She Blinded Me With Science

I've noticed a disturbing trend in America's youth recently, and after reading too many @#$%&#ing comments on facebook, I have to speak up.

It was an article written by a young newlywed male about the virtues of marriage and why getting married is better than not. And yes, he had a lot of his own opinions in there, but what I really liked about the article was that he included links and stats from scientific studies that supported his view.

My friend Kelsey posted it on FB and I'm just a tiny bit obsessed with her andloveeverythingshepostsbutiswearimnotcreepy. So I commented something like "yay marriage!" But ugh, one thing I hate about FB is that if you comment on something it notifies you anytime ANYONE else comments on that same article, status whatevs. So I got like a million notifications that a bunch of people commented on that same article.

A lot of the comments went like this:

• "Well, who says that cohabitating participants can't have an equally fulfilling and happy relationship!'
• "Um, I've been living with my significant other and we're really happy!"
• "I don't need a relationship to feel fulfilled. And its the same with all of my friends."
• "Whats the point of marriage...its just a piece of paper!"
• "I'm going to list all of the reasons why I disagree with this article."

And thats ok! I'm ok if you're cohabitating...and I'm really excited for you if you are in a loving and fulfilling relationship! Seriously! And you can totally disagree with me.

One thing I think is absolutely ludicrous is to disagree with science.

And math.

I mean, who disagrees with that?

I couldn't believe that people were trying to point out all the reasons why the article FILLED WITH SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH AND REGRESSION ANALYSIS UP THE WAZOO was wrong. Especially the point of, well that doesn't apply to me or any of my friends!

Ok...so you and your friends are like n=5? So basically you've just proved that you're statistically irrelevant. Do you even know what that means? What was your major in your liberal arts college? Film?! Um ok, so when was the last time you took a math class? Highschool pre algebra?! How...um...wow.*

Do yourself, America, and the world a favor, and take a statistics class. It will make a world of difference in your life.

Oh, and that girl (or guy) with three letters behind her/his name? (PhD) probably knows more than you. Respect the numbers.

And yes, it has been scientifically proven that people have better and more sex in a marriage, children do better in school and end up making more income when they have married parents, and married people make more money, and save more money. Notice! That you can actually measure all of those (except maybe how good your sex is) with numbers. I actually read a lot of these studies in my Econ classes at school. They're f-ing legit.

Econ 388 OUT! (drops the mic)

* When I was talking to Cameron about this I went so far as to say "Go get a vasectomy! I don't want your mathematically illiterate brain to procreate." But I would never say that on my blog...it's way too controversial!