Older women on TikTok telling younger women not to get married...

[Monsteronthehill]

I'm finding this trend fascinating - mostly because it's not just women who have had divorces or are in unhappy marriages giving this advice - it also includes women who admit they are happily married but still saying don't do it.

So I was wondering. If you are happily married, would you tell a 20 year old woman that she should get married, too? I’m not trying to bash marriage, just interested in how attitudes are shifting. It seems like a big change from how older generations used to talk about it as being the best/only viable option. I do think women don't generally benefit from marriage as much as men do. There's of course the consideration that if you have kids and/or assets then being married is better financially for the woman should you split up, but I don't think this is what it's getting at here, just that marriage in general is a raw deal for women.

In many cases especially on here you see that women don't realise they've married a dud until the children come along. So what do you do to insulate yourself from that as much as possible? I absolutely agree that the best way to ensure you have a good life and career if you want it and be a mother is to have a supportive partner but you often find out far too late if that's not the case. I guess I'm just curious why the women who are reasonably content with everything still think it's not a great move.

Fwiw I speak as someone who is not unhappily married as such but not exactly twirling round like Julie Andrews, either, but I'd never tell someone else what to do with their life and not that they'd listen anyway!

If you actually look at that story it's absolutely insane that it's being reported as "get married"!

Yes the first question does have married women with children as the happiest and unmarried women without as the least happy but it conveniently doesn't mention "unmarried with children" scores higher for happiness than "married without children." So it's the "child" aspect that is relevant not the marriage one.

Not to mention the fact that a survey carried out by the "Institute for Family Studies" and the Wheatley institute which describes its MO as "Strengthening society through research-supported work that fortifies the core institutions of family, religion, and constitutional government" is hardly going to be objective!

It seems fairly obvious to me that if you have other people living in your house and interacting with you every day you might be less likely to be lonely than if you live alone. But you are also significantly MORE at risk of physical and mental abuse - obviously they don't ask that question!

Think of lockdown -single person households were struggling in one way, women in abusive relationships in another. Neither is automatically harder or worse.

Really?? Im currently being fucked over in divorce. I would and have said to both my DDs to ensure that anything financial is ringfenced, house deposits etc. If they have children its a 50/50 shared split. If they desire to be a SAHM, make sure hes a millionaire.

god yeah, my tolerance went the same way as my oestrogen.

I m married and wouldn’t tell people not to get married, we’ve been a team through a lot of shot, but I’d tell them not to be a sahm and always to have their own savings

😭😭😭 so the best time to marry is never??

Or once menopause has passed maybe?

😭😭 when then? Surely not during your good premenopausal years

Humans weren’t designed to be monogamous and marriage is a Victorian institution.

I’m in a tricky marriage of 23 years - 50% super nice but 50% very difficult. I fell in love with the nice bit without knowing enough about the difficult bit.

I have two young adult children and no, I would not advise them to get married. I won’t actively discourage it, but by not mentioning it much and not elevating its importance, I’m hoping neither child will see it as the be all and end all. It’s just not worth the hassle at the end of the day.

For me it’s because I’ve watched so many seemingly good men show their true colours after marriage, I recognise that actually my ‘good’ marriage is largely the product of luck, not my ingenuity as I might have previously thought. You said yourself many women don’t realise who they have married until after kids, so whilst I am a ‘lucky’ one who it has gone well for (although still would say it’s been smooth sailing!) I’ve seen enough tricky marriages around me to recognise why young women need to be careful when deciding, and they should set up their lives so marriage is a choice, not a necessity (ie build independent financial means).

Now I am 20+ years in I can understand the risks much more.

It probably depends whether or not you want to have children and reduce your hours or give up work. It is generally a bad idea to do that if you’re not married (unless you are seriously wealthy in your own right).

Never 😂

Getting married is only financial protection if the woman is the lower earner. In my case I out-earned my exh so it benefited him in the divorce. I wish I had never married the fuxker - I didn’t need to marry for financial stability and could have had kids whether we were married or not obviously. So I think it’s good advice.
Many more women are earning more than men than in days gone by. Marriage may not be the smartest financial decision.

Would I tell the average 20 yr old to get married? No, but I wouldn’t tell them not to either.
What I would say is that it is very important to be aware of what marriage gives you, and what you don’t have if you’re not married (both in terms of benefits but also downsides). It is not “just a piece of paper”, it can protect you, but can also mean you lose assets. People who say “we don’t need to get married, because it’s just a piece of paper” are idiots. There are very valid reasons to not get married (if DH were to die, Iwouldn’t remarry and risk losing my house in a divorce, for example) but thinking it’s just an irrelevant bit of admin is not one of them. It’s so important people understand the legal situation they are in.
For example, a colleague of mine is fully convinced that because she’s been with her partner for 10 years, they are viewed as married legally and so if they split it wouldn’t matter that she works part time, and isn’t on the mortgage, because she’d get half his pension, half the house etc.

It makes sense that women who prioritise relationships and connections over money and careers are happier. I'm amazed at how many people try to convince women that money and a career are more important. I work to live and enjoy luxuries with my family, I don't live to work.

I think if you are making life choices based around what a stranger says on tiktok then you are probably too immature to commit to another person. And probably the world would benefit from you not reproducing either.

😄😄

I would tell women that they need to think about marriage as a legal contract, which it is. I would also advise that they are very careful who they marry esp as regards assets. With young women now earning well with careers and having their own properties they need to look after no. 1.

How are you going to pay for those luxuries if you have a poorly paid job?

We’ll be telling both of ours that it isn’t sensible to marry someone who doesn’t bring a similar level of finance to the relationship to them.

But if a woman doesn’t have her own financial security how can she make a free and sensible choice? If she needs to be married, it becomes less about choice, and the duds tend to swarm for those women!

Having been married and divorced I wouldn’t do it again. I mainly did it because it was expected. I don’t need a man for financial security but a good relationship makes your life exponentially better. This is what I’d want my DC’s to focus on.
I’d want to keep finances separate and have a joint bills account as I did when married. If I buy a house with a partner I’d legally secure any financial investment each partner brings in case we’d split up, having learned from divorce. That’s the only advice I’d give to my DC’s. Their life choices are their own.
But I’d never want either of them to be financially reliant on another person to the extent it limits their choices
My DC isn’t interested in marrying his long term partner now, but they probably will one day. They’re far better suited than me and his dad were so likely to do better than we did anyway.

I’m torn, I’ve been married for 40 years and having the financial protection of marriage is essential as I have smaller pension etc.
My DD however is not married to her partner of over 8 years and has a 6 year old, they earn the same but she has a far better pension ( Teacher) and we gave her 80% of the deposit for their house.
She has him as beneficiary of her pension and life cover if she died and they own the house jointly.
In reality, the benefit to being married for them is in death, as it stands we would need to administer her estate and his parents to do his

I don't have what I perceive to be a poorly paid job and I am doing a job I trained for and that I find fulfilling. I'm not a high earner but I earn enough for nice holidays because I don't wear designer clothing, I cook from scratch with ingredients from Aldi or Lidl, I'm driving an old car that I bought outright for 5k 8 years ago and I spend £6 per month on my phone. If I wanted to, I could increase the hours I put in and progress in my career but I'd rather be focused on my family than have the latest designer handbag, iPhone and shiny new car.

I don't think people are, and I don't think that's the point. It's more to do with exploring why older women have formed this opinion. I also generally don't think we should dismiss platforms as places of huge social influence as they are and it's only going to go further in this direction.

Im doing all that now in my 30s with out seeking a husband or partner.
Ive never wanted marriage.