The Effect of Family on Relationship

The Effect of Family on Relationship

The evaluation of newspaper advice columnists, such as Ms. Manners, Ann Landers and Dear Abby can touch on many societal values such as family, gender and marriage, but most importantly shows how individuals interpret and react to their situations. By reading a collection of these columns, one will notice the multiple factors that come into the individual’s situation and how the advice they demand is one that must appease a variety of subjects. The article attached is a Dear Abby column entitled, “Husband Asks if Torn Marriage Can be Stitched Back Together”. In this article we are shown a clear example of how the situations the columnists are presented with include many outside factors that affect the reaction of the writer. Furthermore, we can agree that the factor that shapes the way the person feels the most is how the trusted, loved ones around him or her feel about the issue. As a result one must agree that the most important factor in the act of one asking for advice is the pressures from trusted family members and how they feel towards the individual’s dilemma.

In the Dear Abby column aforementioned, we are shown a situation in which the families around both parties are entrenched in the issue and their actions are affecting the way the married couple each approaches the problem. We are shown the perspective of the husband, who has been cheated on by his wife in the past. In the article he mentions the outside forces of in-laws that have taken over the relationship. He says, “Both sets of in-laws are trying to sabotage the marriage” and then goes on to say that, “…my feelings for my wife have changed, and