To ask what happened to having traditional values?

[mozzarellasticks]

I'm 23 and from a very young age I was told that it was 'right' to live life in a 'traditional' order.
For example: being in a relationship with someone, buying a house, getting married, and then having kids.
Not trying to be smug or on a high horse, just wondering what happened and why people are getting pregnant after knowing someone for 5 minutes. I'm generally considered to be have old fashioned views but want to know why no one else feels the same way

Do you really think you're the only one with old fashioned views?
And while I agree getting pregnant after knowing someone a short while isn't sensible, I don't agree uou need to be married first.

Wait, you’re living together before marriage in your scenario? Slut.

@StealthPolarBear
Yes, I do - and I don't feel like anyone bothers getting married anymore either

@YippeeKayakOtherBuckets 😂😂😂

Oh, to be 23 and smug again!

Just a warning, OP - life doesn't always go the way you plan it. You'll soon find that out.

and I don't feel like anyone bothers getting married anymore either

None of your business

Some of us share those values OP, we just seem to be a dying breed...

@peachgreen I know it doesn't. We lost a parent last year which definitely wasn't part of the plan

Real Life.

That's what gets in the way of it - and it always has.

@FriarTuck I'm glad I'm not alone!

Loads of people can't afford to buy houses.
I did it all in the 'correct' order, was widowed at 35 and now plan to shag about a bit.

There used to be stigma about having kids out of wedlock because of the lawful consequences, it’s not so much a thing now - in the old days it would affect inheritance etc but it’s not an issue anymore as ‘illegitimate’ children are legally equal to those born with marriage.
Additionally, with things like the housing crisis not everyone is able to get on the property ladder at a young age and may wish to marry/have kids before buying.
Attitudes change over time and what is important to one generation won’t be to another.
I also think marriage isn’t for everyone so not everyone will see it as a necessary step.

Decisions should be based on logic and reason, not vague nonsense like "traditional values". Getting pregnant when not married may be a poor decision but equally it may be absolutely the right choice for the individual given their situation and goals. There a plenty of people who got married, bought a house and had kids in that order who are absolutely miserable.

But why is it right? I can see why getting pregnant without being able to support and care for your child isn't fair to the child, I can see why getting pregnant to a partner you haven't known long enough to know to know they'll be a good parent isn't wise. I don't see why having a baby without getting married hurts anyone. I don't see why having a baby and renting your home hurts anyone.

I think that "traditional values" can refer to just doing things the way they've been done before without really thinking it through. I don't see why that's a good thing.

It's a shame they are considered old fashioned values now.
We see so many kids coming from broken homes, sometimes because the couple have known one another 5 mins.

We weren't married first but had been together for four years and married the year after we had dc1.

FWIW I think you are right, certainly not smug. However, as most people are as you describe you'll not have many agree with you on here.

People did things 'wrong', realised the sky didn't fall in on them and carried on.

Most of the people I know who did things 'right' (got married then had kids) have, to me, known each other for a very short time in comparison to me who is not married but had kids with DP after 8 years - most of them were met, married and enchilded within 3 years.

Tradition has no inherent value.

The vast majority of friends my age are married, certainly those with kids are.
However I’m 39 not 23 - no one I was friends with at that age was married, we’d have thought they were nuts.

Yes that's how I envisaged my life panning out when I was 23. But life doesn't generally tend to go as planned for all sorts of reasons.

The quickest Google would tell you that 239,000 couples got married in the UK last year, so plenty of people still clearly do care about it.

What effect does everyone else's life choices have on you? Living by the rules set by your parents as you were growing up doesn't automatically make their/your way correct and everyone who deviates from that path wrong. . Times have changed.

We weren't married first but had been together for four years and married the year after we had dc1

So you’re bemoaning the lack of “traditional values” but didn’t get marrried first? Do as I say, huh?

People also ended up getting married way too young and way too soon because it was frowned upon to be having sex/living with a partner out of wedlock, ended up in unhappy relationships and bringing kids up in unhappy environments so......

I also think ‘traditional’ values means marrying young because it’s the ‘right’ thing to do, and of course in the old days you weren’t allowed to sleep in the same bed as your partner until you married so lot of people did it just to bonk! And then you had a lot of people in unhappy marriages who married because they felt they had to, and unable to leave as divorce was too stigmatised.

The idea that buying a house should be a precondition for having children is ridiculous

Lots of young people today will not be able to afford a house until they are well past childbearing age.

Under 'traditional values' they won't be able to have kids at all.