When did marriage become taboo for younger people?

It’s not but what has happend is true adulthood does not set in for many now until like age 30 or even older.

Taboo is the wrong way of viewing it. Once the idea takes hold that sexual activity on the part of a woman no longer marks her as “damaged goods” (at least amongst the peers she considers worthy of her), the incentive to surrender her freedom lines up with that of men. Once the slut label barrier is eliminated, women have the option to roam as freely as their male counterparts for an extra decade or even 2 as the determinant shifts to minding their child bearing biological clocks.

Not taboo.

Pure rational thought.

1) 50% of marriages end up in divorce. With a success rate like that, what’s the point?

2) Economics. Women don’t need to be married in order to live. They can live and succeed without being taken care of by a man. Why any woman would want to be under the control of a man (e.g. moslem countries) is beyond me.

3) Where is the advantage – emotional, financial, social – to marriage?

From a rational point of view, marriage makes no sense.

I think I am one of those people, even though I am in my 40s and married. I’m very confused about this question. Who says you can’t have commitment without marriage? I’d also like to ask how marriage got to be so fashionable in the first place. Why is it rational to want to get married? I genuinely don’t understand.

There were less opportunities in the past for young women in particular. Also roles were very prescribed, for example, loving your husband and having children was a priority.

These days materialism has meant that higher salaries are required and many couples want to be able to attend university etc., in order to sustain a certain lifestyle. They also want to know for sure that they can afford the children they do have. Many younger people without education can’t find jobs and are paid very low minimum wages when they do

Today’s world is all about self actualization, self authentication and growing into your full potential. A persons brain is not fully developed until they are in their 20s. This was probably a good thing in days gone by, as people made the choice at such young ages to marry someone they thought they knew, only to find out they didn’t even really know themselves. (Tongue in cheek).

The libido of young people promotes sexual activity that until recent years likely resulted in having children, which required that they marry at an early age or risked social condemnation. Furthermore, women’s limited opportunity to achieve personal financial means then required them to marry to reduce the likelihood that they and their children would be living in poverty. Today the risk of pregnancy is greatly reduced and opportunities to pursue careers increased. The “terror” that @Lemley suggests exists, likely is not of marriage but of such pursuits being limited.

Society no longer forces marriage on young women or young men. They don’t need it to have sex. They don’t understand what being happily married means or gives you. I don’t blame them.

I don’t think it’s taboo. It’s just not necessary the same way any more.

When I was in university 40 years ago, young men were desperate to get married before they graduated from university. They seemed to think they couldn’t survive on their own. Maybe some of them couldn’t .

Teaching boys to cook in family studies/home ec seems to have cleared a lot of that silliness up.

People can choose to get married when they’ve found someone they want to be in a long-term partnership with, who they want to care for and who will care for them.

I don’t see it as taboo for younger folk; I just think more and more are getting married somewhat older for reasons stated above; they can have sex without getting pregnant, they are starting a career, and they can live independently. It seems to me that most of my sons’ friends have gotten married in their late twenties or early thirties and that those young women I know who are not married and are in their later thirties are unhappy about it.

Wait..what does this sentence even mean: “Interestingly, none of the people I’ve discussed this with seemed to have rational reasons for not wanting to get married” What, exactly, would you consider a rational reason?

Funny. I over heard a conversation between a waitress and customer at the restaurant we ate at yesterday. The place was virtually empty, except for us and them, so they were carrying on the conversation from across the room. The customer was talking about getting together with her husband in 1972, etc. The young waitress said she’s not even interested in getting married. Too much hassle, she said. And she’d have to change her name, she said. I had to laugh. I almost said, “AND you’ll have to include ALL of the last names you’ve ever had in your Facebook name so if anyone comes looking for you they can find you!” But I didn’t.

I just don’t think there is any particular advantage to getting married any more…except that you still get your spouses, or ex spouses SS (if you were married for at least 10 years) when they die. But who knows where that’s even going to be 10 years from now.

Well, and there is always the fact that if your spouse dies unexpectedly the husband or wife is automatically entitled to all the inheritance. But what young kid thinks about stuff like that?

I was reminded of a comment my boyfriend in college and I had not long after we broke up. He said, “I know you always wanted to get married.”
I looked at him strangely and said, “I never said I wanted to get married.” That made him stop and think, and then I saw it dawn on his face that I had, actually, never once said any thing about marriage during the two years we were together.
It was just assumed all women wanted to get married.

I’m 31 and I’m not married. I don’t know if I ever will be. It’s not because I think it’s taboo or there’s something wrong with it, I just think, overall, it’s a silly and pointless concept. Except for the benefits you get from getting married, it really doesn’t mean anything.

The benefits are the point. 2 to face the world should make it easier. That’s the theory. And then there’s the compulsion afflicting so many around parenthood. Rarely a rational decision.

Not taboo.

Ask the gay community if they think marriage is worth fighting for as a civil right. They understand better than most young people how being married affords you legal safeties you cannot achieve with just contracts and legal documents. Young people tend to not worry about the legal aspect, because no one is really explaining it to them, overall they are discouraged to get married at a young age, and now it is morally acceptable to live together, or even live apart, but have sex and a full romantic relationship in every aspect of the expression.

The biggest change in the last 50+ years is women have more financial independence, and don’t need a husband to have adequate shelter and food.

I know plenty of young people who are getting married or got married recently. The people under the age of 25 tend to not live in large cities. The people in large cities seem to be more likely to marry later. Also, education level seems to have some influence. There must be stats on that. More and more people have college degree now compared to years ago.

Also, having a baby out of wedlock doesn’t carry the shame it did before.

Marriage is a legally binding contract.
Try to exit a relationship without a marriage certificate and you’ll understand that marriage is a conceit for the wealthy. Culminating in the pre-nup.
Poor people “split the sheets.”

I was 27 when I first married and my wife was 23. Ten years later, she left because I attempted to curb her drinking; I got a no-contest divorce two years later. I married again when I was 53. Between those years, I kept dating women with alcohol and other substance dependencies. When I met the woman who is now my wife, she was nothing like those I had known before.

If I had been younger, I would not have even considered even dating her since she was totally opposite from me. Because of my history of failed relationships, we dated for over three years before I proposed. Now nearly 25 years later, I could not be happier. It was not for economic advantages, but for our loving companionship that our marriage has been and will continue to be successful.

Interestingly, none of the people I’ve discussed this with seemed to have rational reasons for not wanting to get married anytime soon, like not being sure if they really want to be with the person they are currently with or something.
There ii is there, when you strip all the bullshit off it the pragmatically logic one is left with is fear, what fear generated by some perceived loss of freedom, even if on a subconscious level; the fear of loss over the desire to gain. Rather than seeing a marriage as a life union and partnership with the person they chose and the desire to work to keep it together, they fear that if they chose the wrong person and things get dicey enough they can grab their fern, there pots, the cat and clothes and spilt; being free again. To validate that train of thought they manufacture ideas that marriage is some mind-jack use by the powers-that-be or the government to levy taxes on a person or extract money from them. Often it was parents or other adults that bamboozled the upcoming young with that fallacy. Imagine if business were ran that way, it would be total chaos, the moment someone got pissed, did not get their way they took their fax machine, the three employees they brought, the magazine rack, coffee maker, and their fil cabinets, packed up and left the business. Going even deeper the fear rides on the back of selfishness, I have to be happy, I am only with the other person if they contribute to my happiness. The young are told renting a relationship has more benefits than actually locking the deal down and getting the title.

Divorce is a pain in the butt.

@Hypocrisy_Central I’m sure fear has something to do with it for some of the people who don’t want to get married, but I guarantee that fear also has absolutely nothing to do with it for a lot of us, as well.

I wasn’t particularly interested in getting married, even after we’d dated for 4 years. Why should I? Getting married is a pain in the butt too. We’d discussed it a tiny bit, but I wasn’t interested. His proposal surprised me.

Well, it’s been 10 years so I get his SS!

When maintenance enforcement came around.

@Hypocrisy Central of course you either do or don’t want marriage for selfish reasons, otherwise what’s the point? But I don’t think that the reluctance on the part of young people to tie the knot has much to do with them being talked out of it. From a practical standpoint, just witnessing the spectacular failure rate must be daunting. And a whole slew of “happy ever after” examples are never as memorable as the one devastating horror story breakup. There is also the adage about the marriage industry taking a beating in times of economic uncertainty. The days are gone when that lifetime job guarantees the foundation to providing a secure future for a family. Then there’s the fact that most “benefits” formerly restricted to married folks are no longer exclusive to those with the ring and walk down the aisle. That leaves the supposedly uncontested motivation for marriage, the prospect of children. And here I think is probably THE major reason for the reluctance of young people in tying the knot. It is the deliberate decision on the part of legions of young women to delay or forego motherhood.

I don’t see it as taboo; neither do the young people in my world. I admit my world is upper middle class and educated.

@stanleybmanly @Hypocrisy Central of course you either do or don’t want marriage for selfish reasons, otherwise what’s the point?
Personal reasons are not always selfish reasons, but selfish reasons are always for one self. If you go into the marriage with the ideal of team, the ideal you are adding them to you as you would your arm that is one thing, if you go into it as a coat you can take off when it gets old, is another thing.

I think the problem has little to do with people walkin down the aisle thinking marriage a temp job. It’s more likely about the coat turninng out to be hot or suffocating, or simply not the item advertised. The oldest and most dependable story in the history of the world is the one about fools blinded by love. Thank God, there’s a way out when reality sets in.

Marriage is an old-peoples institution.
Until the 50’s it restricted interracial marriage, and until recently prohibited gays from marrying.