AIBU to think the term illegitimate children is outdated and offensive?

[TheAverageJoanne]

I heard someone talking about illegitimate children this morning. I thought that disappeared in the 60s, except perhaps on the TV show where people are reunited with babies given up for adoption. It's offensive and unfair.

60+ is hardly ancient!! I’m 60+ and like to think I keep up with modern parlance, the (right and just) acceptance of unmarried mothers etc.

maybe “born out of wedlock” should be resurrected.

She belongs to a bygone age. Or perhaps just lives somewhere, or comes from a culture, where it's still taken for granted that marriage precedes having children.

Mostly it's not relevant whether parents are married until there's a breakup or death, so there is no need to have a phrase handy to describe families in the local nursery.

I’m 59, I would say anyone using this term would be distinctly older than me, it isn’t a term my friends would use. My first ds was only ever called it once by someone my parents age, and I remember being shocked as I hadn’t heard it about a modern baby. I suppose I’d think them puritanical and nasty with it, rather than a particular age.group.

There are plenty of words which were used in days of old, which are simply not used anymore, we know exactly what they mean, we also know there are greater connotations in their association, so we have more modern language, legally and in conversation. This is one of them.

It was used in an aunt’s will. She left everything to be divided between her nieces and nephews, but if any should predecease her, their share should go to any children, ‘whether natural or adopted, legitimate or illegitimate’.

That last was certainly included by a solicitor, to avoid any possible arguments later. I doubt very much that she’d have thought of such a thing herself.

I've only heard it in historical context - where it can matter - it's common in DH and my family trees - and despite my assumptions it does look like often the family were the support in many cases

Most of my DC friends most of their parents aren't married - and when they are few happen after kids were born - but what make my DC unsual is not only are we married still and before they were born so are/were both sets Grandparents - last few direct genertaions have been very straight foward and boring. If I felt need to mention it probably say parents co-habit or co-parent if not in same house.

Their cousins live in complex modern families - muliple half siblings and lots of persudo step siblings ie live together in house as kids for few yeras but no actual marriages happened.

Yuck no. My brother manages to shoe horn into as many conversations as possible that his DC are the only ones on their generation who are "legitimate" or "born in wedlock". My cousin and I both think its weird. It makes literally no difference to our DC. He also talks about how his DC will be doing things "the right way". That is, marriage where the woman takes the "man's" name, and then children.

I can see the use if there were titles to inherit. But as we don't have those it literally means nothing.

And just to clarify, my cousin and I don't have children together! It reads a little like we do.

I'm 68 and it was used when I was a child. At school in the 60s it was rare for a child to have unmarried parents, in fact I didn't know of anyone. Even divorce was whispered.
I haven't heard it used outside of the law in 40 years.
I do remember my DC (now late 20s) used to hate the fact that DH and I had different surnames because teachers assumed they were from a "broken home". This is only 20 years ago, albeit rural village school.

I'm 58 and would never use it. Nor am I aware of many of my friends in their 60s/70s would find it unusal so many relationshops are not married...

As a point of information-lots of people of 60 and over chose not to marry and had children “out of wedlock”!

Horrible, ridiculous word. I hadn't heard it for many years, either.

I can see a legal purpose, but it should never be used to hurt someone's feelings or insult them, or to make someone feel smug or superior.

Also "bastard" of course, and "broken home". I can tell you that as a child, who naturally blame themselves, I definitely heard "you broke your home".

In the context the op has posted, I would have wondered if the person was using the correct word - how would they know the marital status of the parents of all the other nursery kids?

Could she have been saying “illegal immigrants” that was misheard by OP as “illegitimate” for example? Certainly seems to be a lot more people around with a bee in their bonnets about THAT these days rather than children born out of wedlock. It’s also something that shouldn’t matter, but would make more sense with his times have changed!

I think outside of the legal system, like the situation mentioned by @Badbadbunny , where property, titles etc are being inherited, there isn't a need to be publicly commenting on the marital status of people's parents.

The point I was making is that the woman speaking , if she was using such an outdated phrase , would have heard it commonly used . Which it definitely was. As in born in 1960 upwards . Most people have moved on from it but obviously she hasn't . Not saying ALL 60+ would use it normally.

It's mainly a legal term as everyone says.

It makes me think of Liz Hurley and Steve Bing's son not being able to inherit his grandfathers (Steve Bings father) wealth because he was "only" an illegitimate child, not a ligitimate child like his daughters children were, who inherited everything, leaving both of Steve Bings "illegitimate" children with nothing.

It's a perfectly servicable legal term. I'm over 60 and both mine are rather proud of being bastards! ( Disclaimer - they are both heavily into heroic fantasy where being the bastard son of so-and-so comes with dark and edgy overtones and probably a big sword and a black horse with fringes ... )
I agree that anyone trotting it out in normal conversation is probably meaning it as a criticism.

Unless Sean Bean is saying it (a la Game of Thrones). He is possibly the only person who should be allowed to.

Yes, you're right.

The first term I heard was for a relative who was born on (hushed voice) the wrong side of the blanket. Took me years to work out what that meant.

😂

Yes. And in the past, bastard could be an enviable title. There's an actual surname based on the fact that someone way back was a royal bastard.

My daughter when to Loughborough University and always pointed out the ornate wrought iron and carved stone 'Bastard Gate', put up by that family and proudly bearing their name.

Weirdly, when we registered our children’s births we were told that, should we later marry each other, we were legally required to re-register their births (I assume because they would then be deemed legitimate).

It isn’t, though. An act in the late eighties removed all legal distinctions between children born inside and outside marriage. Sure, it is still relevant in historical documents. I think the only place it’s legally relevant these days is in immigration law for people born when there was still a legal distinction between legitimate and illegitimate.

I imagine the woman the OP overheard is the kind of bigot you encounter a lot on Mn, who thinks that a child who uses both their parents surnames makes it look as if their parents aren’t married, as obviously all right-thinking women use their husband’s surname and give it to their children. It’s highly unlikely this person has been able to investigate the marital status of the parents of every child in the nursery.

My parents would be well into their 80s were they still living and they would never use that term. It’s just unnecessary. I think if I were to explain the legitimacy of an heir in a historical context I’d probably say X was considered illegitimate because his mother wasn’t married. Or something like that.

The main issue in that case though was that Steve Bing himself specifically excluded any offspring in his own will. Had he included them in his own estate they’d have had a far better chance of being included in the family trust when it went to appeal.