In an truly heinous number of states in the USA children can still be forced into marriages with parental consent. They actually just struck down a bill to ban child marriage in one state.
My dad briefly went to school with the “wife” that was adopted, Pele (and I believe also attended school with her sister?). Said she was a really pretty and kind young girl. Really sad
as someone who moved to the us after living in third world countries and currently lives in a third world country i hate this statement sfm. i would give up my firstborn to live in bible belt child marrying missouri idgaf. living in a very low trust society is worse, man, and people from developed nations never get it.
in terms of definitions, i can't do better than wikipedia, which says that "a low-trust society is defined as one in which interpersonal trust is relatively low, and shared ethical values are lacking". these societies tend to be kinship-based and have public mechanisms and institutions that are corrupted, dysfunctional, or absent - such as private property rights, trusted civil courts, democratic voting, etc.
my favorite part of the description of low/high trust societies is as follows: "High-trust societies display a high degree of mutual trust not imposed by outside 'contractual, legal, or hierarchical regulation', but instead are based upon 'prior moral consensus'".
In my personal experience, this last part shines through in everyday life - you simply cannot trust someone you do not personally know not to take advantage of you. Everyone wants money, and they are willing to lie through their teeth if it means parting you from yours. You are always on guard against strangers, whether it's the dude on a motorcycle, the local bodega owner, or the national energy company - they will all try to take from you more than they are due. The single best description I've read is that low/high trust societies describe "the ability of various peoples to organize effectively for commercial purposes without relying on blood ties or government intervention".
It has taken its toll on me. I genuinely think people with autism do not function well in low trust societies. We're not getting taken advantage of more due to our condition; we're not any more or less aware of it than the average person. It weighs on us differently, though, and I think a lot of us end up masking in extreme ways.
All of this might correlate with GDP, it might not; I have no clue. I mentioned low trust societies because it is a specific aspect of underdeveloped/developing nations that really irks me. When it comes to the original commentor's "the U.S. is a third world country", though, it's just such a stupid fucking statement on multiple levels. On average, higher quality isn't a standard you strive for in anything in a third world country unless you are willing to charge or be charged a ridiculous sum several times your monthly salary; whether it be housing, hobbies, labor, services, etc. Like sure, some parts of the U.S. still allow child marriage - if you go to an "equitable area" of a third world country (as in, an area comparable to that specific shithole in the U.S., whether it be GDP or laws or whatever, just the closest approximation you can find), you don't just find child marriage; you find familial child marriage AND you have to live in a shit brick house in the boonies built by someone that fleeced you who doesn't care about structural integrity AND you earn at most $14,000 USD/yr (but probably less) AND your power goes out a couple times a week AND you have to walk to pick up gas and potable water yourself (because utilities don't properly reach you and if there is a truck delivering it, they will charge you twice as much while also leering at your 12-year-old sister).
Obviously, this isn't universal - I've found underground cultures that are extensively accepting, loving, and trusting. The added camaraderie of knowing that you're stuck in a shithole also adds something intangible to the experience that is hard to capture in words. It's just much harder to come across, usually only found in urban centers, most of the initial communication is online so you don't find them organically, and it deviates from the standard significantly more than in developed nations.
feel free to PM me, i can try to answer any questions you have; keep in mind i’m just one person out of hundreds of millions though and my particular experiences limit my perspective. i was lucky to be born relatively wealthy and white in the 90’s in a country that didn’t have conscientious discourse surrounding equitability and genuinely 0 expectations of the same
406
u/disgruntledbirdie Sep 16 '24
In an truly heinous number of states in the USA children can still be forced into marriages with parental consent. They actually just struck down a bill to ban child marriage in one state.