Ross PK Posted November 19, 2009 Share Posted November 19, 2009 I've never understood that. Over here in Britian there is a big percentage of couples in society that have kids and aren't married. No one thinks you must get married if you have kids or if you're going to have kids. In fact I think most couples over here aren't married. Is it a religous thing over in America or something? Link to post Share on other sites
2sure Posted November 19, 2009 Share Posted November 19, 2009 No. It has less to do with religion than it does health insurance, legal logistics, income, mortgages, etc. Many people in the US do not get married specifically so that they can stay on state health care or otherwise receive social services such as financial aid for tuition, child care, etc. If marrying would put their income over the amount to receive these tax payer paid benefits...they dont get married. Link to post Share on other sites
jerseyboy Posted November 19, 2009 Share Posted November 19, 2009 Thats encouraging So much for the dominance of western civilization. Because religiion aside, long standing societal institutions dont exist out of ambivalence or lack of creativity, but because they work. Marriage is by far the best means or rearing healthy and productive citizens for any society. Conversely pathology leveles in children raised outside that institution are absurdly higher by several magnitudes. And whatever endearing personal triumph story you may wish to share aside, the fact remains it would not be predictive on a large scale, and in fact all the data would refute your testimony. But these things are self correcting in as much as dying cultures such as ours when they jump the shark as it were, are in historical terms quickly replaced in dominance by others who adhere to practices better suited to producing a healthy and productive citizenry. In short well quickly be repalced by actual adults Link to post Share on other sites
El Ben Posted November 19, 2009 Share Posted November 19, 2009 Haha. Personally, I feel that some of the best family units existed before marriage. In Africa there used to be "compound families" in many cultures, where nobody bothered who owned which kid, everyone simply raised them. Similar things happened in immigrant communities back in the day. Marriage is simply a way of creating and maintaining a sense of community, if communities could be made strong enough, marriages won't be necessary. Link to post Share on other sites
jerseyboy Posted November 19, 2009 Share Posted November 19, 2009 Haha. Personally, I feel that some of the best family units existed before marriage. In Africa there used to be "compound families" in many cultures, where nobody bothered who owned which kid, everyone simply raised them. Similar things happened in immigrant communities back in the day. Marriage is simply a way of creating and maintaining a sense of community, if communities could be made strong enough, marriages won't be necessary. How many African super powers have you heard of since Carthage:) Link to post Share on other sites
Thornton Posted November 19, 2009 Share Posted November 19, 2009 (edited) I've never understood that. Over here in Britian there is a big percentage of couples in society that have kids and aren't married. No one thinks you must get married if you have kids or if you're going to have kids. In fact I think most couples over here aren't married. Is it a religous thing over in America or something? It's because there are more morally corrupt people in Britain who think it's ok to have illegitimate children (although there are a large number of them in the USA too, and increasing numbers in other western countries). Also the British welfare system favours single mothers over those who are married - if you're a single mother you can claim a free house, no property tax, money to live on, free health and dental care, etc... if you marry someone who has a job you immediately lose those benefits. It doesn't make financial sense to get married in the UK, and many couples remain unmarried and pretend they're not together so the woman can continue to claim full benefits. Edited November 19, 2009 by Thornton Link to post Share on other sites
threebyfate Posted November 19, 2009 Share Posted November 19, 2009 Ross, refer to the legal differences between countries and states, in how they view Common-Law marriages. Link to post Share on other sites
Thornton Posted November 19, 2009 Share Posted November 19, 2009 I think it's more to do with how the welfare system favours single mothers. I know people who want to marry the father of their child, but won't do so because they'll lose a huge amount of financial benefits and he'll have to support her and the child. Link to post Share on other sites
clv0116 Posted November 19, 2009 Share Posted November 19, 2009 .... religiion aside, long standing societal institutions dont exist out of ambivalence or lack of creativity, but because they work. Best post of the thread. Link to post Share on other sites
Author Ross PK Posted November 19, 2009 Author Share Posted November 19, 2009 (edited) It's because there are more morally corrupt people in Britain who think it's ok to have illegitimate children (although there are a large number of them in the USA too, and increasing numbers in other western countries). Also the British welfare system favours single mothers over those who are married - if you're a single mother you can claim a free house, no property tax, money to live on, free health and dental care, etc... if you marry someone who has a job you immediately lose those benefits. It doesn't make financial sense to get married in the UK, and many couples remain unmarried and pretend they're not together so the woman can continue to claim full benefits. There's nothing 'morally corrupt' about having kids and not getting married. No offense but you sound like you've grown up in a very repressed, authoritarian family, or neighbourhood. Edited November 19, 2009 by Ross PK Link to post Share on other sites
Author Ross PK Posted November 19, 2009 Author Share Posted November 19, 2009 I think it's more to do with how the welfare system favours single mothers. I know people who want to marry the father of their child, but won't do so because they'll lose a huge amount of financial benefits and he'll have to support her and the child. I think it's because most people don't see the big deal in getting married, it's kinda looked at as a bit old fashioned I guess. And if you're married and want to split up, you both have to go through a lot of crap with the divorce, and the guy usually comes worse off. Link to post Share on other sites
silverfish Posted November 20, 2009 Share Posted November 20, 2009 (edited) I think it's because most people don't see the big deal in getting married, it's kinda looked at as a bit old fashioned I guess. And if you're married and want to split up, you both have to go through a lot of crap with the divorce, and the guy usually comes worse off. Also, marriage or no, if you're living with some one in the UK you are treated as 'married' as far as the benefit system is concerned. I think its great that in the UK the working tax credit system exists which means that a single parent can work over 16 hours a week, and support her children. This has meant that thousands of women do not have to remain in relationships for financial reasons and can support themselves and their children. It also means single parent families do not have to live in poverty, remain in abusive or violent relationships just for financial reasons. Obviously this means a tax burden on single people, but the welfare of children now will be repaid in the welfare of pensioners, the sick and impoverished in the future in the form of the taxes they pay. As they say in Africa it takes a village to raise a child Edited November 20, 2009 by silverfish typo Link to post Share on other sites
Thornton Posted November 20, 2009 Share Posted November 20, 2009 Also, marriage or no, if you're living with some one in the UK you are treated as 'married' as far as the benefit system is concerned. Hence why single mothers in the UK don't admit to living with someone, because if they do then their welfare payments are stopped and their partner is responsible for supporting them financially. In practice, single mothers usually claim to live alone so they can receive money and a free house, and then they move their partner in without informing the authorities. The partner may claim to live with his parents or another family member and will be registered on the electoral roll at their address, so if someone informs the authorities that he's living with the single mother, he can "prove" that he doesn't because he's registered at a different address. This means the single mother can still have a partner while avoiding losing her free house and money. Link to post Share on other sites
alphamale Posted November 20, 2009 Share Posted November 20, 2009 I've never understood that. Over here in Britian there is a big percentage of couples in society that have kids and aren't married. No one thinks you must get married if you have kids or if you're going to have kids. In fact I think most couples over here aren't married. Is it a religous thing over in America or something? the US is an extremely puritanical and conservative society... Link to post Share on other sites
Thornton Posted November 20, 2009 Share Posted November 20, 2009 There's nothing 'morally corrupt' about having kids and not getting married. No offense but you sound like you've grown up in a very repressed, authoritarian family, or neighbourhood. Ever notice that the lower classes pretty much have the monopoly on having multiple children out of wedlock? You don't see the Royal Family etc running around in public with illegitimate children. Statistically, illegitimacy is linked to poverty... having illegitimate children pretty much marks you out in terms of social class. The majority of people in prison come from fatherless homes, as do the majority of runaways, children with behavioural disorders, school dropouts, etc. Not a demographic I wish to identify myself with... Link to post Share on other sites
silverfish Posted November 20, 2009 Share Posted November 20, 2009 Ever notice that the lower classes pretty much have the monopoly on having multiple children out of wedlock? You don't see the Royal Family etc running around in public with illegitimate children. Statistically, illegitimacy is linked to poverty... having illegitimate children pretty much marks you out in terms of social class. The majority of people in prison come from fatherless homes, as do the majority of runaways, children with behavioural disorders, school dropouts, etc. Not a demographic I wish to identify myself with... The Royal Family is rife with divorce and illegitimacy going back centuries, from Henry VIII to the present day. Having multiple children out of wedlock was an upper class hobby - why should they have all the fun? At least the lower classes give their kids proper names like Craig or Wayne, and don't force their kids to grow up being called Tiggy Legge-Burke, Tara Palmer-Tomkinson or Fergal Uppington-Smyth. I know, lets get rid of the Royal Family, reposses their land & stop their allowances. After all they are a far bigger bunch of spongers and drain on society. Link to post Share on other sites
ADF Posted November 20, 2009 Share Posted November 20, 2009 No doubt religion is part of it. The US is a fanatically religious society by Western European standards. Studies have found that in terms of religious fervor, the US population has far more in common with the population of Iran or Saudi Arabia than, say, Spain or France. But there is another aspect as well. In the US, married couples receive many benefits not available to unmarried people. For example, where I live (Illinois), a married couple can purchase their primary residence under a rule called tenancy in the entirety. This means that the legal owner of the married couple's home is not either one of them, nor even both of them. Rather it is a fictional, legal entity--i.e. the owner in the entirety. What this means, on a practical level, is that if the married couple accumulates debt, creditors many NOT force a sale of their home in order to satisfy that debt. It is a critical legal protecion ONLY available to married couples. Cohabitating couples may not claim it, nor can same-couples, regardless of how long they've been together. There are hundreds of rules like this. Their existence is one of the reasons people in the US opt to get married more often than couples in Europe do. Link to post Share on other sites
Thornton Posted November 20, 2009 Share Posted November 20, 2009 The Royal Family is rife with divorce and illegitimacy going back centuries, from Henry VIII to the present day. Having multiple children out of wedlock was an upper class hobby - why should they have all the fun? At least the lower classes give their kids proper names like Craig or Wayne, and don't force their kids to grow up being called Tiggy Legge-Burke, Tara Palmer-Tomkinson or Fergal Uppington-Smyth. I know, lets get rid of the Royal Family, reposses their land & stop their allowances. After all they are a far bigger bunch of spongers and drain on society. I still don't think that they go around publicly flaunting illegitimate children like the lower classes do... it was generally seen as a stigma to be denied, not something to be proud of or even publicly admitted to. Link to post Share on other sites
El Ben Posted November 20, 2009 Share Posted November 20, 2009 How many African super powers have you heard of since Carthage:) Super powers? I thought we were talking about family support units? Link to post Share on other sites
El Ben Posted November 20, 2009 Share Posted November 20, 2009 I still don't think that they go around publicly flaunting illegitimate children like the lower classes do... it was generally seen as a stigma to be denied, not something to be proud of or even publicly admitted to. True, they don't flaunt they illegitimate children (I believe polite society refers to them as bastards) Instead they hide them away in the dark, where they develop personality disorders and end up quite dysfunctional. Illegitimate children? What is an illegitimate child? What legitimizes a child? ALL children are legitimate. The problem tends to be a lack of good parenting. A breakdown of family units and a lack of sound parenting. Lower classes??? What are you on about, really? Have you been to the UK anytime in the last two centuries?? Link to post Share on other sites
Author Ross PK Posted November 20, 2009 Author Share Posted November 20, 2009 Ever notice that the lower classes pretty much have the monopoly on having multiple children out of wedlock? You don't see the Royal Family etc running around in public with illegitimate children. Statistically, illegitimacy is linked to poverty... having illegitimate children pretty much marks you out in terms of social class. The majority of people in prison come from fatherless homes, as do the majority of runaways, children with behavioural disorders, school dropouts, etc. Not a demographic I wish to identify myself with... By lower class you mean working class and by middle class you mean posh right? For one there's nothing wrong with being working class, I'm working class myself and I'm proud of it, I'd never want to be middle class. And you middle class people may snear at us but did you know that most working class people snear at middle class people too? In fact I'm sure that I read somewhere that even a lot of middle class people themselves are embarrased about their status. Even if there was something wrong with being working class, so what if more working class people have kids out of wedlock than middle class people? That doesn't mean that having kids out of wedlock is wrong, or would turn you into a working class person, and I doubt it would make your kids more likely to go to prison. How about if the father didn't leave home because they were married? Good chance he and his wife would be arguing all the time. Do you think that would be better for the kids? It's well known that kids are better off with one parent than two that are always arguing all the time. And who cares what the royal family does? Is that who you really want to be like? Link to post Share on other sites
LucreziaBorgia Posted November 20, 2009 Share Posted November 20, 2009 We got married when we had our daughter because it made sense to, and it made things so much easier logistically and financially. Besides, when we had the kid we became 'family' and decided to make it legally so. Didn't have anything to do with obligation or a sense of 'doing what we HAD to'. Link to post Share on other sites
thom3 Posted November 23, 2009 Share Posted November 23, 2009 (edited) Over here in Britian there is a big percentage of couples in society that have kids and aren't married. No one thinks you must get married if you have kids or if you're going to have kids. In fact I think most couples over here aren't married. Is it a religous thing over in America or something? In East Asian countries (China, Japan, Korea), the share of out of wedlock children is 1%, compared to 40% in the US and 50% in the UK. You see? The US numbers aren't much lower than the UK numbers. In East Asia, marriage has nothing to do with religion, but simply a desire to provide a stable framework for children to be raised. It's not to please God. Both Japan and South Korea are first world countries too, so it's not a matter of being in an industrialized country either. I wish more Americans would "think you must get married if you have kids." Unfortunately, it's no longer popular in the US either, to our own detriment. But the thing is, if you look closely at the American data, you will find that the professional upper-middle class overwhelmingly have children in marriage (96%) and have a far lower divorce rate (at less than 20%). The majority of out of wedlock births and divorces in America are occurring among the lower and lower-middle classes. The sad thing is that this creates a downward spiral for the lower classes, preventing upward mobility in a divide and conquer sort of way, like a reset button back to zero with each generation. The people who would benefit the most from a stable family unit (pooling of resources for the next generation) now do not have such a unit. As others have said, lower lifetime income, mental illness and criminal behavior are directly correlated with children born out of wedlock. That doesn't mean that having kids out of wedlock is wrong, or would turn you into a working class person, and I doubt it would make your kids more likely to go to prison. Obviously correlation does not imply causation, but the correlation is very strong. So regardless of whether it was directly due to having kids out of wedlock, or conditions/attitudes that led to kids being born out of wedlock in the first place, it doesn't change the fact that children born out of the wedlock do worse in school, get worse jobs and go on to have children out of wedlock. As parents we worry about the slightest things for our children, like chemicals in our plastic bottles or mercury in our fish, but why do we ignore the 800-lb gorilla that is out of wedlock births and divorce? Those two social events are far more traumatic to our children than anything else we could put them through. Edited November 23, 2009 by thom3 Link to post Share on other sites
silverfish Posted November 25, 2009 Share Posted November 25, 2009 Then thats an economic issue rather than a marriage issue. Poorer children do worse at school than richer children. Obviously being poor affects your ability to fund a wedding, buy your own home, afford health and dental care, raise your children wiithout both parents having to work, buy healthy food...the list goes on There are many other factors to consider, and to focus on marriage as the cure for the ills of society seems ridiculous to me. Link to post Share on other sites
burning 4 revenge Posted November 25, 2009 Share Posted November 25, 2009 the US is an extremely puritanical and conservative society... Are you kidding me... Link to post Share on other sites
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