Marriage Over time, the understanding of marriage has slowly split into two main understandings. The traditionalists have an understanding based on tradition and religion that holds firm against the changes of society. In a traditionalist marriage: 1) The marriage is between one man and one woman, neither of which is a Theriandroid. 2) The couple is completely monogamous, including that they do not make use of Theriandroids sexually. Typically any form of pornography other than what they make of themselves/each other is considered a softer form of cheating: it is strongly discouraged but it would be naive to believe it never happens. 3) Most of these couples are at least nominally Jewish, Christian or Muslim. Often this is simply the religion they are born into, and many go through the motions without strong convictions. However, others are true believers, especially those who were converted later in life. Athiests and agnostics make up a substantial portion of the adult population, having drifted away from the beliefs of their parents, but they tend to enter nontraditionalist marriages (or eventually change their marriage to a nontraditionalist structure). 4) Traditionalists tend to highly value children, and as such they have a lot of them. As mentioned previously, traditionalists average about six children per woman. However, due to the gender ratio drift (about twice as many boys as girls are born due to a side effect of genetic modding) and the scarcity of children from the other half of women, the net effect is a roughly stable population with very little growth. 5) Traditionalists are generally culturally opposed to divorce. While it is permissable in certain circumstances, one or the other spouse will generally be shunned by their peers either due to their actions which precipitated the divorce, or for divorcing without sufficient cause. (Often both will recieve such shunning from different people, because they heard only one side of the story or the other.) Divorcing while minor children are in the home is considered far worse than divorcing after the children have moved out. 5) About half of women ultimately chose to live the traditionalist lifestyle, marrying a faithful husband and having children. However, that only accounts for one in four men, so 75% of men don't even have the option of a traditional marriage. Nontraditionalist families come in a wide variety. While tradition and peer pressure keeps the traditionalist model alive, and their birth rates ensure that the ideas remain well represented, nontraditionalists have had their ideals of freedom enshrined in the legal system. Many nontraditionalists skip the formalities of marriage entirely. They often have a temporary monogamy enforced by the offended party leaving if any cheating is discovered, though others are happy to share their partners. Birth control and abortion account for much of their low birth rates, totally a mere 0.5 children per woman. In addition, many nontraditionalist (especially men) have Theriandroid partners who are completely infertile by design. Those who do chose to marry though enjoy a greatly expanded set of options. 1) The requirement that spouses be of different genders was the first to go. Even the basic form lists "Spouse 1" and "Spouse 2" rather than "Husband" and "Wife" for the last two hundred years. 2) Next, the requirement that a spouse not be already married disappeared, as polygamists won their day in court. For simplicity, multipartner marriages are kept to a seperate form. In most cases all members of the marriage are considered married to each other, though more complex arrangements are possible with enough legal documentation. 3) As genetic modification technology improved, the restrictions against relatives marrying went away, since any genetic flaws could be removed either from the parents before hand or in most cases in the child afterwards. 4) Finally, a landmark case in the 2100s established the right of parents/guardians to consent to anything an adult could consent to on behalf of their children, so long as neither the child nor another parent/guardian objected. This was openly used by some families to make arranged marriages fully realized as early as the birth of the younger spouse. (Legally, despite objections from religious groups and scientists, unborn children are still considered a part of the mother's body and thus unable to be married regardless.) It has also been more infamously used to legalize pedophilia, child pornography, and a handful of insular "clans" where men marry their own daughters upon birth. (While these clans tend to have a -lot- of children, they are extremely rare and they are ultimately a rounding error in the overall population.) While most outsiders assume the patriarchs of these clans are some kind of smelly, awful pigs or something the reality is often the opposite. Since the mothers can so easily block their daughters' marriages, the patriarchs need to have the charisma to earn such devotion from their original wives to make them want their daughters to be blessed by such an amazing husband. Matriarchs marrying their own sons are extremely rare (especially as an ongoing practice as opposed to a one-time thing), but there is at least one family (with their own reality show, naturally) that has made a practice of adding all of thier children into their own giant glob of a marriage. After a few generations, they've reached over a hundred close relatives all married together, completely defying any natural language description of their relationships to one another. 5) The only real remaining obstacle for marriage is Theriandroids and other non-humans. The law only recognizes the marriage of two members of the Greater Human Species (basically anyone who could naturally concieve with a human, or could do so if not for some medical condition). Some people do chose to have "marriage" ceremonies with thier Theriandroids (especially clone types), but they have no legal force as the Theriandroid partner is legally their owner's property. Some of these have had the foresight to make provisions in their will that allow the Theriandroid to keep a hold on their property after death to take care of themselves, though this sometimes falls apart if greedy family members object. Some marriages are very much like traditionalist marriages, except that one or both spouse (usually the husband) has one or more Theriandroid lovers on the side. Unless this is done very discreetly, however, they tend to find themselves gently pushed out of traditionalist social circles for their "perversion" and find themselves associating more easily with nontraditionalists. Such couples are often, but not always, inclined to avoid having children so they can focus on enjoying their own lives, especially since they associate more with people who encourage that kind of thinking. While traditionalists generally hold to an ancient sense of sexual morality, nontraditionalists are all over the map. They decide for themselves what lines are unacceptable to cross, and over time they tend to slowly erase those lines. The only line that has held solidly throughout society is that almost everyone agrees that rape is wrong and should be severely punished. The widespread availability of Theriandroids as prostitutes or personal lovers has eliminated what little sympathy rapists ever had. Most other sexual acts are legal as long as concensual (with parent or guardian permission for minors). Public sex acts are a bit of a gray area, as essentially it is non-consensual "sex" with any onlooker that stumbles upon the lovers. While not nearly as severe as rape, it remains prohibited, and would allow any observer (or their parent or guardian) to sue. Semi-public sex clubs exist, however, with clear markings that require anyone present to consent to seeing live sex acts, which is generally enough to satisfy most exhibitionists. Prostitution also remains illegal in places, though Theriandroids are exempt due to their status as non-humans and generally undercut human prostitutes even where they are legal to the extent that only those with some kind of exotic lure are able to earn anything worth mentioning.