R: Your Spouse Should Be Your Best Friend

While the common man typically spends his Valentine’s Day in a frenzy of pagan worship, crafting icons after icons of Cupid and his lusty arrows, the members of the Federalist Party tend to use the day of Saint Valentine to contemplate higher understandings of love. This year is no different, as we prepare to debate the necessity of friendship in marriage. Many theories and definitions of friendship exist, but we will only consider those that identify similarity and common interest as the driving factors of friendship. As conservatives, we understand that values matter, and nowhere more so than in a marriage. But whether interests, passions, careers, and objectives should be categorized as “values” or not is the central dilemma of this debate, as well as the intersection of marriage in all of it.

The affirmative takes the meaning of “life partner” to its extreme: your spouse should be someonewith whom, throughout the course of your life, you will want to do everything. Compatibility of spirit—that is, the connection that allows for the holy union of marriage to take place—is important, those in the affirmative argue. But compatibility of temperament—the thing that really makes you like your spouse—is equally so. Sharing temperaments manifests itself in watching the same TV shows, going on trips abroad together, even working in the same industry or company. The merging of two lives into one should be the goal of a relationship, and a successful one manages to do it without conflict. A marriage should not just be tolerable. It should be joyous from start to end.

The negative approaches marriage from a “dual-lives” framework—that is, a theory in which married life and personal life are two distinct, separate domains. This side argues for a more practical interpretation of marriage, one in which the differences between men and women are inherently recognized and accepted. A husband should not necessarily want a wife who loves the Super Bowl as much as he does, nor should she want him to love Gossip Girl as much as she does. Making marriage about interests—or even pure enjoyment—defeats the inherent responsibility of commitment in marriage. Instead, let your spouse compliment you in a way that nuances your interests without intensifying them. Keep your domains separate, and focus on the true meaning of love.

What defines friendship? What defines marriage? And should the two definitions ever be thought of as mutually exclusive?