times can be solved easily!
We also don’t expect women to tolerate abuse, both physical and verbal, from husbands anymore. In the past , women stayes in these marriages because of pressure not to spoil potential shidduchim and there was no outside support available.
In look at how many people under age 25, pushed into marriages at age 18,19,20 are now divorced
Also, there seems to be a much higher rate of mental illness then there used to be. I’m sure that’s a contributing factor as well.
when you cram couples in tiny apartments, no front and backyards, one living on top of the other…..you’re bound to get some miserable unhappy people!
In our efforts to find contributing causes, let us add a few very realistic ones.
• There are many people who consider themselves askanim – shalom bayis machers. Some of these do good work. Most have no training. Some of them make matters worse.
• Some Rabbonim who are consulted on marital issues take sides immediately. This adds to the conflict, not its resolution.
• The demands for money, whether payoffs to give or take a get, are getting severe. It is disgraceful that any Rov ever participate in holding a get for ransom.
• There is terrible stigma attached to being divorced, often without need. So many couples decide to “stay together for the kids”. Sometimes, probably not very often, this may be the better choice.
• Because of the stigma, many couples do not seek any outside help until things have become bitter and irreparable.
• In the past, many agunos remained stuck. There are now various community services to help them, and that brings these cases to divorce.
• An individual who had some psychological issues was not necessarily a divorce candidate. Today, there are many behaviors that become vices for such individuals, many of which make marriage untenable. I refer to such things as drugs, drinking, gambling, and illicit relationships.
• There is always the shidduchim expectations. Many young people are married off long before they achieved the maturity needed to maintain a stable home. These marriages rarely last. Likewise, second marriages are sometimes entered into without past issues having been resolved. These are additional recipes for disaster.
To an earlier comment – the internet. Nope. The internet is just a more easily accessible places for people to play in the wrong places. It is not the source of the problem. It is the arena where the problems get played out. Prior to the internet, there was considerable effort to go elsewhere to be involved in trouble, and some simply did not make the effort. (P.S. – I do not advocate a heter for internet. I just feel the fingers are being pointed inaccurately.)
Oy! You all are looking too deeply into this matter. It is simple: “Why wants to be married to someone who lives in Brooklyn? Oy, who can stand that Brooklyn accent, or that Brooklyn attitude?”
Each morning, so many men, and an equally large group of women, wake up and realize, “This person in the other bed lives in Brooklyn, and sounds like Brooklyn. Why am I married to someone from Brooklyn. Yuck, I can’t stand the accent or the attitude. OMG, he/she even snores with a Brooklyn accent. I can’t take it anymore.”
So, off they go to beis din, and get a get. Now they are not married to someone who lives in Brooklyn. They are not married so someone with that horrible Brooklyn accent. They are no longer married to that disgusting Brooklyn attitude.
See how simple the matter really is?