Is Getting Married Just Mindless Conformity?

hoodwinked

Agricola wrote: »

Theres the guilt too! Friend of mine is with his gf 5 years now. Hes 29, shes 34. Hes keeping his head down and hoping it goes away but it won't. Hes getting it in the neck bigtime from his future in-laws, his own family and from various others. Her clock is ticking and if he doesnt man up soon, she will do it for him I reckon!

See that to me is wrong! it actually reminds me of my brother in law and his new wife,

they had been dating 6 years when i met my husband, we went on to have our daughter and agreed to get married based on factors such as

a. We loved each other,
b: we got along fantastically in every sense from day to day living to the way we are in general.
c: for him to have full rights to our daughter (which i maintain he should have anyways)
d: to improve our finances since we are living together with joint finances anyway via tax credits

there were loads more reasons which influenced our decisions in the positive for marriage,

from the moment we got engaged the brother in law was not only getting the quoted above, but decided him and his new wife had to get in there first (aka before his little brother got married) even though we were living together with a child, we saw each other warts and all, they never lived together.

they rushed everything because she believes herself to be some kind of princess and of course had to have the fairytale wedding to continue her 'fairytale' life, before 'we stole the limelight'

we pretty much did exactly what we wanted...our way on our budget.

ill let you decide which one worked out better,

anyone who gets married like they did, to be married 'first' or because they have been dating long term (especially when not living together) is a fool. They should get married because its something they themselves decided to do, not because of outside influences.

KwackerJack

Morag wrote: »

You don't have to be married to have legal guardianship of your child, you do how ever not get it automatically, you have to apply for it and if a garda didn't' know that then they are an idiot.

Was never mentioned. He simply said well if the child is with the mother there's nothing I can do!! Thanks for that info

A bit off the subject I apologise!

Doc Ruby

Ah marriage is a fool's game. Granted it once served a purpose but these days you'll save a few (very few) euros on the taxes (maybe) in exchange for all sorts of legal obligations and the potential for a bill that will make your savings into pocket change if things don't go just right.

If you love someone you shouldn't need a legal contract to spend your life with them. If you don't love someone you shouldn't be trying to legally bind them to you. Some say that the contract helps keep two people together when things get rough - if they can't stay together when things get rough anyway maybe they shouldn't be together.

Don't get married. Its not natural.

livinsane

KwackerJack wrote: »

Was never mentioned. He simply said well if the child is with the mother there's nothing I can do!! Thanks for that info

A bit off the subject I apologise!

It is straightforward enough to obtain legal guardianship if the mother consents.

If not, contact your local district court. They have family law days where you can apply for a court order for guardianship.

See here

And don't mix up custody with guardianship as the former has less rights, e.g. mother can still obtain a passport without your consent.

thier

In my opinion, the only reasons to get married are

1) you desperately want to have children or
2) you have lived life to the full, done everything you possibly wanted to do with your life and now you've nothing left to do. And you're old and incapacitated so you get married because you've nothing better to do anyway and it's the one thing you haven't done yet.

Madam_X

Marriage isn't a mere slip of paper. If you want to be in a long-term relationship with no familial or legal/financial ties to each other (e.g. if one partner dies, may as well be a stranger) and if you have children and the father doesn't want an increase in his already miniscule parental rights, fine. But marriage will ensure all of the above is looked after.
What way the marriage is marked/celebrated is up to the couple.

Plenty of men want to get married too btw.

Seems to be some projecting on this thread - why be so bothered by other people's decision? And those who are vehemently opposed to it might change their mind if/when they meet the right person. It isn't always something that's forced. Lots of marriages don't work out, that's true (just like lots of long-term relationships don't work out) but not taking the chance in case it doesn't work out is stupid IMO.

RADIUS

I would argue that it is conformist to be anti-marriage nowadays.

When I told my friends and family that I was getting married (at 25), I suffered a lot of derision and slagging from 'mates' who could not wrap their heads around it. Some extended family members had trouble with the idea as well, not in the least because she is 'foreign'.

We did it with a civil ceremony that cost very little.

Best thing I ever done was marry my wife.

darced

This post has been deleted.

Mr Benevolent

No-one has mentioned that in Ireland marriage is the only way of legally having all the concomitant rights of access to your children if it goes wrong.

anncoates

I'll ask the wife and get back to you.

Mr Benevolent

RADIUS wrote: »

Some extended family members had trouble with the idea as well, not in the least because she is 'foreign'.

She's from Cork?

dj jarvis

so are single people, or couples who are not married, any happier or un happy than married people ?

your post assumes that the former are happier than married couples
and this assumption is stupid

every section of society is as un happy or happy as each other in equal measure

what is it about about AH today and the not so intelligent threads

Banjaxed82

As far as boring/fighting/divorcing married couples, etc, etc.

From the perspective of someone who's parents split up when I was young. I had a kid prior to marriage, got married, then had 2 more kids (with same woman). My conclusion is this: Marriage doesn't change a relationship. Kids do.

People like to make a big deal about it, but it's just a piece of paper. Kids are the real "marriage" that people often refer to (knowingly or not) in these discussions.

keithclancy

LivelineDipso wrote: »

I was just thinking about the Gay adoption thread and thinking about the need to get married. Most married people I know are not happy and staying together 'for the sake of the kids'. The rest are seperated, divorced, getting divorced...

Very few I can say are truly happy as a married couple. Most are just playing the game because getting married is what you do...

What makes Gay people want to emulate this? In some Western Countries the divorce rate is over 50% now and in some parts of the USA is close to 80%.

Yet people still 'tie the knot' and think it is something THEY HAVE to do.

It's just social conditioning like religion when you think about it and considering the VERY SERIOUS legal implications of getting married, then why so many people enter into it without due consideration for the full implications and often negative consequences?

Being in love is not a valid excuse - that's just homones and neuro-transmitters.

I got married in a Hotel by a registrar ... whats that got to do with religion ?

hoodwinked

Banjaxed82 wrote: »

As far as boring/fighting/divorcing married couples, etc, etc.

From the perspective of someone who's parents split up when I was young. I had a kid prior to marriage, got married, then had 2 more kids (with same woman). My conclusion is this: Marriage doesn't change a relationship. Kids do.

People like to make a big deal about it, but it's just a piece of paper. Kids are the real "marriage" that people often refer to (knowingly or not) in these discussions.

i agree with what you say on kids being the 'real' marriage in that i came across a journal about two years ago where a study showed that 50% of couples who marry before having a child end up divorced, and 10% (roughly- maybe less it was 2 years ago) for couples who had children before marrying. the fact that out of every 2 couples without children 1 of them will get divorced is why it stuck in my head.


the jist of what they were saying the stress, the sleepiness nights along with the adjustments of having a third person taking all the love and affection was a relationship killer amongst married people

where because unmarried couples were technically not tied together it was a more psychologically 'im here because i want to be' thing as opposed to the married peoples 'im here because i have to be' that did the most damage!


i don't agree marriage is just a piece of paper though, its more than that its a legally binding institution which offers privileges and protections to your other half, little things like legally taking your husbands name (or him taking yours) all add to these. It also defines the extent of your relationship, it says i am committed to this man/woman for life because i chose to. a piece of paper doesn't do all that.

BraziliaNZ

For a while, after all my mates back home got pressured into getting married by their GFs, I thought women were just crazy wedding and child obsessed lunatics. I've been lucky enough to have met similar minded women to myself in the last few years, so my opinion has changed! Each to their own I guess, but I'm just relieved to know I'm not the only one who thinks it's a load of bollocks, and these ridiculous weddings with speeches etc make them want to vomit. Why people must inflict them on their friends and relatives is beyond me.

dj jarvis

BraziliaNZ wrote: »

For a while, after all my mates back home got pressured into getting married by their GFs, I thought women were just crazy wedding and child obsessed lunatics. I've been lucky enough to have met similar minded women to myself in the last few years, so my opinion has changed! Each to their own I guess, but I'm just relieved to know I'm not the only one who thinks it's a load of bollocks, and these ridiculous weddings with speeches etc make them want to vomit. Why people must inflict them on their friends and relatives is beyond me.

but not everyone has that type of wedding , i have been to plenty that have been as far from the norm as you like

a case of each to their own , and mostly sour grapes from most i suspect

LivelineDipso

I also read once that childless married couples have the most successful, long-term and happy unions. If this is true, then this is a very telling stat.

BraziliaNZ

dj jarvis wrote: »

but not everyone has that type of wedding , i have been to plenty that have been as far from the norm as you like

a case of each to their own , and mostly sour grapes from most i suspect

I would say the majority of people have that wedding, in Ireland anyway. All of my friends said they were just going to elope, or have like 20 people there, then they turned into castles in Offaly and whatnot.
I suppose it's just something I'll never get.

Mrmoe

Spending huge sums of money on a wedding just for the sake of it is pointless and mindless conformity. I married my wife in a civil ceremony with no more than 20 people there. That is what we wanted but some people would make you believe that it isn't a proper wedding unless you have a huge crowd and spend lots of money.

keithclancy

BraziliaNZ wrote: »

For a while, after all my mates back home got pressured into getting married by their GFs, I thought women were just crazy wedding and child obsessed lunatics. I've been lucky enough to have met similar minded women to myself in the last few years, so my opinion has changed! Each to their own I guess, but I'm just relieved to know I'm not the only one who thinks it's a load of bollocks, and these ridiculous weddings with speeches etc make them want to vomit. Why people must inflict them on their friends and relatives is beyond me.

In our case we would have been just as happy going to City Hall and getting married, then going for a meal and on the lash with friends.

However since we live abroad a Wedding is a great reason for your entire family to come together and see each other. We traveled back to Ireland, loaded up the car with a rake of Wine.

Wedding was a great craic, only invited close family and people we've know for longer than 5 years.

Had a civil ceremony in the Hotel, would have done it in the Church but it was too inconvenient tbh.

Was the last wedding my Grandad was at before he passed away, he had a great time.

Didn't go crazy on the spending either, we budgeted the wedding to the amount we could save up before hand, and the wife haggled like f*ck.

We already had a Samenlevingscontract (pretty much a Civil Partnership) which is kind of the opposite of being Married and recommended before you buy a house.

Its just a contract that sets out up front who owns what, who's expected to pay for what and what happens if it doesn't work out. You don't have to follow it but it suits some people and its recommended that same fiscally for tax purposes (Although not in Germany)

I'm delighted to be Married anyway, theres not really any difference to be honest, took about a year to get used to calling each Wife or Husband :pac:

I wouldn't say we were forced into anything really, we took getting married seriously, its a big commitment (although to be honest I think buying a house together is a bigger commitment)

Saying that ... we almost got Speed married at a Music Festival a few years back ... :pac::pac::pac::pac:

BraziliaNZ

I actually got married once when I was 20 ffs, we kind of needed to so I could live in her country. It was a shotgun wedding type thing, no one knew, and we were so young and stupid we thought it would last anyway. Sounds like a Coronation st storyline.

Fighting Irish

yup, it's just some bull****

eviltwin

With my husband since our teens, did everything backwards. Had the baby, then bought the house, only got married when I was 31 and he was 36. We did it cause it was what we wanted, married 4 years now and honestly I can't imagine being any other way.

squirrelohara

Answering the original question.....yes I believe so. It's beyond me how a couple can stay happy after a 5 year period. Even up to that long it seems impossible. The so called "spark" would be well gone by then.

But then again....I'm kind of a pessimist about marraige and kids haha

aaronjumper

My parents are still together but are not married. Works for them.
Filthy hippies :pac:

Madam

20 years married next year, we've had our ups and downs - more ups than downs , thank god;). Didn't have to get married but we both wanted to, its been the best decision we ever made and as I said its not always been a bed of roses and I suppose we're just lucky we met each other. Not to say we wouldn't have been just as happy 'living over the brush'

Horses for courses, we have friends who are unmarried and ones married, in all honesty doesn't really make that much difference as long as their happy with their lot, no piece of paper will make the difference.

Son Of A Vidic

LivelineDipso wrote: »

Can't you tell I am single and lonely?

With a username like that, I can't possibly guess why.

FullblownRose

Well, how well you do as a couple depends on how well you can handle what life throws at you, how much thought and work you're prepared to put into the partnership, etc. I don't think it's fair to say people are foolish or anything like that, to get married. A lot of people will, in a moment of annoyance or frustration, say to a friend that they they regret marrying, doesn't mean they do deep down. It's not always easy for everyone and not many people are happy *all* of the time whether or not they are married.

rolliepoley

LivelineDipso wrote: »

Can't you tell I am single and lonely?

Its an is institution, Beware of your actions mindless or other.:p