Map shows the varying share of births outside marriage across Europe.

27 comments
  1. My parents have told me that kids were shamed for being conceieved outside marriage when they were young in the 60’s. Lots have changed in relatively little time.

  2. Does this include people who are partners in eyes of the law but who did not marry as married or not? And people who live together but are not marred in the traditional sense? Because I know a lot of people who are not married but still have lived together for more than 10 years and have more than 3 kids together..

  3. Would be interesting to see if there’s correlation with the average age. In my country it has been quite noticeable that people have been leaving parents house later and later. Usually commons investments like house, car, marriage itself (the party), kids expenses have grown. So i think young people have been delaying moving on with some of these steps for it. In the end, some marry after or skip it either for the costs or because they don’t care at all.

  4. Kids birthed outside of marriage doesn’t automatically mean the parents didn’t want the kid / aren’t prepared / aren’t gonna be good parents. But unfortunately it does seem that more and more kids are neglected and raised on iPads and tik tok, regardless if the parents are married or not. Both parents needing to work full-time just to get by might be one of the reasons why.

  5. I was surprised by my own culture on this topic. I live abroad and had my first child while not yet married. She has her mother’s nationality by birth, and I went to the Turkish embassy to register her for the Turkish too. The guy there told me “it’s quite simple but you need to register your marriage first, otherwise, you know, she’ll appear as illegitimate”. Maybe just a legal term but he said it in an ugly tone. this hit me really badly, hearing my child is considered “illegitimate” by the state. I said “fuck you” (in my head) and left. She’s never getting that passport.

  6. I think the high percentage in the Netherlands is caused by just a decrease in marriages overall. An official partnership, or what its called, is a better alternative than marriage since you get all fiscal advantages without having to throw a 5-10 thousand euro party in your 30s.

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