At NRO, Kathryn Jean Lopez interviews Mitch Pearlstein of the Center for the American Experiment about his recent book, From Family Collapse to America’s Decline: The Educational, Economic, and Social Costs of Family Fragmentation:
…LOPEZ: You…write: “The more I’ve learned and pondered about the breakdown of marriage, both in America and elsewhere, the more I’ve come to increasingly appreciate just how deeply embedded and complex its causes are and how unlikely more than marginal progress in turning matters around will be made in any near term. More than a sobering thought, it’s a depressing one.” So why do you bother writing about it? What, honestly, can be done?
PEARLSTEIN: When I first read (about 35 years ago) the 1965 “Moynihan Report” about what were then considered high rates of out-of-wedlock births in African-American families, the problem he described seemed manifestly obvious and severe to me. And when I learned how Moynihan had been pilloried as a racist, largely by the Left, and how questions of family breakdown were essentially removed from public discussion for many years — which, of course, exacerbated the calamity — my anti-P.C. juices took over, and I’ve been occupied by such matters ever since. It needs to be understood that, far from being a racist and a victim-blamer, Moynihan attributed family breakdown in the black community entirely to white racism. There wasn’t a racist punctuation mark in the report, which was written while Moynihan was an official in LBJ’s Department of Labor.
As for what can be done, the quickest and shortest answer is, let’s see where things stand a generation from now. Will we have made any progress? I can conceive of making a fair number of men, for instance, more marriageable by helping them clear their names after arrests and incarcerations, therefore helping them get good jobs and build decent careers. But will we be able to get the toothpaste back in the tube, as some people like to put it? I really don’t know. But it’s not as if our culture hasn’t changed in fundamental ways over the last two generations, often for the better. Think of racial and religious tolerance…
Categories: Marriage
Mitch Perlstein:
“Adults over the past 4-5 decades have been overly interested in their own happiness and fulfillment (self-actualization) and much less concerned with their societal responsibilities.”
The common good argument, I think.
Amazon Reviewer summation of Mitch Perlstein:
“ “From Family Collapse…” is rich with content. Several examples include:
* School reform will continue to fail as long as we continue focusing on how schools work rather than on how our culture does.
* A by-product of the same-sex (redefinition of marriage) debate – Proponents are working overtime to avoid using words like “mother” or “father” when they can get by with the safer and all-encompassing “parents” instead. Gender-based terms are neutralized denying the distinctive and vital contributions of men-as-fathers and women-as-mothers. “Their language is suggestive that human beings are interchangeable parts.”
* “Babies and their futures routinely get lost in discussions about the highest tech ways of bringing boys and girls into a new world in which fathers – biological or otherwise – are purposely excluded.”
* There is no substitute for the institution of marriage. “What is the elephantine reason why many children are less likely to be taken to libraries, zoos, and museums, not to mention sufficiently supervised and inspired around kitchen tables reconfigured each night as study carrels? People ignore the problem of children growing up with only one parent at home.”
* Family fragmentation has more to with the cultural and spiritual air we breathe than the legislation we pass. It has more to do with what is right and what is wrong.
* Inviting chaos…“a community that allows a large number of men to grow up in broken families, dominated by women, never acquiring any stable relationship to male authority, never acquiring any set of rational expectations about the future – that community asks for and gets chaos. Crime, violence, unrest, disorder – most particularly the furious, unrestrained lashing out at the whole structure – that is not only to be expected; it is very near to inevitable. And it is richly deserved.” – The Moynihan Report.
* Schools have become a scapegoat. Children who come from disorganized home lives find it hard to concentrate and work hard enough to perform academically yet we believe in the power of schools to overcome virtually all.
* Family fragmentation leads to an increase in personal, social, and spiritual poverty which leads to income inequality which leads to class divisions.”
Without having read the book, which is really an injustice to be speaking about it, my take is that faith beliefs, attaching families to faith beliefs would be a big key to help restore marriage. Should the questions we should be asking is what has happened to faith beliefs informing culture?
What has happened to faith beliefs informing culture?
There are more faith beliefs than ever before informing culture. People have more exposure to a plethora of faiths and beliefs, which is causing them to question and re-examine their beliefs more often; explore other ideas and beliefs they come in contact with. Scientific discoveries have influenced people as well; fundamentalist ideas that are incompatible with scientific knowledge get abandoned by more people (while at the same time, a re-interest in religious mysticism is surging). Greater political freedom and human rights for formerly marginalized groups mean fewer people are interested in authoritarianism; people who are used to democracy in other institutions want democracy in their religious institutions as well, and either work for change from within or leave in search of a faith that serves them better. Or, no faith at all—greater intellectual freedom has made room for people to publically claim atheism and agnosticism.
Go to any Barnes and Noble, or anyplace else with a healthy magazine section. Lots and lots of evidence of spirituality—someone is buying all those issues. What people are rejecting isn’t spirituality per se; they are rejecting authoritarianism, abuse of power, church hierarchies they have no voice in, hypocrisy from spiritual leaders, and narrow views of spirituality that don’t speak to their hearts. Women are explicitly rejecting patriarchal traditions, whether or not they leave their faith of origin.
Re: Women are explicitly rejecting patriarchal traditions, whether or not they leave their faith of origin.
Women are overrepresented relative to men in all Christian traditions, except (IIRC) Eastern Orthodoxy. And have been for a very very long time (in 19th century France it was noted that organized religion was a mostly female pursuit).
I mean, your statement is technically correct, but also misleading: Christian churches are seeing a demographic decline across the board, but women are *less* likely to leave their church than men. If you walk into any Roman Catholic or evangelical church (or for that matter a mainline church too) most of the people there are women.
Re: What people are rejecting isn’t spirituality per se; they are rejecting authoritarianism, abuse of power, church hierarchies they have no voice in, hypocrisy from spiritual leaders, and narrow views of spirituality that don’t speak to their hearts.
The problem with that claim is that ‘liberal’ mainline churches are seeing some of the fastest rates of decline, and the decline in churches like the Episcopalians and ELCA Lutherans has *picked up* since they decided to accept women clergy, homosexuality, etc.
La Lubu,
Gosh, you’ve nailed exactly what’s going on within our culture religion-wise. I think I’m going to printout your analysis because it’s so spot-on. I see in my own life I’ve migrated from a strict, conservative Catholic belief to a more open, spiritual outlook harmonized with Catholicism, as best as can be with that.
So, La Lubu, what are your solutions to the marriage problem? Is it more economic than anything else?
Re: The problem with that claim is that ‘liberal’ mainline churches are seeing some of the fastest rates of decline
I should point out that may not be the case anymore- the Roman Catholic Church has seen a catastrophic mass exodus in the last ten years or so, due to the sex scandals, and at this point their rate of decline (leaving aside immigration) might be as bad or worse than the mainline Protestant churches. The Pew Forum data gives a cumulative, integrative perspective, but doesn’t really tell you as much about what’s happening right now.
Hector_St_Clare:
“Women are overrepresented relative to men in all Christian traditions, except (IIRC) Eastern Orthodoxy. And have been for a very very long time (in 19th century France it was noted that organized religion was a mostly female pursuit).”
Actually, Hector, I think more women being attached to Christian religions than men has been so for many centuries. It’s not a 150-year-old development. It’s especially pronounced in Europe.
There is one notable religion that actually engage more men than women: Islam. Why Christianity seems not to do so, I have no idea.
Women stay in their churches, they just blow off any of the rules they don’t like.
Re: Women stay in their churches, they just blow off any of the rules they don’t like.
Do you have any evidence of that?
There certainly isn’t a gender gap in terms of attitudes about abortion, and I doubt there’s one on contraception. Anecdotally, the Catholics I know who oppose contraception are mostly women.
(Do you have any evidence of that?)
Sure – there is lots of evidence.
Rachel K. Jones and Joerg Dreweke have a study that finds the following:
[There are approximately 62 million women of reproductive
age in the United States, and virtually all of them will use
a contraceptive method other than natural family planning
at some point in their lives. Even among married Catholic
women, only 3% practice natural family planning, while
a majority uses contraceptives that the Church hierarchy
routinely denounces.
This research suggests that the perception that
strongly held religious beliefs and contraceptive use are
antithetical is wrong—in fact, the two may be highly compatible.
Contraceptive use by Catholics and Evangelicals,
including those who frequently attend religious services,
is the widespread norm, not the exception.]
If you google around – 50% of abortions in any given year are procured by Evangelicals and Catholics.
Or this new survey from PEW
[Slightly more than half (54%) of white evangelicals, according to the Pew Research Center study, favor completely overturning the 1973 Supreme Court decision that affirmed a woman’s right to have an abortion.]
So quite a lot of them support Roe.
And
[substantial majorities of white Protestants (76%), black Protestants (65%) and white Catholics (63%) say the ruling should not be over turned, the survey found.]
Religious denominations have lost the power to compel. You don’t have to stop going to church because you have an affair or an abortion, use the pill or have non-procreative sex. Just don’t tell the Priest. It’s optional and the majority of people who attend church treat it as such.
Hector_St_Clare: “Women are overrepresented relative to men in all Christian traditions, except (IIRC) Eastern Orthodoxy.”
While I get what you’re saying (with regard to attendance and membership), it seems pretty important to specify since many denominations categorically restrict women from positions of power. Women may be prevalent in some Christian contexts, but it’s much harder to argue that they’re dominant. Overrepresentation is ambiguous between those two meanings.
Teresa: “There is one notable religion that actually engage more men than women: Islam.”
I think a big part of this is where exactly you’re talking about. If you’re talking about North America or Europe, those are predominantly immigrant populations, where men disproportionately immigrated into those regions. On the other hand, compared to the rest of India, the Muslim population is disproportionately female (although for a variety of factors it’s still predominantly male, just less so than non-Muslim Indians). It’s theorized that female infanticide is lower among Muslims than some non-Muslim populations in India, so that’s what’s driving the difference.
In any case I feel like it’s also relevant to point out that the first convert to Islam was a woman. : )