J.D. Vance has become a laugh line to some, but his stance on divorce is seriously dangerous [View all]

Republican vice presidential candidate J.D. Vance, shown at a rally in Mecosta County, Mich., on Aug. 27, 2024, has shared his view that divorce should be more difficult. (Photo by Anna Liz Nichols/Michigan Advance)

Laughing at J.D. Vance has become a part-time job for progressives, who have been gleefully sharing childless cat lady memes and couch jokes. I’ll admit I’m guilty of chuckling along with them.

But Vance’s regressive agenda to limit the right to divorce has scared me. As a therapist who specializes in treating women navigating divorce, many of whom are leaving abusive marriages, I believe Vance’s stance is dangerous. His long list of what women should not be allowed to control keeps getting longer: their bodies, their reproductive rights, who they marry, whether they have children (or cats) and now, whether they can divorce.

In 2021, Vance lamented that children suffer when their parents divorce, even when those marriages were violent. In his memoir Hillbilly Elegy, Vance describes being raised by his grandparents, who had a chaotic and violent marriage. He recounts a scene in which his grandmother doused his grandfather with gasoline while he slept on the couch. She then lit him on fire and their 11-year-old daughter had to put out the flames. For Vance, even this extreme level of family violence is preferable to divorce.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/j-d-vance-become-laugh-091506390.html