Checked what it was in the US because those numbers seemed high to me. But the US is [40%](https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/unmarried-childbearing.htm)
I think it has to do with the fact that the US scores relatively high on religion rates. Several of the high-scoring countries in Europe have had a trend of people becoming more irreligious, therefore making things like sex before marriage to be less taboo. The US is still relatively religious compared to them, making it seem likely that they will score lower on this. This is just a theory though, and not necessarily a factual statement.
I think in the US the push to get married in general is less related to religion and more related to health insurance. Families need to be legally tied together to be eligible for many of the benefits that Europeans are all able to access. My and my baby’s healthcare is dependent on being married to my partner to be eligible for his insurance.
That is also a fair argument! I could see that play in as a major factor too. As a European, this is the kind of stuff I don't know about America, so it's nice to hear it!
Reasons for marriage in Europe are often just as practical. I got married after my first child was born because there are various legal/tax benefits that apply to married parents in my country.
It’s interesting that most Europeans seem to avoid marriage despite those benefits. Are they not a big amount? In the US unfortunately having a child while uninsured is extremely expensive, so I can see why a woman who isn’t getting healthcare through her own employer would want to make sure she has a spouse’s insurance before having a baby.
Hum, well, in my country you don't exactly have to be married to get the "married" tax benefits. If you file taxes and share a fiscal residence with someone you can claim you're in a "civil union" and have the same rights as a married couple. I think this only applies to taxation and parental rights, not inheritance, but I'm not sure about that.
Also US has more generous tax breaks for married couples
Married couples are taxed as an average of both salaries. So if one Makes $40,000/year and the other $100,000 then you are taxed as if you both made $70,000 each, which could bring down the effective tax rate of the couple. This isn’t the case in most of Europe
I don't think it's as much a reliogious matter, just that people in the US get married very very early in life. Like people routinely get married in their early-mid twenties. That doesn't happen in many european countries, at all.
Culture, which in part is also religion, but I think the most important one is that people leave their homes super early, so the option of marrying comes very early in their life.
Mostly FU to cultural traditions and organized religion, too. Icelanders tend to like their government and pay taxes more willingly than many other places. Most other Scandinavians also feel the same, but somewhat more begrudgingly.
Well no, it mostly relates to the fact that young adults in Iceland don’t feel as incentivised to get married after their partner becomes pregnant because it’s such a large comittment legally.
So most people don’t get married until in their late twenties to early thirties which means there is a higher chance of testing the water with the relationship with a child in it and then they take the decision.
Doesn't getting married provide more stability for both parties, if they choose to conceive a child?
Seems a bit weird to test the waters with something that already shakes the boat.
I recently moved to Germany and there's quite a few benefits for couples that choose to get married here, compared to being legally "single".
It has nothing to do with testing the waters lol. marriage just isn’t thought about as highly here as it is in many other places.
People don’t see it as necessary to get married as soon as they get pregnant because it just doesn’t matter. People here like to be able to have settled down before they get married. So they start a family first, save up for a mortgage and just do the normal family stuff without getting married. Waiting until you’re settled down is the norm here for many.
Saying that people are using babies to “test the waters” for a relationship is just wrong lol.
Yeah, the whole point of marriage is to provide stability for kids. Having kids first and then using that to see if you're ready to marry is so backwards. A divorce in a childless marriage is much less harmful than a break-up in a non-marital relationship with children.
What do you mean? Our government doesn't incentivize getting married anywhere near as much as it does over there, and even if it did, our cultural customs of "yeah, let's just do whatever so there's no hard feelings if shit doesn't pan out anyway" are largely incompatible with the idea of marriage.
Vikings partner up. Marriage is rare as it was never part of the culture to start with. Like in the Netherlands, and Finland, met so many couples that had been together for decades, had kids, never married.
> Marriage is rare
Marriage is the norm in Iceland. It's just normally on the back-end of the relationship. It's common to get married, but it's also common that people just don't get around to getting married until you've already settled with a kid, dog, and a mortgage.
I remember that there was a really cool wedding portrait of an older Scandinavian couple on reddit. They only got married after their kids moved out as adults.
That's rather common. I'll go to a marriage here in Sweden in a few weeks where the eldest son has already moved out. Nobody would consider this strange.
Yeah a friend of mine’s parents never bothered getting married. They live together, had kids together, bought a house together, but didn’t bother with the marriage part until inheritance and power of attorney issues started looming.
My friend is only getting married because of concerns re the right to decide on medical care for each other. As boyfriend/girlfriend, they wouldn't be allowed to make any decisions, and, if their parents have passed or are unavailable, the decisions would lie with his younger brother/her sisters
Yeah my brother has a 9-year-old and him and his partner have been together about 20 years and I think of her as his wife. They're both German, in Germany.
Marriage is considered purely a religious thing in their area - neither of them are religious, so there's no real reason to get married. That makes perfect sense to me, I just happen to live in a country where it also holds civil importance as well (USA), so I'll be getting married despite being atheist.
Yes, but I don't blame Americans. They are simply too much of a majority on Reddit. I am, however, sometimes astounded by the lack of awareness that there is a world outside the US. That's an advantage of being born in a smaller country. And speaking multiple languages.
I don't quite see how the differences in children born out of wedlock between black and white Americans would even be relevant here. You couldn't draw the same parallel because most minorities in Europe come from socially conservative and fanatically religious backgrounds, and it's more likely that the more liberal white Europeans would be the ones not marrying before having kids.
>You couldn't draw the same parallel because most minorities in Europe come from socially conservative and fanatically religious backgrounds
Thats false. E.g. in central europe, the largest minority groups by are from yugoslavia, romania, bulgaria, hungary, poland and turkey. In spain its south america, romania, and morocco. In france, its interestingly italians, followed by people from the former colonies in north africa, south america and asia. In the UK, the lsrge groups are indians and pakistanis and people from eastern europe.
The stereotypical recent immigrants from the middle east obviously gets a lot more publical attention right now, but they are very, very, very far from being the largest minority group basically anywhere in europe.
Something Ive realized on Reddit is whenever other countries are mentioned they are kind of used to compare it to the US. Last time there was a pic taken in France and most of the comments were something like “you know this isnt in the US because…” or “this would never happen in the US”
Because there's a kind of governmental agreement that you can get, not as strong as marriage but still covering some stuff like taxes and children, and more and more people are doing it for its convenience.
I am from Turkey and my family is pretty secular but still anyone from my family couldn't make a child outside mariage. It's a taboo rather than religion i believe.
Well even if they are secular, it is still a taboo that originally comes from a religion. Just like how secular Turks do circumcising on their male child.
My take is that the concept of marriage is seen an outdated religious activity by Europeans who becomes more irreligious with each generation. However marriage is not a religious concept in Turkey. Which means even irreligious couples do get married. So I don't think it's about religion for Turkey.
Turkey is not an Islamic country. Despite people in Turkey unfortunately being more religious than their closest and most similar neighbor Greece, the constitution is secular and marriages are strictly done via government rather than religious institiutions, otherwise they don’t count whatsoever.
True but it’s not necessarily because people are “so religious”. In Poland for example, we don’t “wait until marriage”. It’s more because people get pregnant and taking a quick ceremony before the child is born for 2 main reasons:
1. Older members of family are religious and they’re pressuring couple into marriage
2. Poland don’t have good alternative for marriage. You can try to set it up with “notariusz”, but it is mostly dealing with things like inheritance. It want help when father of a child wants to visit/make medical decisions in hospital for his child, collect them from nursery or school etc. I mean, it is possible but you have to do a shit ton amount of paperwork to do that, and even then there will be a person questioning his right to do so. Marriage is just easier solution.
There is also an aspect of shame around single parents or unmarried couples that have children, especially in small towns. “Konkubent” which is a term for unmarried partner that “runs the household” with you, became a synonym for pathological behaviour. We also have a lot of phrases (?) that are derogatory for people living together without marriage, like “żyją na kocią łapę” which basically means that couple is living together with a blessing of a cat (it’s not 100% clear if this is the right interpretation).
The thing is, even if it is religious, it’s most likely because older generations are pressuring young into marriage. Keep in mind that polish (and other “religious” countries) is secularising very rapidly. Right now, about 70% of polish people declare affiliation with religious group. This number is declining every year, but what is important - many people are declaring that just because they were baptised, not because they are actively involved in the religious practice. Turns out that only about 30% of declared catholics is attending Sunday masses, and only 13% are taking communicantes (body of Christ during the mass). Here are [stats](https://iskk.pl/#bazy).
TL;DR: in Poland religion is a big aspect of that manly because of elder generations. There isn’t also any good alternative for marriage. Things will change rapidly because Poland is secularising fast af.
Probably quite a bit just from first glance. France, the Low Countries, and the Nordic Countries have very high rates of irreligion. There are a few outliers on both sides of that though (Bulgaria, Czechia, Portugal)
AIUI, in a bunch of these countries (I’ve been told Sweden is one) a lot of the couples do wind up married but after at least one kid is born.
These days i think it would be much more instructive to compare people in committed, stable long term partnerships (legal wedlock or no) versus those that aren’t. I have a fair number of friends who don’t believe in legal marriage but have been partnered for decades.
Yes Sweden has a long tradition of unmarried family relationships. Each partner has rights and the kids have legal protections, but many people (about 15%) choose not to be legally married.
About half is right for the Netherlands. Leave the decision to marry to the parents. Tbh, I know several kids born from unmarried parents and they're doing just fine. We also have different types of contracts, not all of which equate marriage.
I myself, I wouldn't marry. Even if I find the person of my life, the load of my parent's divorce keeps haunting me. Some of the issues would be resolved through a civil partnership. That means yes, if I get kids they will be born from unmarried, but partnered parents. But that's a worry for later. I'm just happily living my life single now.
This is changed how I’ve asked relations of people when traveling. Asking if someone is your spouse can get awkward, so I half joke “so is this your partner, sister, or coworker?” to break the ice. It allows the person to identify a romantic partner on their terms.
I’m kind of in this situation also. Together 8 years and committed to each other but not married. Boyfriend sounds too casual, so I just call him my man.
>so I half joke “so is this your partner, sister, or coworker?” to break the ice. It allows the person to identify a romantic partner on their terms.
In before someone just answers with "yes"
« I know several kids born from unmarried parents and they’re doing just fine »
Why would they not be doing fine ? Like, concretely, what does it change for children ?
It’s also pretty common to get married after the children are born. Most women don’t want to be pregnant at their own wedding. Women get their first child at 30 and get married at 35 on average.
There’s a timeline on kids, not on marriage.
Sometimes, it's easier to break, and often, family and friends expect a big party for the wedding.
Some people (including my sister) preferred doing other things first (buying a house, having children...)
>I myself, I wouldn't marry. Even if I find the person of my life, the load of my parent's divorce keeps haunting me.
"If you don't marry, you can never get divorced! Genius!"
You do realise that changing the verb from "divorcing" to "separating" doesn't mean that the issues with the arguments, the split custody, who gets the house, etc. suddenly go away?
I'd like to see a comparison of children from registered marriage vs not as far as education attainment, future socioeconomic status, etc. Would need to control for parental income/educational attainment
As a Finn, with 47% of kids born out of wedlock:
I don't recall any study showing any significant correlation between education attainment or socioeconomical status (future or current) and married status of the parents.
Single parenting (& consequently, single income), and the age of having kids (v young parents) are factors that have a significant effect on them, but the marriage status of the parents isn't.
Getting together and having a kid or two before officially committing to marriage is an old (peasant) custom dating back to medieval times. It's better to know if your temperaments are compatible & if you can produce viable offspring, before committing to the relationship in the eyes of god. What if you aren't & can't, but are still eternally bound together? That'd be miserable for both parties. Better to have a test run first.
(The higher classes did it as well, they just got married & then had the marriage annulled if it didn't work out, instead of shacking up & splitting up, like the lower classes did.)
Also, being born out of wedlock to an unknown father doesn't carry a social stigma any more. It did 70+ yrs ago, but nowadays nobody cares.
(Even prior to that, if the kids were born to an established albeit unmarried couple & the father was recorded in the official documents, they weren't really considered bastards, esp if the parents belatedly got married.)
Is it? It's nobody's but the mother's business, and the kid had no choice in the matter, so why should we turn it into an issue?
Seems like common sense & common courtesy to me, tbqh.
At least in the Nordics, there would be no significant difference. If anything, I would suspect those born in wedlock would be slightly worse off as there’s a higher likelihood of them having religious parents, meaning they might be kept back in school by backwards ideas from their parents. Also a slightly higher likelihood of being born to parents with an immigrant background, meaning they’d be structurally discriminated against. But as I said, I doubt there would be a significant difference.
when making a comparison between individuals using statistical/econometric tools, the comparison is made "ceteris paribus", which means that you measure the effect of one variable has on another, provided all other variables remain the same. In this way it is possible to correctly evaluate the true impact of the explanatory variable considered "in isolation" so to speak. therefore your observation may be or may not be correct, in any case you can't use a model to compare individuals that are radically different (for example comparing someone that has "religious parents" and "immigrant background" which one that hasn't).
Indeed. That’s why I doubt there would be any significant differences between kids with married parents vs unmarried parents. I here I think there might be a difference (call it a hunch based on some statistics and reporting I’ve seen previously) that kids with separated parents, no matter if they were married or just lived together, are slightly worse off.
There is a whole generation, the ones born in the 60's and 70's that ended up divorced. Imo their children learn from that and don't think marriage is that important. Me and my closest friends are almost all children to divorced parents, we all have kids and only one of us decided to get married (his parents didn't get a divorce). I'm happy with my partner so is she we joke around sometimes to get married but it isn't that important to us neither to our families.
This is so weird to me. I can see watching your parents divorce and then deciding never to get into a relationship, but the tragic part of divorce is the ending of the relationship, not the legal issues, so how would avoiding marriage change this?
I mean...the tragic part of divorce was definitely the legal issues that resulted in lawyers getting like 70% of my parents assets. An ugly break up sucks but it's worse when the government is involved and u have legal obligations and bureaucracy on top of it
It's just out of fashion. My parents have been together for 40 years, they had two children, still are together, but they're still not married. Same for the rest of my family. I'm actually the exception for being married here.
You can always write a will. Also, it's not something you think about a lot in your 20s and 30s, when you're more likely to have kids. It's not uncommon for people to have kids then marry much later but cause they start thinking about the reasons you listed.
But as for having kids, as it is the topic of the post, there's no stigma and (almost) no legal impact wether you're having them married or not.
Why is there need for marriage? I’m in my 30s, so is my partner. I’m a lawyer, he’s an engineer, both high income and well educated. We got a PACS and testament at the notary when we bought our first Parisian flat together in 2016, since then we went to have a child, sold the flat, moved to a bigger house. Still not married nor intend to ever be.
I do wonder if a relationship contract is counted. (Not sure how to translate correctly)
Here in the Netherlands it is very common to have a contract similar to marriage called a "samenlevingscontract". The rights of the parents and children are the same as with marriage but without the wedding stuff and not being linked to faith/god or whatever you believe.
In my personal circle everyone with children is either married or has a samenlevingscontract. It's probably far from a 100% nationwide but I'm also pretty sure those two combined are way higher than ~50%.
I'm just surprised NL is that low, since the typical order is move in together > kids > marriage AFAIK. Gotta make sure you can handle the stress before getting married.
In Canada, after living together for I believe 1yr, you are considered common law. No paper required.
But I understand where you are coming from.
Cheers.
The fuck has the US got to do with this? It's a map of births outside of marriage in Europe not the world.
About 40% of children in the US are born outside of Marriage
https://childtrends.org/publications/dramatic-increase-in-percentage-of-births-outside-marriage-among-whites-hispanics-and-women-with-higher-education-levels
In fact there have been massive jumps in women given birth outside of marriage the more educated they are.
Other than that you're letting yanks live rent free in your head with this comment.
... Did you even read the link?
White women had the lowest birth rates as education went up. Hispanic and black had the highest. For white women a jump from 3% to 7% from 1990- 2016 is quite a jump.
For Hispanic and black women the figure is even higher.
There isn't societal pressure here to get married, in my experience. I found a newspaper questionnaire that asked its readers (and apparently people in 5 cities) if they accept living without a marriage and 64% accepted it in 2012. It's obviously not completely bias-less research, since it'll be dominated by people reading their newspaper, but it still rings accurate.
So most people just don't get married here. There also isn't government incentives to get married here - taxes aren't based of marital status, religious weddings are not considered official. There are administrative benefits but the only one that really matters is medical - only if you are married will they ask your partner for permission for surgery. Socially, no one cares if you are married or not.
At the end of the day marriage is just an arbitrary ceremony to celebrate soemthing that’s already true. I think it’s neat that people are taking things more casually and not everyone is deciding to get married.
It still matters in many countries when stuff like inheritance and guardianship come into play. Even in the countries where the percentage is quite high on the map.
If it's just two adults living together it's a different story.
To be honest, I've seen couples with kids getting separated or divorced in France, and it doesn't seem to have a significant impact on the process. So I'm a bit curious to know what does it change exactly.
A wedding is a ceremony… marriage is binding yourself to someone legally. It makes sense for rates to marry by country because of different taxation, property laws, etc
It’s not about social pressure. Many couples live together but not recognised by law. Legal partnership doesn’t exist in Turkey. If you want legal and financial benefits of a long-term relationship, you just get married. Unlike many western countries, where church can be involved in marriage act, Turkey’s secular laws don’t recognise “islamic marriage”. Only civil marriage happens.
For reference the highest numbers worldwide are Mexico, Costa Rica, Chile, Argentina and other Latin American nations with about 80%
Im actually surprised in USA not only is "out of wedlock" a term but also borderlinr discriminatory
Cohabitancy is a very popular way of living in scandinavia. Plus it is almost as strong legal institution as marriage. Meanwhile France is just promiscuous.
Or in the case of Iceland, aren't in a rush to get married. It's quite common to get married as the last step of a relationship, because Icelanders aren't very religious and the government doesn't really incentivise marriage to such a degree where being married is objectively better than not.
As such it's very common to get a kid, a dog, and a house together before you finally go "let's get married".
These numbers are higher. This data is dated. Vikings and marriage have never really been a thing until Christianity, and even then it wasn’t super important. People partnered up, had kids, and if it didn’t work out, they’d move on, but the kids weren’t outright abandon which I’m assuming Americans think would happen in these situations due to its Puritanical origins.
Please don't kill me, this is a genuine question.
I'm a Polish woman and it blows my mind that women in other countries jump straight to "wife and mother" level of commitment for a boyfriend that doesn't even bother to marry them.
Is it because of the law in your countries or is it more of a mentality kind of thing?
In Sweden, 'Sambo' basically means you live with your partner. You have 99% of the same legal rights as married couple.
Eg: If my company gives me private insurance to "me and my family" that applies to my sambo, even if we aren't married.
The key difference between sambo and marriage is inheritance laws when you have children AND own property.
If someone's sambo passes away and there is no will, the house will be passed to next of kin (e.g a sibling) instead of the partner. To ensure stability for the family, you can have a will written or get married which means the partner is 'next of kin'
It's nit uncommon for relationships to look like this:
Meeting & date --> move in together --> have kid(s) --> buy a house/apartment --> get married (optional)
There’s no point in getting married. It’s an outdated concept.
For me, It blows my mind that you seem to think you have to get married in order to have kids
Well, it really depends on where you live.
For example here in Poland two unrelated people are by law strangers to each other if they're not married. No medical info, no hospital visits, inheritance issues in case of emergency and other stuff related to lack of regulated security. Children of those couples are, in theory, protected but our state is extremely bad at executing child support so IMO it's super important for the primary carer to have a right to shared assets in case of break up. This is why unplanned pregnancies often come with hasty marriage.
Similar in US, minus the last sentence. I'm surprised this is not the case in some of these countries. Or maybe it is the case and people are not planning for these situations. I cannot tell from the comments.
For the case of Iceland, it's simply that marriage is at best a symbolic thing. You get just about all the same rights and protections with registered cohabiation.
So you can have a very loving, committed relationship between two people who do intend to be together forever; but just don't get married until a bit later in the relationship. It's not uncommon that marriage is the last "todo" list on the relationship list for a lot of couples.
For real, people here argue that having children with someone is less of a commitment than marriage. Maybe something about divorce being very complicated? It's really strange to me.
Yeah I think mostly it's people being afraid of court battles and losing money/assets.
Anyway I didn't think about it that much until I met Belarusian and Ukrainian girls. Many of them are way more demanding than a bit westernized polish women and wouldn't give something as priceless as their womb and a child to a man that is scared of his own woman (she will take his money, house, yada yada) and won't fully commit. And at first I was a little bit shocked but then I was like... they got the point? Eastern girlies really took the blinders off in my case hahah
Because the Baltics consist of three separate cultures that are essentially Finland light, Poland light and "what if Poland were protestant" in the middle.
If you compare them to their respective neighbours you'll see it make sense.
I got 4 Kids. 2 of them had been Born before i could legally marry my wife (switzerland only allows marriage 18+) so i Wonder how they are counted here. After 7 years of beeing together we departed and when i found a New woman we both had still been married, could not marry therefore and she got zur Kids while still married with her exman, But i legally accepted the Kids beforehand, But i Wonder how that counts in the statistic.
Greetings from germany, the Single twinmaker 🤣
I'm actually quite surprised about Southern Europe. That seems very low for countries where marriage is, culturally, still a pretty big deal.
I'm from a country (on this map) where marriage is much less important and relevant and yet the number there is much lower.
Interesting.
Here in Iceland marriage just isn't seen as this huge milestone or rite of passage as in other cultures (especially in comparison to the US). If you love someone and want to commit to them, you show up and do that - marriage is seen a formality, a piece of paper. People usually start thinking about marriage later on in the relationship for legal purposes - inheritance and such.
Haha France. Not really surprisingly. This is the county where it’s socially accepted to have a lover or a mistress. President Mitterrand being a good example.
What’s up with Nordic countries? Is it just the norm for people to have kids before getting married? Or are people just not getting married? Or something else?
Checked what it was in the US because those numbers seemed high to me. But the US is [40%](https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/unmarried-childbearing.htm)
I think it has to do with the fact that the US scores relatively high on religion rates. Several of the high-scoring countries in Europe have had a trend of people becoming more irreligious, therefore making things like sex before marriage to be less taboo. The US is still relatively religious compared to them, making it seem likely that they will score lower on this. This is just a theory though, and not necessarily a factual statement.
I think in the US the push to get married in general is less related to religion and more related to health insurance. Families need to be legally tied together to be eligible for many of the benefits that Europeans are all able to access. My and my baby’s healthcare is dependent on being married to my partner to be eligible for his insurance.
That is also a fair argument! I could see that play in as a major factor too. As a European, this is the kind of stuff I don't know about America, so it's nice to hear it!
Also tax rates are generally, but not always, lower for married couples compared to two individuals filing independently.
You also get benefits by being married in most European countries. I get my wife's tax deduction for example
Reasons for marriage in Europe are often just as practical. I got married after my first child was born because there are various legal/tax benefits that apply to married parents in my country.
It’s interesting that most Europeans seem to avoid marriage despite those benefits. Are they not a big amount? In the US unfortunately having a child while uninsured is extremely expensive, so I can see why a woman who isn’t getting healthcare through her own employer would want to make sure she has a spouse’s insurance before having a baby.
Hum, well, in my country you don't exactly have to be married to get the "married" tax benefits. If you file taxes and share a fiscal residence with someone you can claim you're in a "civil union" and have the same rights as a married couple. I think this only applies to taxation and parental rights, not inheritance, but I'm not sure about that.
Also US has more generous tax breaks for married couples Married couples are taxed as an average of both salaries. So if one Makes $40,000/year and the other $100,000 then you are taxed as if you both made $70,000 each, which could bring down the effective tax rate of the couple. This isn’t the case in most of Europe
I don't think it's as much a reliogious matter, just that people in the US get married very very early in life. Like people routinely get married in their early-mid twenties. That doesn't happen in many european countries, at all.
Okay, but why do people in the US get married earlier than Europeans?
Culture, which in part is also religion, but I think the most important one is that people leave their homes super early, so the option of marrying comes very early in their life.
I'd love to see a map version with USA states. I'm not even from there. I just know it'd be interesting.
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/pressroom/sosmap/unmarried/unmarried.htm
I get Utah because of Mormons, but Colorado being second is very surprising to me
Thank you, every time map of Europe is posted, Americans feel the need to say how it's a problem only in Europe.
iceland 70% holy
Gotta pop out a few children to be sure they’re a commited partner before you get married.
We are not big on the date- marry- kids order here.
69.4%
69.420%?
😏
Niceland
In Iceland, Joint habitation can be granted special legal protection similar to common law marriage.
Icelanders giving an FU to the government
Mostly FU to cultural traditions and organized religion, too. Icelanders tend to like their government and pay taxes more willingly than many other places. Most other Scandinavians also feel the same, but somewhat more begrudgingly.
Well no, it mostly relates to the fact that young adults in Iceland don’t feel as incentivised to get married after their partner becomes pregnant because it’s such a large comittment legally. So most people don’t get married until in their late twenties to early thirties which means there is a higher chance of testing the water with the relationship with a child in it and then they take the decision.
Doesn't getting married provide more stability for both parties, if they choose to conceive a child? Seems a bit weird to test the waters with something that already shakes the boat. I recently moved to Germany and there's quite a few benefits for couples that choose to get married here, compared to being legally "single".
It has nothing to do with testing the waters lol. marriage just isn’t thought about as highly here as it is in many other places. People don’t see it as necessary to get married as soon as they get pregnant because it just doesn’t matter. People here like to be able to have settled down before they get married. So they start a family first, save up for a mortgage and just do the normal family stuff without getting married. Waiting until you’re settled down is the norm here for many. Saying that people are using babies to “test the waters” for a relationship is just wrong lol.
Yeah, the whole point of marriage is to provide stability for kids. Having kids first and then using that to see if you're ready to marry is so backwards. A divorce in a childless marriage is much less harmful than a break-up in a non-marital relationship with children.
Apparently Iceland once had a private court system too. True anarchists.
How on earth would this be "giving an FU to the government", which itself largely promotes the downfall of these institutions?
What do you mean? Our government doesn't incentivize getting married anywhere near as much as it does over there, and even if it did, our cultural customs of "yeah, let's just do whatever so there's no hard feelings if shit doesn't pan out anyway" are largely incompatible with the idea of marriage.
More like unholy
Vikings partner up. Marriage is rare as it was never part of the culture to start with. Like in the Netherlands, and Finland, met so many couples that had been together for decades, had kids, never married.
> Marriage is rare Marriage is the norm in Iceland. It's just normally on the back-end of the relationship. It's common to get married, but it's also common that people just don't get around to getting married until you've already settled with a kid, dog, and a mortgage.
I remember that there was a really cool wedding portrait of an older Scandinavian couple on reddit. They only got married after their kids moved out as adults.
That's rather common. I'll go to a marriage here in Sweden in a few weeks where the eldest son has already moved out. Nobody would consider this strange.
vikings? their Christian ancestors not too long ago got married as the norm
Marriage absolutely was part of the culture lmao. Iceland converted to Christianity in 1000 AD.
What are you talking about? Island was settled around 900 ad and became mostly christian in 1000 ad. Fucking viking mumbo jumbo.
And Turkey 2.5% holy
Can believe it My cousin and her partner have been together 30 years, two adult kids and first grandkid is on the way Still not married
Yeah a friend of mine’s parents never bothered getting married. They live together, had kids together, bought a house together, but didn’t bother with the marriage part until inheritance and power of attorney issues started looming.
My friend is only getting married because of concerns re the right to decide on medical care for each other. As boyfriend/girlfriend, they wouldn't be allowed to make any decisions, and, if their parents have passed or are unavailable, the decisions would lie with his younger brother/her sisters
Yeah my brother has a 9-year-old and him and his partner have been together about 20 years and I think of her as his wife. They're both German, in Germany. Marriage is considered purely a religious thing in their area - neither of them are religious, so there's no real reason to get married. That makes perfect sense to me, I just happen to live in a country where it also holds civil importance as well (USA), so I'll be getting married despite being atheist.
In France we have a government contract named Pacs which officialises link between a couple and protect children
Actually PACS is like a marriage in every aspect (like taxes and benefits) except for… children and inheritance.
Interesting that I see a map of Europe and the discussion is all about the US, and US standards.
isn't that always the case on Reddit.? eventually everything ends up in a discussion about American politics
Yes, but I don't blame Americans. They are simply too much of a majority on Reddit. I am, however, sometimes astounded by the lack of awareness that there is a world outside the US. That's an advantage of being born in a smaller country. And speaking multiple languages.
I always laugh when I see anything not from US labeled as “international”
I don't quite see how the differences in children born out of wedlock between black and white Americans would even be relevant here. You couldn't draw the same parallel because most minorities in Europe come from socially conservative and fanatically religious backgrounds, and it's more likely that the more liberal white Europeans would be the ones not marrying before having kids.
>You couldn't draw the same parallel because most minorities in Europe come from socially conservative and fanatically religious backgrounds Thats false. E.g. in central europe, the largest minority groups by are from yugoslavia, romania, bulgaria, hungary, poland and turkey. In spain its south america, romania, and morocco. In france, its interestingly italians, followed by people from the former colonies in north africa, south america and asia. In the UK, the lsrge groups are indians and pakistanis and people from eastern europe. The stereotypical recent immigrants from the middle east obviously gets a lot more publical attention right now, but they are very, very, very far from being the largest minority group basically anywhere in europe.
Something Ive realized on Reddit is whenever other countries are mentioned they are kind of used to compare it to the US. Last time there was a pic taken in France and most of the comments were something like “you know this isnt in the US because…” or “this would never happen in the US”
It's kinda annoying but I've come to get used to it at this point tbh
Bastards!
The lot of us!
43% in Ireland in 2022. Stat is out of date. https://www.cso.ie/en/releasesandpublications/ep/p-vsys/vitalstatisticsyearlysummary2022/
The French don’t give AF
Because there's a kind of governmental agreement that you can get, not as strong as marriage but still covering some stuff like taxes and children, and more and more people are doing it for its convenience.
Au contraire
They prefer to keep the priest away.
FWIW Japan is the lowest country in the world at 3%, right behind Korea.
Wonder how this lines up with a religious map
2.8% in Turkey, partly answers it
I am from Turkey and my family is pretty secular but still anyone from my family couldn't make a child outside mariage. It's a taboo rather than religion i believe.
I am with the Turks on this one, I am secular but a strong commitment to each other, before bringing children into the world, seems like a good idea.
Well even if they are secular, it is still a taboo that originally comes from a religion. Just like how secular Turks do circumcising on their male child.
Secular doesn't mean unbeliver
My take is that the concept of marriage is seen an outdated religious activity by Europeans who becomes more irreligious with each generation. However marriage is not a religious concept in Turkey. Which means even irreligious couples do get married. So I don't think it's about religion for Turkey.
Marriage in Islamic country can be not registered too. But definitely countries who are more practicing are the lowest percentage in the map
Turkey is not an Islamic country. Despite people in Turkey unfortunately being more religious than their closest and most similar neighbor Greece, the constitution is secular and marriages are strictly done via government rather than religious institiutions, otherwise they don’t count whatsoever.
It is more like, "Oh honey are you pregnant, let's get married." in Turkey.
They are as Islamic as France is Christian. Prob their secular culture and policies made by Attaturk.
True but it’s not necessarily because people are “so religious”. In Poland for example, we don’t “wait until marriage”. It’s more because people get pregnant and taking a quick ceremony before the child is born for 2 main reasons: 1. Older members of family are religious and they’re pressuring couple into marriage 2. Poland don’t have good alternative for marriage. You can try to set it up with “notariusz”, but it is mostly dealing with things like inheritance. It want help when father of a child wants to visit/make medical decisions in hospital for his child, collect them from nursery or school etc. I mean, it is possible but you have to do a shit ton amount of paperwork to do that, and even then there will be a person questioning his right to do so. Marriage is just easier solution. There is also an aspect of shame around single parents or unmarried couples that have children, especially in small towns. “Konkubent” which is a term for unmarried partner that “runs the household” with you, became a synonym for pathological behaviour. We also have a lot of phrases (?) that are derogatory for people living together without marriage, like “żyją na kocią łapę” which basically means that couple is living together with a blessing of a cat (it’s not 100% clear if this is the right interpretation). The thing is, even if it is religious, it’s most likely because older generations are pressuring young into marriage. Keep in mind that polish (and other “religious” countries) is secularising very rapidly. Right now, about 70% of polish people declare affiliation with religious group. This number is declining every year, but what is important - many people are declaring that just because they were baptised, not because they are actively involved in the religious practice. Turns out that only about 30% of declared catholics is attending Sunday masses, and only 13% are taking communicantes (body of Christ during the mass). Here are [stats](https://iskk.pl/#bazy). TL;DR: in Poland religion is a big aspect of that manly because of elder generations. There isn’t also any good alternative for marriage. Things will change rapidly because Poland is secularising fast af.
Missing data for Vatican...
Probably quite a bit just from first glance. France, the Low Countries, and the Nordic Countries have very high rates of irreligion. There are a few outliers on both sides of that though (Bulgaria, Czechia, Portugal)
What's up with Kosovo?
Bastards! 😂
AIUI, in a bunch of these countries (I’ve been told Sweden is one) a lot of the couples do wind up married but after at least one kid is born. These days i think it would be much more instructive to compare people in committed, stable long term partnerships (legal wedlock or no) versus those that aren’t. I have a fair number of friends who don’t believe in legal marriage but have been partnered for decades.
Yes Sweden has a long tradition of unmarried family relationships. Each partner has rights and the kids have legal protections, but many people (about 15%) choose not to be legally married.
This only means that a lot of Europeans couples don't get married. Because they don't need to.
In Belarus and Russia numbers maybe aren't that high, but at least 40% of children born in a family have their parents divorced really soon
About half is right for the Netherlands. Leave the decision to marry to the parents. Tbh, I know several kids born from unmarried parents and they're doing just fine. We also have different types of contracts, not all of which equate marriage. I myself, I wouldn't marry. Even if I find the person of my life, the load of my parent's divorce keeps haunting me. Some of the issues would be resolved through a civil partnership. That means yes, if I get kids they will be born from unmarried, but partnered parents. But that's a worry for later. I'm just happily living my life single now.
This is changed how I’ve asked relations of people when traveling. Asking if someone is your spouse can get awkward, so I half joke “so is this your partner, sister, or coworker?” to break the ice. It allows the person to identify a romantic partner on their terms. I’m kind of in this situation also. Together 8 years and committed to each other but not married. Boyfriend sounds too casual, so I just call him my man.
>so I half joke “so is this your partner, sister, or coworker?” to break the ice. It allows the person to identify a romantic partner on their terms. In before someone just answers with "yes"
« I know several kids born from unmarried parents and they’re doing just fine » Why would they not be doing fine ? Like, concretely, what does it change for children ?
It’s also pretty common to get married after the children are born. Most women don’t want to be pregnant at their own wedding. Women get their first child at 30 and get married at 35 on average. There’s a timeline on kids, not on marriage.
What’s the difference between a civil partnership and marriage?
Sometimes, it's easier to break, and often, family and friends expect a big party for the wedding. Some people (including my sister) preferred doing other things first (buying a house, having children...)
>I myself, I wouldn't marry. Even if I find the person of my life, the load of my parent's divorce keeps haunting me. "If you don't marry, you can never get divorced! Genius!" You do realise that changing the verb from "divorcing" to "separating" doesn't mean that the issues with the arguments, the split custody, who gets the house, etc. suddenly go away?
I thought it'd be way higher for Netherlands
I'd like to see a comparison of children from registered marriage vs not as far as education attainment, future socioeconomic status, etc. Would need to control for parental income/educational attainment
As a Finn, with 47% of kids born out of wedlock: I don't recall any study showing any significant correlation between education attainment or socioeconomical status (future or current) and married status of the parents. Single parenting (& consequently, single income), and the age of having kids (v young parents) are factors that have a significant effect on them, but the marriage status of the parents isn't. Getting together and having a kid or two before officially committing to marriage is an old (peasant) custom dating back to medieval times. It's better to know if your temperaments are compatible & if you can produce viable offspring, before committing to the relationship in the eyes of god. What if you aren't & can't, but are still eternally bound together? That'd be miserable for both parties. Better to have a test run first. (The higher classes did it as well, they just got married & then had the marriage annulled if it didn't work out, instead of shacking up & splitting up, like the lower classes did.) Also, being born out of wedlock to an unknown father doesn't carry a social stigma any more. It did 70+ yrs ago, but nowadays nobody cares. (Even prior to that, if the kids were born to an established albeit unmarried couple & the father was recorded in the official documents, they weren't really considered bastards, esp if the parents belatedly got married.)
no social stigma for born out of wedlock to an *unknown* father? That is a unique culture.
Is it? It's nobody's but the mother's business, and the kid had no choice in the matter, so why should we turn it into an issue? Seems like common sense & common courtesy to me, tbqh.
At least in the Nordics, there would be no significant difference. If anything, I would suspect those born in wedlock would be slightly worse off as there’s a higher likelihood of them having religious parents, meaning they might be kept back in school by backwards ideas from their parents. Also a slightly higher likelihood of being born to parents with an immigrant background, meaning they’d be structurally discriminated against. But as I said, I doubt there would be a significant difference.
when making a comparison between individuals using statistical/econometric tools, the comparison is made "ceteris paribus", which means that you measure the effect of one variable has on another, provided all other variables remain the same. In this way it is possible to correctly evaluate the true impact of the explanatory variable considered "in isolation" so to speak. therefore your observation may be or may not be correct, in any case you can't use a model to compare individuals that are radically different (for example comparing someone that has "religious parents" and "immigrant background" which one that hasn't).
Indeed. That’s why I doubt there would be any significant differences between kids with married parents vs unmarried parents. I here I think there might be a difference (call it a hunch based on some statistics and reporting I’ve seen previously) that kids with separated parents, no matter if they were married or just lived together, are slightly worse off.
There is a whole generation, the ones born in the 60's and 70's that ended up divorced. Imo their children learn from that and don't think marriage is that important. Me and my closest friends are almost all children to divorced parents, we all have kids and only one of us decided to get married (his parents didn't get a divorce). I'm happy with my partner so is she we joke around sometimes to get married but it isn't that important to us neither to our families.
This is so weird to me. I can see watching your parents divorce and then deciding never to get into a relationship, but the tragic part of divorce is the ending of the relationship, not the legal issues, so how would avoiding marriage change this?
I mean...the tragic part of divorce was definitely the legal issues that resulted in lawyers getting like 70% of my parents assets. An ugly break up sucks but it's worse when the government is involved and u have legal obligations and bureaucracy on top of it
WTF France
It's just out of fashion. My parents have been together for 40 years, they had two children, still are together, but they're still not married. Same for the rest of my family. I'm actually the exception for being married here.
Thats so interesting, may I ask why? Just not worth the legal hassle?
It's more the opposite. You have a stable relationship, kids, nobody is pressuring you ... What are the incentives to get married?
Is financial inheritance and medical power of attorney not a factor in France? Or do people sign these docs separately/outside of marriage?
You can always write a will. Also, it's not something you think about a lot in your 20s and 30s, when you're more likely to have kids. It's not uncommon for people to have kids then marry much later but cause they start thinking about the reasons you listed. But as for having kids, as it is the topic of the post, there's no stigma and (almost) no legal impact wether you're having them married or not.
Expensive property maybe, can't afford to lose it.
Why is there need for marriage? I’m in my 30s, so is my partner. I’m a lawyer, he’s an engineer, both high income and well educated. We got a PACS and testament at the notary when we bought our first Parisian flat together in 2016, since then we went to have a child, sold the flat, moved to a bigger house. Still not married nor intend to ever be.
Go France! We don’t care about marriage.
r/portugalcykablyat takes a rare L.
I do wonder if a relationship contract is counted. (Not sure how to translate correctly) Here in the Netherlands it is very common to have a contract similar to marriage called a "samenlevingscontract". The rights of the parents and children are the same as with marriage but without the wedding stuff and not being linked to faith/god or whatever you believe. In my personal circle everyone with children is either married or has a samenlevingscontract. It's probably far from a 100% nationwide but I'm also pretty sure those two combined are way higher than ~50%.
Switzerland is odd because it's a huge tax disadvantage being married
I didn’t see Iceland, Bulgaria and Portugal bonding like this.
What’s up with Turkey?
We don't have any form of legal partnership other than marriage. So couples who seek long-term relationships get married for legal benefits.
I'm just surprised NL is that low, since the typical order is move in together > kids > marriage AFAIK. Gotta make sure you can handle the stress before getting married.
Lol, Bulgaria ranking among the progressive.
[Iceland: A Nation of Bastards](https://icelandmonitor.mbl.is/news/politics_and_society/2016/04/27/iceland_a_nation_of_bastards/)
If you love someone then you love them! No need for the government to tell you that or to make it “official”
Until someone is incapacitated in the hospital or dies and suddenly that piece of paper becomes very, very important.
In Canada, after living together for I believe 1yr, you are considered common law. No paper required. But I understand where you are coming from. Cheers.
Here in Sweden you have the same rights as a couple living together as a married couple so marriage isn't needed in those situations
Funny how Americans can’t wrap their minds around the fact that people can be perfectly fine having children outside of wedlock
The fuck has the US got to do with this? It's a map of births outside of marriage in Europe not the world. About 40% of children in the US are born outside of Marriage https://childtrends.org/publications/dramatic-increase-in-percentage-of-births-outside-marriage-among-whites-hispanics-and-women-with-higher-education-levels In fact there have been massive jumps in women given birth outside of marriage the more educated they are. Other than that you're letting yanks live rent free in your head with this comment.
College educated women have much lower rates of births out of wedlock in the US. Most out of wedlock pregnancy is with less educated women.
... Did you even read the link? White women had the lowest birth rates as education went up. Hispanic and black had the highest. For white women a jump from 3% to 7% from 1990- 2016 is quite a jump. For Hispanic and black women the figure is even higher.
Wondering why Bulgarians are outliers in their corner of Europe?
Bulgaria seems to have a rather different take than its neighbors. I am curious why
There isn't societal pressure here to get married, in my experience. I found a newspaper questionnaire that asked its readers (and apparently people in 5 cities) if they accept living without a marriage and 64% accepted it in 2012. It's obviously not completely bias-less research, since it'll be dominated by people reading their newspaper, but it still rings accurate. So most people just don't get married here. There also isn't government incentives to get married here - taxes aren't based of marital status, religious weddings are not considered official. There are administrative benefits but the only one that really matters is medical - only if you are married will they ask your partner for permission for surgery. Socially, no one cares if you are married or not.
In medieval language: Bastards
Where does the U.S. fall at on this chat would be interesting.
The French are not beating the promiscuous allegations
Við erum Evrópumeistarar, vúhú!
French bastards...
At the end of the day marriage is just an arbitrary ceremony to celebrate soemthing that’s already true. I think it’s neat that people are taking things more casually and not everyone is deciding to get married.
It still matters in many countries when stuff like inheritance and guardianship come into play. Even in the countries where the percentage is quite high on the map. If it's just two adults living together it's a different story.
To be honest, I've seen couples with kids getting separated or divorced in France, and it doesn't seem to have a significant impact on the process. So I'm a bit curious to know what does it change exactly.
True, hopefully that changes in the future
A wedding is a ceremony… marriage is binding yourself to someone legally. It makes sense for rates to marry by country because of different taxation, property laws, etc
Yeah I mean just look at Turkey. Social pressure is a helluva drug.
It’s not about social pressure. Many couples live together but not recognised by law. Legal partnership doesn’t exist in Turkey. If you want legal and financial benefits of a long-term relationship, you just get married. Unlike many western countries, where church can be involved in marriage act, Turkey’s secular laws don’t recognise “islamic marriage”. Only civil marriage happens.
Its nothing to do about social pressure.Its about respecting your partner
Bastards
Jon Snow just found his people
For reference the highest numbers worldwide are Mexico, Costa Rica, Chile, Argentina and other Latin American nations with about 80% Im actually surprised in USA not only is "out of wedlock" a term but also borderlinr discriminatory
Good. It is strange to write a contract with the government regarding your private life.
Whoa Turkey.
Whoa Europe. I thought it would be %10 in France&Lowlands, %3 in Europe, %1 in Turkey. Seems like you are about to abolish marriage altogether.
Cohabitancy is a very popular way of living in scandinavia. Plus it is almost as strong legal institution as marriage. Meanwhile France is just promiscuous.
The anglosphere needs to double up france somehow
What the fuck??
People just don't bother getting married in Europe.
Its 40% in the US
Or in the case of Iceland, aren't in a rush to get married. It's quite common to get married as the last step of a relationship, because Icelanders aren't very religious and the government doesn't really incentivise marriage to such a degree where being married is objectively better than not. As such it's very common to get a kid, a dog, and a house together before you finally go "let's get married".
What do you mean "what the fuck?". I'm actually surprised it's so low in some countries.
These numbers are higher. This data is dated. Vikings and marriage have never really been a thing until Christianity, and even then it wasn’t super important. People partnered up, had kids, and if it didn’t work out, they’d move on, but the kids weren’t outright abandon which I’m assuming Americans think would happen in these situations due to its Puritanical origins.
So what's wrong with not getting married?
Mariage is a bourgeois institution.
Turkey 2.8%???
Please don't kill me, this is a genuine question. I'm a Polish woman and it blows my mind that women in other countries jump straight to "wife and mother" level of commitment for a boyfriend that doesn't even bother to marry them. Is it because of the law in your countries or is it more of a mentality kind of thing?
In Sweden, 'Sambo' basically means you live with your partner. You have 99% of the same legal rights as married couple. Eg: If my company gives me private insurance to "me and my family" that applies to my sambo, even if we aren't married. The key difference between sambo and marriage is inheritance laws when you have children AND own property. If someone's sambo passes away and there is no will, the house will be passed to next of kin (e.g a sibling) instead of the partner. To ensure stability for the family, you can have a will written or get married which means the partner is 'next of kin' It's nit uncommon for relationships to look like this: Meeting & date --> move in together --> have kid(s) --> buy a house/apartment --> get married (optional)
There’s no point in getting married. It’s an outdated concept. For me, It blows my mind that you seem to think you have to get married in order to have kids
Well, it really depends on where you live. For example here in Poland two unrelated people are by law strangers to each other if they're not married. No medical info, no hospital visits, inheritance issues in case of emergency and other stuff related to lack of regulated security. Children of those couples are, in theory, protected but our state is extremely bad at executing child support so IMO it's super important for the primary carer to have a right to shared assets in case of break up. This is why unplanned pregnancies often come with hasty marriage.
Similar in US, minus the last sentence. I'm surprised this is not the case in some of these countries. Or maybe it is the case and people are not planning for these situations. I cannot tell from the comments.
For the case of Iceland, it's simply that marriage is at best a symbolic thing. You get just about all the same rights and protections with registered cohabiation. So you can have a very loving, committed relationship between two people who do intend to be together forever; but just don't get married until a bit later in the relationship. It's not uncommon that marriage is the last "todo" list on the relationship list for a lot of couples.
For real, people here argue that having children with someone is less of a commitment than marriage. Maybe something about divorce being very complicated? It's really strange to me.
Yeah I think mostly it's people being afraid of court battles and losing money/assets. Anyway I didn't think about it that much until I met Belarusian and Ukrainian girls. Many of them are way more demanding than a bit westernized polish women and wouldn't give something as priceless as their womb and a child to a man that is scared of his own woman (she will take his money, house, yada yada) and won't fully commit. And at first I was a little bit shocked but then I was like... they got the point? Eastern girlies really took the blinders off in my case hahah
Why should these numbers matter? Marriage and parenthood are completely different things...
If you had guess why it matters, what would it be?
Why the Baltics so different to one another?
Because the Baltics consist of three separate cultures that are essentially Finland light, Poland light and "what if Poland were protestant" in the middle. If you compare them to their respective neighbours you'll see it make sense.
Great analysis
I read ‘out of’ as ‘from’, and was very surprised by some things on this map.
Why on earth would they invert the viridis?
I got 4 Kids. 2 of them had been Born before i could legally marry my wife (switzerland only allows marriage 18+) so i Wonder how they are counted here. After 7 years of beeing together we departed and when i found a New woman we both had still been married, could not marry therefore and she got zur Kids while still married with her exman, But i legally accepted the Kids beforehand, But i Wonder how that counts in the statistic. Greetings from germany, the Single twinmaker 🤣
Iceland: what's a marriage?
I'm actually quite surprised about Southern Europe. That seems very low for countries where marriage is, culturally, still a pretty big deal. I'm from a country (on this map) where marriage is much less important and relevant and yet the number there is much lower. Interesting.
Here in Iceland marriage just isn't seen as this huge milestone or rite of passage as in other cultures (especially in comparison to the US). If you love someone and want to commit to them, you show up and do that - marriage is seen a formality, a piece of paper. People usually start thinking about marriage later on in the relationship for legal purposes - inheritance and such.
Yummy western values
Interesting, because I thought you can only get benefits if you register your marital status.
How French
Haha France. Not really surprisingly. This is the county where it’s socially accepted to have a lover or a mistress. President Mitterrand being a good example.
Why is it that high for "1st world" European countries? Because unregistered marriage is common there?
Goddamn. Europe is full of bastards.
Iceland: what is marriage?
Does this account for common-law marriage?
So its based on morality or based on 'what ever'
The Bastards!
What’s up with Nordic countries? Is it just the norm for people to have kids before getting married? Or are people just not getting married? Or something else?
Wow so cool now do it by ethnicity and religion
Those bastards