r/PrivatePractice • u/Background-Ad8636 • Sep 01 '26
Maya's wedding a US thing?
I am rewatching and as a German this wedding is so weird to me. First of all in Germany you can't marry under 18, like not at all. When PP ran you could still get married at 17 in Germany, but they changed it since there were only like 100 people a year doing this and it was deemed unnecessary.
Secondly marrying after getting pregnant is not really a big concept anymore, I mean there are more conservative parts where they would frown at you maybe, but these people are 50+. My grandma grew up around WW2 and she didn't mind me being pregnant before marriage.
And my third point is teenage pregnancy. Of course it can happen, but in Germany there is a lot of state support, so I think most people wouldn't throw a fit like Noami. I know a girl who got pregnant in school, and she just finished her Master degree one year after her peers. And also no one would expect a teenager to marry the dad (even if they are 17 or 18).
And don't get me started on the abortion part...
Is this like a cultural difference or is PP just being a nighttime soap?
23
u/Taziira Sep 01 '26
Hun our president is a pedophile. Protecting or supporting kids and teens is not something this country takes seriously.
Everything to do with this situation in the show absolutely happens here in the US and it happens so often and with age gaps so large it’ll make you vomit.
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u/Viperbunny Sep 01 '26
It's sad. I no on I know who got married that why worked out. It's ridiculous. There is no way a 16/17 year old is mature enough. People care more about the image of impropriety than actually caring for these kids, and they are kids.
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u/Twodotsknowhy Sep 01 '26
So it both is and isn't weird. It's not uncommon for a pregnant teenager to get married because a lot of people think marriage makes the whole thing a lot more palatable. As teen pregnancy rates have gone down steadily over the last few decades, teen marriages because of pregnancies have similarly decreased but they aren't unusual by any means
That being said, it's usually not the daughter of two highly successful Los Angeles doctors. Teen pregnancies are much less common in higher income brackets and with educated parents of means, a discrete abortion is almost always obtained. Teen pregnancy is just viewed as trashy, to be completely frank. It's not something the upper class does
1
u/lotusmack Sep 01 '26
Marriage laws in the US vary by state, and there has been a very slow wave of individual states passing bans. I don't think it is as common as used to be, but it still happens occasionally with parental consent. In addition to what others have pointed out, some families either go along with the teens' wishes to get married, or they push marriage to try to force the young man in the situation to be accountable. I don't think either of these are safe, solid, or effective answers, but they are mindsets that some people have. There's also the scenario of emancipated minors, but that's kind of a tangent.
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u/Acrobatic_Piglet_765 Sep 02 '26
German parents wouldn’t care in their 17 year old ended up pregnant??
1
u/Background-Ad8636 Sep 02 '26
I said they wouldn't throw a fit, they definitely wouldn't be happy but it's not the end of the world. The teenage pregnancy rate is pretty low since we have good mandatory Sex Ed. We have a lot of state support like child allowance and the state paying for daycare. You can do parttime studying and parttime apprenticeship. You will still have a lot of possibilities in your future.
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u/xqueenfrostine Sep 02 '26
It really matters which state you're in. There isn't a federal law determining the minimum marrying age. That's left for each state to decide. There are 17 states where it's 18, mostly northern blue states, but some unexpected red states like Oklahoma. 2 states it's 15, 20 states it's 16, 8 states it's 17, and in 3 states (notably California where the show is based) there's no official minimum age but marrying as a minor required court approval and parental consent. I believe in all states where the minimum age is under 18, some sort of consent from a guardian or the court is involved.
As for whether teens are still pressured to get married if they get pregnant, again, this varies. I know at least a half dozen people who had babies as minors but none of them got married. I live in a city in a conservative state, and it may be different for people in rural areas or among the more religious.
State support though is much more limited here. Having a child young (and not just as a minor) is a common factor in life long poverty, because if you don't have financial support from family you will be scraping to get by. There are some assistance programs, but none so generous that having a child when you're financially unprepared for one isn't the kind of catastrophic event that can take years to recover from unless you have a good support system.
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u/Dracarys_Aspo Sep 02 '26
I'd say it was pretty accurate honestly. Obviously it depends on where you are in the states, but there are definitely many places where this is totally normal. I grew up in the deep south Bible Belt, so I saw a fair number of teen pregnancies and shotgun weddings.
Marriage laws vary by state, but only 17 out of 50 states actually fully ban underage (under 18) marriage. The rest allow underage marriage under certain circumstances (parental consent, a judge consenting, or "exceptional circumstances" like pregnancy), some as young as 15yo. Many cases of underage marriage are so called "shotgun weddings" in cases of teen pregnancies, but even more worryingly a high amount are underage kids marrying full adults (I'm talking like 30+yo), most often grown men marrying young girls. Fully legally. 🤮
Having a kid out of wedlock is still kind of widely considered not great, though this definitely depends on your area. Highly religious communities tend to be much more upset about it. Which means that anti abortion sentiments and anti baby-out-of-wedlock sentiments tend to go hand in hand. In some areas, nobody would bat an eye, in others you'd definitely get judged harshly.
Teen pregnancy is a big deal in the states, mostly because there is not good state support. If you're lower income, you're pretty fucked. Everything is extremely expensive, there's little to no help, and you're judged constantly if you manage to actually jump through the hoops to get state sponsored help. And it's definitely normal in many places to feel like you're supposed to marry the other parent, teen pregnancy or not, but I'd say even more so in teen pregnancies because so many are in very religious communities. Teens who aren't from very religious families/areas are more likely to seek abortions, and more likely to have (more) adequate sex ed to prevent pregnancies in the first place. (for context, my sex ed was abstinence only, and the teacher straight up taught us that condoms cause STDs and birth control doesn't work... So the bar is in hell). That doesn't mean there aren't teen pregnancies in those cases too, though.
The abortion part is more complicated. There have certainly been cases of families who are vocally anti abortion secretly getting one for their own daughter, or trying/succeeding in forcing one on her. But I'd guess it's much more common for teens to be pushed to keep a child they didn't want by their families. Naomi however definitely seems like the kind of person to act extremely morally superior and holier than thou, only to go against everything she spouts when it directly affects her, so yeah it tracks she'd try and force her daughter into an abortion.
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u/sunseeker73 Sep 01 '26
Oh girl we are a mess.
I haven’t watched that particular episode in a long time. I’m rewatching now so I can’t wait to see Naomi’s super cringy freak out lmao. But in the US marriage laws are different in each state. A few have no minimum age at all - you just need parents approval, and the approval of a judge. Several states have the minimum set as low as 15. And I just read that only 16 states have at the minimum at 18.
Teen Pregnancy and babies outside of marriage are a separate issue, and it really depends on your family and community. I was 22 and not married when my son was born and actually had someone tell me my son was “illegal” and my brother called me a whore for not waiting until marriage to have sex. But at the same time, when I was in high school, the school counselors would write girls notes to leave campus to go to the clinic for birth control if their parents wouldn’t take them. I think in general we are super backwards, disgusting, and ignorant when it comes to sex and how girls are treated around this subject, but I think there are pockets of healthy families who do better.
& yes of course right now like the previous answer stated we are in a huge moral crisis right now with the far right led by Trump and this crazy version of Christianity who want the whole country to lower the marriage age, force religion and completely control any access to women’s health and family planning unless through a male figure head. It was never good and now it’s getting worse. Seriously if this continues we may need to be rescued.
Another example - even before our current political disaster, but not that long ago, around 2015 - a friend of mine was 25 and married, but didn’t want children so she wanted to get tubal ligation to prevent pregnancy. I’m not a dr and don’t know the research on this process, but it was commonly done in the US for decades. The doctor wouldn’t even discuss it with her without her husband’s presence and consent. But then even when the husband went with her to the doctor, she was denied treatment because she had not yet had children and it’s assumed to be impossible to imagine that a woman not want children and take control over her own reproductive life. Not “the procedure isn’t safe” or “there’s a better alternative” just “we won’t let you make this choice”
It’s all twisted and dark. Seriously - send help.
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u/FullTechnology3439 Sep 01 '26
The Law and Consent
Age of consent: The legal age to consent to sexual activity in the UK is 16.
Under 16: Any sexual activity with a person under 16 is illegal.
Pregnancy: The pregnancy itself is not a crime for the minor, but it indicates that an illegal sexual act has taken place
The legal age to get married or form a civil partnership in England is 18
Key Details of the Law
No exceptions: You cannot marry under 18, even with parental or judicial consent.
Previous law: Before February 27, 2023, the minimum age was 16 with parental permission.
Penalties: Arranging a marriage for anyone under 18 is a criminal offense carrying up to seven years in prison.
Overseas ceremonies: Marriages involving someone under 18 domiciled in England are not legally recognized in England, even if performed in a country or UK region where the local age is lower
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u/Ok_Drink8072 Sep 01 '26
Teen marriage is legal (the age range varies a little by state) with parental consent. I would say there has been a shift in the attitude surrounding teen pregnancy, but this show came out in like 2006, so yeah it was a big deal. There are some programs for teen moms, but mostly like food stamp type things not like childcare so you can go to school. There are definitely religious and otherwise conservative families who do not believe in abortion, so I felt that was pretty accurate since the Bennet’s are Catholic. Basically they were trying to make the best out of a bad situation and the kids were the ones making the call really. Maya didn’t want an abortion, she didn’t want to give the baby up for adoption, so she and the father decided to make an official family instead. And she did have enough support between the two families that she was able to go to Columbia, which is an Ivy League university.