What exactly inspired the attitude of shaming a male born without a father?

It wasn’t just males, it was females as well and I would look to religion as the reason. It is hard evidence that there was sex outside of marriage. Certainly an ancillary reason could be property laws and the need for a “legitimate” heir or heiress.

Well there’s the cultural stigma and all that religious bullshit about women remaining “chaste & pure.” Clearly, there can be no such thing as a child without a father. I suspect the actual basis for all the stigma associated with out of wedlock birth is actually about severely penalizing women for sexual excursions. It’s just another tool in the huge chest labeled “keeping them in their place.”

Historical, even biblical, and definitely continuing into the middle ages (knights, lineage, etc.).

If you have no father, you are not part of the tribe; you have no title, you have no chance of nobility. And because of that you do not have standing, power, or respect.

Good news, though! There is very little of the stigma left in the general social population, in spite of what the white, conservative, politicians say.
At least in the U.S.

I really think the root of it goes back to a time when we didn’t have a welfare government. If you gave birth out of wedlock, it was an almost impossible financial hardship for many families, especially the woman’s. That got morphed into morals and religion, which, of course, vilifies “bad girl behavior” much more than “bad boy behavior.”

I’m sure that there was also a “sins of the father” attitude about this, too. That is, the adults around this child in society – who had children of their own (and especially daughters) to raise and marry off as best they could – would have a consideration that “if this is the kind of lineage he has, then he will act in the same shameful way that his father did”. And no one would have wanted that for their daughter. In fact, no responsibly old-fashioned parent really wants that even today.

@NerdyKeith Regarding children born “outside of marriage” /(without a father) or sometimes “illegitimate” There are no illegitimate children. Only illegitimate parents.

Inheritance laws.

In the beginning, a man would retire and divide his goods among his sons according to his own judgment, and they would support him for the rest of his life. Then laws were passed specifying who got what. Suddenly it became a big deal to be very certain who fathered who. The custom of a hereditary throne was even more so. When a woman of the royal family bore a child, the entire court was present to witness the event. The princes kept careful track of their escapades to be sure that all potential claims to the throne were recorded, and if possible, thwarted. Did you see the flick “King Ralph”? That’s what it was about.

Children without a father.

I think it had to do with inheritance, money, religion, power, and cheating on your wife. A bastard child was proof you didn’t live up to your promise to be faithful. The child is born from sin, without wedlock.

In modern day we don’t use terms like bastard child (I hope no one does) but there is still a stigma that that child has some stats stacked against them. It’s not about religion so much anymore, but it is still about economics, and I’d add in other measure of success. Although, that is more associated with absentee fathers, rather than simply a child born out of wedlock, but they too often overlap.

When we moved away from a Matrilineal society into a Patrilineal one.

Which, is all bullshit, because the only person you can count on as being your blood relative is your mother; she could have boinked a half dozen males besides your father and any one of them could have provided the sperm so whether or not you have a “legitimate” father is a moot point.

@canidmajor yep. harsh economic realities are extracting a heavy toll from outdated pointless habits.

Honestly, not just a long time ago, people still shame the mother and newborn that is being born with father for pragmatic reasons. In traditional society, it’s the fathers that earn the money, thus allowing the wife to be alive (having food, house, etc) as well as the existence and wellbeing of the child. By seeing this it easy for the society/family to shame a woman that stupidly want to bring another liability in her life as well as her family (especially if she still stays with her family). To be real honest with you, women here only care for men’s wallet, and if a father doesn’t exist so does his wallet, and what sane woman will want to give birth to a child without a wallet to support such action? The modern shaming here is more about pragmatism, even though some shaming derived from religious reasons still exist in other parts of the world.

@Unofficial_Member, where are you from that such misogyny is so ingrained as to be the social norm?

@JLeslie I agree with most of your statement, but the father isn’t always a married person. He could be a 16 year old who had sex with another 16 year old, found out she was knocked up, and ran away, leaving the girl to deal with the stigma and shame all by herself. If she tried to point to him as the father, he could just deny it, say she’s a whore, and it’s done.

A Scarlett Letter comes to mind, too.

^^Sure, you’re correct. In that case I think the woman was more branded than the man back in the day. The child also was branded, but branded as the child of an unmarried woman more than anything I think. The woman was the slut. It’s her responsibility to keep her legs closed.

@canidmajor I wish I can tell you that. All I can say is that I live in thrid world country.

@Unofficial_Member: That explains a lot. Here in the US, social mores tend to be much more progressive. We are very fortunate. :-)

@JLeslie Throughout history it has always been the woman who was branded, while the men got off scott-free. They still do is so many ways. It didn’t matter if neither of them were married.

^^yeah, I think that people are trying to turn the tide and shame the men when they don’t stand by to help raise the child.

Too bad that the tide has turned so far that women are having babies left and right, out of wedlock, and nobody gives it a second thought. Then the women find themselves alone on a row boat in a storm, which they never expect.

Well, MOST people don’t give it a second thought. My sister, a devout Christian, tried to shame my daughter once by making a comment about her “illegitimate” children.

I have a huge objection to branding the child at all. One thing is to question the behavior of the parents, but the child is innocent. I find it reprehensible for a child to have to feel any shame regarding the circumstances in which they were born. Each person is born equal—period. Not equal in the sense of opportunity, I wish that were the case, but equal as a human being.

Some famous quote about putting others down is a way for the person speaking to feel better about themselves. It’s an artificial boost for the insecure, and mean spirited.

Agreed. I don’t even like the terms that separate biological from non-biological family members….“Step” “Adopted” what ever. Sometimes, for what ever reason, it’s necessary. But I would never introduce my oldest as “my adopted daughter.” Hell, usually I forget that she’s adopted.