I’m 36 and have been with my current girlfriend for almost 5 years now - my longest relationship yet. We live together & everything else couply, just not married. I see marriage as unnecessary pressure that has a tendency to put strain on the relationship. Right now if we’re happy together we stay, if we’re not we split. Simple. Marriage complicates it.
Marriage is just a formality, with the government. So there’s probably very little benefit if your jurisdiction recognizes defacto relationships, if it doesn’t there are some advantages, but also jurisdiction dependent.
Weddings are 100% bullshit.
100% agree. Marriage is a choice. Weddings carry a tremendous amount of unnecessary baggage, social obligations, and opportunities for the wedding industry to leech off of you.
Fully agree. We got married at the courthouse. 30 bucks I think for filing. We’ve always been happy with that.
Wedding we priced out. For only 50 people on the cheap we found it’s be minimum 15k in my area. Fuck that. May have a small thing on an anniversary, but not a wedding
This right there. We married because it’s easier and cheaper than notarizing our joint possessions.
I personally love being married
Nothing says ‘I love you’ like a legally binding contract.
Where I’m from if you live together a year it’s the same, legally, as marriage. So most people get married if they’re traditional/religious, or want a big party. There’s almost zero legal difference.
A cop told me, “There are two toothbrushes in the bathroom? Married.” Colorado, I think common law marriages kick in at 6 months.
That seems dumb. I share an apartment with a friend, which is getting more and more common in this housing market. Would this law mean we’d be married even though we’re just friends or does it only apply to men and women living together (and does that mean that 2 people of different sex cannot live together as friends without accidentally getting married?)
Idk about the states but where I’m from common law is also 6 months and generally is considered if people are living together as a couple for 6 mos. then they are technically in a common law marriage. They can make the claim on taxes or health insurance benefits whatever other claims and it is legally allowed.
Two roommates who don’t claim that they’re married anywhere legally are not in a common law marriage.
Same sex marriage is legal in my country so I assume this rule applies to any couple living together.
“Marriage” gives you benefits and rights just living together won’t.
This is why we got married.
If your GF has an accident and falls into a coma, you have zero say in her treatment, as you’re just a roommate as far as the hospital is concerned. You can’t even go see her. Her parents will most likely make all the decisions, do you trust them?
Inheritance is another, depending on the local laws, usually the spouse has different rules for inheriting than a roommate, even if you have a separate will in place.
In here for example the other spouse gets to live in whatever apartment or house they were in even if the other half goes to the children or whoever is next in line.
We got married for legal reasons. It’s much easier to get married than to get power of attorney, wills, and all that legal stuff done separately, so one day while sitting on the sofa looking at that stuff, I just said “hmm, you know, getting married is much easier”. And that was our proposal.
We got married with just our close relatives there, because my mom would kill me if I didn’t invite her, and his grandma would help out.
We DID have a big 10 year anniversary, because we wanted an excuse for a party, but it wasn’t wedding-like at all.
In addition to that, having kids, crossing international borders and moving to different countries are also things where marriage gives benefits.
And in some jurisdictions, there can be very significant tax advantages.
Which is why there was always a big fight for marriage equality.
But if you don’t want all these legal benefits, then co-habiting is fine.
I love being married, I met my wife 10 years ago and we got married 3 years later.
The wedding was just with our close family and homemade food, nothing expensive.
One big aspect of being married is that our relationship is not a question anymore. By being married we are committed to each other, it means we can make decisions accordingly.
For example I love the house we have, but without being married I don’t think we would have bought it. The house is a lot of work, will take years of renovation and is perfect for our family currently but would not be as good for either of us separately.
So if we were in the mindset that we could split up at any time we would have never bought this house.
I find marriage is actually freeing.
I think that’s the thing. It’s just the security. Buying a house with a decades long mortgage with someone is terrifying, being married shows there’s a commitment there. I’m reading these comments and they’re all like “love is love you shouldn’t be afraid of someone walking away”, but I’ll tell you what we were looking at buying a house while debating on marriage, and I’ll tell you we both relaxed a lot when we decided to get married.
Life throws very long term things at you that it’s very reassuring knowing you have a long term partner to be there, that they were willing to put it on the line for you and say they’re in it for the long haul with you. That if you have a child or get a mortgage or a car or anything they’ll be with you to help.
Yes there’s the legal things there too, and the tax benefits, but for me it’s all about the constant reminder around my finger that I have more than a significant other, more than just a boy/girlfriend, but a lifelong partner.
It truly is hard to describe to people who haven’t been married because we’ll, they’ve never felt it. I certainly didn’t know how it’d feel before.
Also I’m pretty sure banks give better terms to married couples vs two roommates buying a house.
I love being married. It gives my wife legal rights in my jurisdiction and it gives me legal rights in her jurisdiction should we decide to move.
For all intents and purposes you are married. Depending on where you live your relationship might even have a legal recognition despite not signing any papers.
Weddings are a waste of time and actually counterproductive to a stable relationship, I agree. Although not directly, it has to do with the system of values that celebrates form over substance.
We got married in 2011, moderate sized wedding and reception. What a waste of money. If I’d do it again I’d get married at a registry and then take the family out for dinner. Result would be the same and I’d probably be $20k AUD richer. 🤷
Being married is fine and pretty chill. Weddings are stupid
Our wedding budget was small, so we blew it on a great vacation, and got married on the beach in St Lucia. Neither one of us has a single regret.
The only reason my partner and I got married was to make insurance and taxes easier. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have done it. Only three people were at our wedding which was in our living room.
Over thirty years with my partner, not married, same reasons.
Legally you’re a couple, so technically if you each go your own way there’ll be some sort of “divorce” process in relation to assets, but I’ve never looked into it deeply.
We like being married! Were it not for marriage, it would have been significantly more difficult for us to live together as an international couple.
My partner and I dated for nearly a decade before we decided to get married. It’s more important that you two are on the same page than it is for you to measure up to some arbitrary cultural norm. Even after a decade, we still laid some ground rules and made some agreements about HOW we would handle things in a worst case scenario. Prenup/postnup type stuff. People may view this as nonromantic, but I can’t think of anything less romantic than arguing about shit after the fact with someone you already broke up with.
Make sure you have your paperwork in order though. If you want your partner to be able to make decisions for you in an emergency or if you want them to inherit something if the worst happens, you should check because you likely have to explicitly set that up.
deleted by creator
Just get married in law. You don’t have to go through the whole wedding thing if you don’t want to.
It depends where you live and what local laws are but usually it’s called something like “civil partnership”, it’s legally the same thing as a marriage and grants your partner all the same rights as they would if you were married.
I’m guessing you don’t have kids and have not yet thought extensively about retirement.
Marriage is about responsibility sharing in a way that survives even the worst of breakups while keeping all parties responsible in a fair way.
I’m also suggesting you entertain a thought experiment where you swap genders in the relationship and also assume you have at least one child you love dearly and taking care of it takes about 100 times more time and effort than you currently think.
Now you might have an inkling why people get married.
Full disclosure: not married but have most if not all the responsibilities in writing with the mother of my children so she does not end up in poverty if we ever split after raising our kids with so much of her life love and health.
I actually do have a 14-year-old son, but with another woman (she’s the extremely independent type; I have sole custody but we’re co-parenting nicely). I don’t want any more kids.
“make up a situation that doesn’t/won’t apply to you and see if that changes your mind”
Try to see something from somebody else’s viewpoint. Basic empathy.
I’m not interested in changing your mind, OP asked for insight, this delivers it.
