How many more women are going to find themselves in this situation ?

[sofrustratedbylackofknowledge]

Thread borne by the sheer amount of posts this week alone, of women who have moved in with wealthier men . Men who own houses solely in their name.. and women who have children with them without a contract of marriage or civil partnership..

The relationship breaks down and the woman is either not working or massively economically disadvantaged compared with their partners .

Made even worst by the courts bias towards shared care rendering CM almost negligible...

Why are women putting themselves in this situation. ?

Marriage has a lot of patriarchal connotations which are 'no go' for some women... but now we have civil partnerships why would you not go for this option .. ? Or is it the man refusing to commit ?

Also really concerned about the massive number of contraception failures . So many women taking the pill finding themselves pregnant and deciding to continue the pregnancy with no legal protection ..is the pill /implant failing ?

It's just common sense though, isn't it? You can make the emotional choice but you need to be aware that there's a risk that you're not acting in the best interests of yourself or your child. You can continue with a pregnancy without any legal protection but you should be aware that doing so makes you, and more importantly your child, incredibly vulnerable. It's not a smart thing to do unless you're independently financially secure and will be long term. People don't like to admit that though, as you've shown.

Both choices are emotional choices. And for the record my six year old is perfectly fine and has never been classed as vulnerable. Done now.

I'm happy for your good luck. As you frequently see on here, many many many women are not so lucky and they and their children suffer for it.

I agree with you OP, I think marriage is the feminist position.

Of course, in a totally misgynistic-free world it would be unnecessay, because women would not automatically be the ones making concessions to their earning potential to have children. Partnering up with a wealthier man without part owning the house and having children is a terrible position to be in. Just get married, it's protection. And if the partnertship starts out equal you just don't know what will happen with children, when relocation and promotion talk starts happening, and so on. If you are making decisions as a unit where the intention is that everyone will benefit from joint decisions, then the decent thing to do is protect both partners by formally building that unit into the law.

Disclaimer: I actually have a child without being married, but I have higher earning potential than DP and am the one who gave up career for childcare (so no guilt about fleecing him).

@Mumkins42 This is a really good post. I was absolutely influenced by my own upbringing (i.e. mothers stayed at home and looked after the children/house/pets/everything else, and dad went to work). I'm in my early 50s, though, so am probably older than a lot of the women posting here. I still wouldn't swap the time I spent with my children for any salary, though. Funnily, it was my ex husband who wanted us to get married, when I wasn't bothered. Little did either of us realise what a big favour he was doing me.

I don't think we need a change of laws, I think that we need women to really understand what marriage is: a form of legal protection.

Like many women, I was raised with this really romantic view of marriage. You meet the one! Your soulmate! You wear a beautiful dress and are a princess and it is the best accomplishment of your life!! And like lots of women I called bullshit and wanted no part in it. It actually took MN to make me realise that this picture plays into the hands of men who want to avoid marriage for the legal implications. We should stop romanticising marriage and bring it back to what women of the past understood: marriage is what ensures that the work that you put into the joint family unit doesn't walk out the door with your ex.

I don’t know a single person in real life who has put themselves in this situation.

Yes it's legal protection - get married if you want kids. And the comment about a waste of space man who looks after the kids. Well, it is his protection too. Children deserve this kind of protection because without them divorce is straightforward- if you have kids, protect them and get married before you have them.

Umm... there's no divorce without marriage.

I presume you mean that without marriage people splitting up is more straightforward.

Good. Fewer people living in miserable relationships.

Studies show clearly that separated parents does no damage to children, provided it is amicable and that the children are provided for financially.

So let's focus on:
*affordable, universal childcare
*removing sex discrimination in the workplace, directed at mothers in particular
*equalising the roles of men and women at home with men being expected to do 50% of child rearing
*removing the penalties in the tax system for single adult households
*encouraging women to become financially independent and remain so after having children
*enforcing proper CMS payments that equate to 50% of the costs of raising that child. And prison sentences for those who won't comply as with Council tax.

I'm a little younger but I'm with you. No regrets about the time taken out for my kids at all. If I have to live with lower income going forward because of it, still no regrets.

One thing this thread has really made me do is appreciate what a good man my husband is. I hope my sons will take him as a role model.

Sadly, a lot of Muslim women get fucked over by having an Islamic marriage only. I wish the law would change to automatically recognise these as legal marriages, as is the case with Jewish marriages.

I might be wrong but I think the reason they don't is that the ceremony doesn't include the elements that are required by law.

Also I have a feeling it is because when the bride and groom are asked if they enter the marriage they aren't in the same room.

@GiraffesCauseTrouble - I'm divorced and agreed! But get married to protect the children you have.

The rest is up to you

This.
Both parties need to realise the risks and implications of their decisions ESPECIALLY if there is inequality in earnings or assets

my partner and I have recently done a civil partnership. Together 30 years, 2 kids in their early twenties. Very equal in earnings / assets . We absolutely should have done it sooner but thankfully we are both decent people and i honestly believe neither of us would have screwed the other over.
I never wanted the big public display that a marriage presented (yes , I know it didn’t need to be so public) so a 20 minute civil partnership agreement protected both us us

this gives the same protection and is a very viable alternative for any partnership where one might not want a ‘marriage’.

Yup. And all the guff about "soul mates" and finding "the one"
Too much Mills and Boon, not enough common sense.

If you want to be married, then don't have a baby with a man who marry you-forget engagement-marriage is the key word,

If he knows you want to be married and he won't-doesn't matter what reason he gives-then he sees you as the bottle of sauce in the tombola, not the bottle of champagne. You are just the trial run, so that he can say to his future wife-I've never met anyone I wanted to marry until you-all the rest were just less than a wet fart.

If he loved you and wanted to be with you for ever then most men hotfoot it to the registry office.

If you're the one who doesn't want to get married, then crack on if you don't need his money or time to support the child.

So much misogyny here.

Women need men to look after them
Women can't earn more than men
Women can't support themselves
Women have to do most of the childcare
Women should sell themselves: a hole in return for a piece of paper. Just one without the Queen/ King's head on it, because then apparently it's respectable.

We need women to stand up and demand to be equal members of society with their own assets and incomes equivalent to men's. And teach young girls to expect to provide for themselves, and both partners to provide equally for the children in time and money. Then this whole issue is shown to be the irrelevancy that it is.

The focus shouldn't be on teaching young women how to obtain a share of men's assets. Teach them how to become financially secure in their own right instead.

I agree in part. The problem is that a lot of women (and men) still want one parent at home full time. A lot of people talk about how they couldn’t possible afford to work full time, but more often than not it’s because they want to. I think women should maintain their own careers, but it’s not going to happen for every woman. And there’s a small percentage who don’t have a choice due to their childrens needs/caring responsibilities.

Aside from banning sahp not sure how anyone outside the family can stop that.

If a person wants their partner to give up work to look after joint kids, then I think marrying them is the least someone could do.

And no one is teaching girls to take half a man’s assets. If you are married they are joint assets. Same when women are high earners and marry. They are joint. If you want someone to give up work to raise your joint children, but also won’t give them security and bet your financial future on it as well, you are not a good partner or person.

I won’t marry dp because I have more in assets. I have 2 kids. We are not having more. But if I wanted another child and expected dp to stay at home, I would marry him. I wouldn’t expect him to give so much up with no security.

The focus shouldn't be on teaching young women how to obtain a share of men's assets. Teach them how to become financially secure in their own right instead

I want my daughters to be financially stable of their own accord and not rely on a partner - howver having children unbalances this relationship.
Having 3 children I gave up work because it wasn’t financially viable or practical.

I am grateful I had the opportunity to raise my own children.

My career has suffered, my husbands career exploded financially and we do ok.

Is that right? Probably not!

Yes, you are right. They don’t necessarily include the elements of a civil wedding, but it would be trivial, e.g., if imams were given powers. Bride and groom don’t necessarily have to be in separate rooms.

A man can divorce a woman by saying the word 3 times. That is it. A woman needs to seek permission and jump through hoops for one. There are cases where women have been thrown out of their homes overnight. Many will be of a demographic where they don’t understand the implications of an Islamic marriage without a legal one.

@Shitfather oh I know about that and it's terrible that these women who believe they are married find themselves not so legally.

I believe a lot of work has gone on within the community to spread this message. I know friends of mine have been unable to book their Islamic ceremony without either a booked date for their civil wedding or their marriage certificate.

I was just saying that I think the reason the ceremony hasn't been included in the law is because the traditional format of it does not include the requirements under British law.

Yup. And all the guff about "soul mates" and finding "the one"
Too much Mills and Boon, not enough common sense.

Absolutely. The way people think about marriage in our society is disastrous. The awful Disney miasma of hearts and flowers, the competition to rush down the aisle. The obsession with engagement rings. It’s responsible for so much poor advice, wrong motivations and bad decision making. Particularly by women who have the most to lose.

We need to educate our children properly about what this means.

But the legal protections exist. Your friend could have refused to have a baby until they were married ( and there was reliable contraception available entirely free, I know , because I’m even older than you and I had it, unmarried, from the age of eighteen. Shagged a lot, never got pregnant).

She could have refused to play the ‘wife’ until she was the wife; yes, it would have caused big ructions, but not as big as when he decided that actually marriage was really attractive, just not to her. Sometimes you have to fight your corner.

Maybe what we have to do is to try to raise girls to say ‘no’ again. No, I’m not having our baby until we are married, that is, a legally recognised family unit. Why should the ‘law’ have to take the responsibility of protecting people against their own foolishness?

Unfortunately this will probably not occur for any religion which advocates or legitimatises polygamy, which is not the case with Judaism or Christianity (however, I know for Christianity and think for Judaism ) that the ceremony includes ‘registration’, that is a state sanction and recording of the marriage. So we are back to the point of marriage being a legal entity within the legal system of the country.

I think finance is something that should be addressed to boys and girls in schools. Budgeting, mortgage, pensions, savings, credit cards etc. I think this sort of information is important for children to learn and not every child has parents or guardians who can or will advise and teach this information.