George Bernard Shaw said “The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself.” Shaw was discussing revolutionaries, but this quote works perfectly well when it comes to the breakdown of marriage, specifically when one half of the couple cites “unreasonable behaviour” as the reason for filing for divorce. Of course, many people would argue that this is entirely subjective but in many ways that’s rather the point. The legal test is what that person who has filed for divorce finds unreasonable, not what the public thinks is unreasonable. It could be, for example, that the woman loathes the colour red. She won’t have it in the house, she never wears the colour, she can’t stand to look at it and she certainly can’t tolerate her husband wearing red clothing. If her husband then starts wearing red shirts or trousers or whatever and refuses to change, then this could rightly be regarded as unreasonable behaviour. However, if the husband could then produce photographs of his wife wearing red then the judge will almost declare that the husband’s behaviour was not unreasonable. Pre-nuptial agreements go a considerable way to ironing out these marital wrinkles, as the couple can agree acceptable modes of behaviour and so on before they get married. The UK courts still don’t regard them as legally binding but there’s no doubt that since the landmark Supreme Court ruling in favour of a German heiress Katrin Radmancher, who shared a prenuptial agreement with her husband Nicolas Granatino, this may well change. In the meantime, unreasonable behaviour remains the most common reason cited when it comes to divorce petitions, mainly because it allows for a relatively quick divorce. There is, however, a big “BUT.....” attached to this. In my next blog post, I’ll explain why it is important to bear in mind that when citing unreasonable behaviour, there are time limits involved.
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