Why the POSSLQ Experiment Failed

The Reader's Digest wrote a trendy, upbeat article about it; Seventeen, a popular magazine geared toward teenaged girls, cautioned girls to consider whether they really wanted such an arrangement with a boyfriend who was "only 70% committed" to them; even CBS commentator Charles Osgood got on the bandwagon with a little verse:

"There's nothing that I wouldn't do
If you would be my POSSLQ
You live with me and I with you,
And you will be my POSSLQ.
I'll be your friend and so much more;
That's what a POSSLQ is for."

In the late 1970's, the term POSSLQ was coined by the United States Census Bureau to define unmarried couples in living-together arrangements. Although prior to that time-period, such arrangements were much rarer, much less frequently talked about, and in most parts of the United States much less accepted, POSSLQ's-- Persons of Opposite Sex Sharing Living Quarters-- were soon popping up everywhere. As with most trends, for the majority to be pressured into considering something acceptable before becoming aware of the negative aspects, its popularity not only hasn't vanished but in fact has become more prominent, despite the facts unfolding that it was really not such a good idea.

In general, people do not like to think about consequences. Sometimes it is a matter of lack of knowledge; in other instances people like to think that anything negative is surely about "somebody else," that they themselves are immune, different, and that they will beat the odds. But there is a lot of history in the time-period from which this subject began to attract the attention of the American public-- and approximately
thirty years of history cannot be discounted as irrelevant.

The first case of opposition to the living-together arrangement can be summed up in terms of the Seventeen magazine article being slightly mistaken-- for regardless of the intent of the individuals setting up house together, and regardless of how many may loudly disagree with this fact, the fact remains that when "keeping house" does not include marriage, there is no commitment. The decision to live together is not a "70%" commitment, nor even a "7%" commitment; it is only "until-" or "unless-," and there are no strings attached. This point, which far too few understand or acknowledge, comes out in its saddest clarity with the statistics showing that those who live together prior to marriage are twice as likely to divorce as those who did not. It is not about "moral codes" or any other concept; it is about the simple fact that few who live together, even with the intent of marrying at a later date, realize that living together and marriage have very little in common, and going from the former to the latter is not a transition, not a change, but an entirely different relationship for which few POSSLQ's are prepared.

The second stand against POSSLQ is human nature. Regardless of how many people wish to sneer at the subject, bonds form, and when the bonds are broken, so are hearts and lives. It was quite a distressing pattern for so many who came-of-age in the late 70's: two individuals move in together (with or without the notion of it being a "trial" for future marriage). Girl becomes pregnant. They get married. Girl's natural impulses of care for her child and home blossom. Guy has no such impulses. They divorce. In the first wave of single motherhood, at least young mothers were granted the opportunity to care for their own little children at home, and possibly even acquire a suitable mate; but the hostility of the Reagan-Bush administration took away these chances for bonding by insisting that no one should be allowed to be "dependent on the welfare system" for an entire year's time simply because she had an infant to care for. From the ultra-conservatives to the ultra-liberals, everyone who had any say-so were saying mothers belonged in the workforce, children belonged in daycare, fathers should have "rights" with no responsibilities, everything was about money; and, naturally, those who had no say-so were the children. With this amazing decline, it should be no surprise that more young people are opting to not get married in the first place-- and mistakenly concluding that it is their own decision, rather than seeing how the last thirty years have affected them and why they are so averse to the subject.

The POSSLQ experiment failed. Perhaps if we look at it from that point of view-- that it really was not such a good idea, and the last three decades proves it-- perhaps the upcoming generations can decide to not make the same mistake.