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Saturday, January 04, 2003
AUSTRALIA'S FAMILY COURT rules that an adult stepchild is legally entitled to financial support from her stepfather in the areas of education and disability, just like a biological child would be entitled to support from her father, even if the marriage involving the stepfather is over. The Court said that the only difference between step and bio is that, with step, the quality of the parent-child relationship must be taken into account. This new ruling would seem to pave the way for the Court to examine the rights of adult children of never-married parents. IN THE GUARDIAN, a letter to the editor from a fathers' group (Fathers Direct) on the new British parental leave policies. Friday, January 03, 2003
The new global opinion survey from Pew reports that about half of Americans believe that their children will be worse off when they grow up, compared to how adults live today. The British hold a similarly dark view, while the Italians, French, Canadians, and Japanese are even more pessimistic. In contrast, most Asian (other than Japanese) and Central European parents believe that their childen's lives will be better than the lives of today's adults. The reversal of traditional U.S. optimism on this issue is particularly striking. THEODORA OOMS offers a clarification to Jane Eisner's op-ed: Welfare recipients in Oklahoma are NOT required to take relationships skills classes...the classes are one of many different activities recipients can choose that count as a required work-related activity. Thus they attend on a voluntary basis. Also, the classes are offered state-wide to anyone in the community, not just welfare recipients. REPORT FROM BRITAIN: Rebecca O'Neil of the British think tank Civitas emails that "I spoke to the group that carried out the study, a recruiting agency called Reed, and they read me some of the raw data, which don't appear in the report. On the question: When looking for a new job, would you prefer to receive an additional �1,000 per year or one of the following?: 31% chose flexible working hours 22% chose an extra �1,000 18% would be willing to work extra hours for extra pay 17% chose the option of working from home 6% chose 3 extra holidays per year 4% chose working half-days on Friday 1% did not state So, more people did choose flexible working hours out of 6 possible options. Apparently the issue of company cars and gym memberships was included in a separate question. We should also bear in mind here the sample (5,000 people researching online for a new job). Needless to say, this does not appear to be a scientifically rigorous survey. Regarding the issue of work-life balance, the British government (certain elements more than others) seems to be encouraging a model in which men reduce their hours and women increase them (so everyone works about 30 per week) and all those who care for children reduce their hours (while also ensuring they have the opportunity to work if they choose). They are also trying to lure more men into the daycare industry. On the plus side (as I see it), they are increasing the number of weeks and pay for mothers on maternity leave, which eases the financial situation for many working couples, making it easier for mothers of young children to care for them at home (more 'partnered' mothers than single mothers work here). Civitas' response to the work-life balance agenda is that it creates too many pressures for businesses who should be able to decide along with their employees how to structure work. A different, interesting development here is the government plan to create civil partnerships for same-sex couples who register (would include most of the rights and responsibilities of marriage...same sex couples already won the right, along with cohabiting couples, to adopt). This is actually a step-down from the government's earlier proposals to create civil partnerships for same-sex and heterosexual couples." "YOUR TAX DOLLARS PROMOTING MARRIAGE": Sound like a press release from the National Organization for Women? No, it's the headline CBS news gave to an AP article about an HHS announcement of "$2.2 million in grants to 12 states and a variety of religious, nonprofit and tribal organizations to advance the nation's child support enforcement system." The headline is accurate, of course, but how many unbiased articles about government spending begin with "Your Tax Dollars..."? An article in the British Medical Journal suggests that drug companies, looking for the next Viagra-like success, are seeking to develop drugs to treat "female sexual dysfunction." Is this another example of our tendency to medicalize, and then treat with drugs, more and more aspects of life? Thursday, January 02, 2003
MY FAVORITE QUOTE FROM EISNER ON "THE MARRIAGE MOVEMENT": "Liberals, in particular, heard the wake-up call this year. No longer confined to the outer reaches of the Religious Right, the "marriage movement" is moving center stage, as those on the political left are belatedly adding their voices to this necessary debate. One example, of many: The National Council on Family Relations, an organization for academic researchers and practitioners, had been so skittish about discussing marriage that some members stopped attending its annual meeting. Not anymore. This year, there were several panels addressing marriage, and next year's entire conference will be devoted to the subject." No wonder Martha Fineman is annoyed. Syndicated columnist Jane Eisner explains why liberals are right to participate in the marriage movement: Remember Dan Quayle's clumsy but now famous speech decrying the single motherhood of TV sitcom character Murphy Brown? It became convenient for liberals to scoff at Quayle's simple-minded moralizing without peering more closely at the truth tucked into his remarks: Children are best raised by two parents in a happy, stable marriage. MARRIAGE SEEN THROUGH BLINDERS: Showing why many law professors should not have influence over family law, Martha Fineman refers to marriage as a tie that is "purely legal." She follows, "Other ties may not be legal at all, but functional, based on caretaking or affection." This is effective rhetoric, to try to reduce the social institution of marriage--with all of its embedded "functional" and (for some people) sacred meanings--to something that is "just a piece of paper." But while Fineman accuses marriage advocates of narrow-mindedness regarding family structure, her comments most certainly reveal narrow-mindedness about the social meaning of marriage. FIRST BABY OF THE YEAR: "...neither the media crowd that had gathered nor the legal system in Virginia was fully ready for this baby and its family." Britain's Department of Trade and Industry releases a new poll showing that, among current job-seekers, especially parents, flexible working hours are a highly desired benefit. Both the DTI press release, and the BBC story, suggest that job-seekers would prefer flexible hours over more pay ("Job hunters would rather work flexible hours than get more money"). But, as I look at the numbers made available, that statement appears to be incorrect. The actual finding seems to be that one-third of job-seekers would prefer flexibility over more pay, suggesting that the majority would prefer more pay. The poll is described as one part of a larger plan by the Labour Government to increase the availability of flexible working hours. The New York Times asked a handful of academics to nominate "the most overrated idea" of 2002. Martha Albertson Fineman, a legal scholar from Cornell, nominates "marriage" (requires registration, scroll down). To me, her comments reveal an ignorance of social science methodology. She suggests that what matters for children and society is family process, not family form -- as if the two are unrelated! She illogically implies that since other things besides marriage are important, marriage is not that important. (Since eating fruit is an important part of a healthy diet, eating vegetables is not important.) She also employs scare words such as as "naive," "antiquated," "romantic," "panacea," and "Bush." This same style of arguing is also apparent, alas, in Fineman's academic writing on this subject, which I discuss here and here.) A letter to the editor in today's Times also addresses Fineman's argument. But what to make of the idea that some scholars consider that our society is now "overrating" marriage? To me, such a notion is a backanded compliment to the marriage movement. It's certainly true that emphasizing the importance of marriage is higher today on the public and scholarly agenda than it was ten years ago, or even five years ago. I can understand Fineman's discomfort. Wednesday, January 01, 2003
HAPPY NEW YEAR. Effective this year, New York state has modestly reduced the marriage penalty in the state tax code by increasing the standard deduction for married couples from $14,200 to $14,600. Since the combined standard deduction for two unmarried cohabitors in New York is $15,000 -- 2 time $7,500 -- married couples taking the standard deduction still typically pay higher taxes than similar couples who are unmarried. But this change is a step in the right direction. Expanding the standard deduction for married couples is one of the better ways of reducing the marriage penalty in the tax code. There are bad ways to do it, also. Tuesday, December 31, 2002
Monday, December 30, 2002
Over the holiday break I saw the first half-hour of �Austin Powers in Goldmember.� �Shoot the Moon� it ain�t, but father involvement (or lack thereof) seemed to be an underlying theme of the 60s-spy-movie spoof. At his swingin� bachelor pad, Austin (Mike Myers) belted out a song called �Daddy Wasn�t There.� One reviewer writes: [W]ithin the outrageous, over-the-top comedy are some pretty down-to-earth relationship issues. The father/son relationship plays an important part for both Austin Powers as well as Dr. Evil. While both of them felt neglected by their dads, they responded in completely different ways. Powers turned to overachieving in hopes to impress his father; Evil turned instead to . . . evil.Myers himself said, �Austin Powers was born out of trying to celebrate my father's life.� As if the world isn't grim enough these days, last night I watched "Shoot the Moon," a raw, disturbing movie about divorce from 1981, starring Albert Finney and Diane Keaton. The late Pauline Kael called it "unapologetically grown-up" and "perhaps the most revealing American movie of its era." Revealing, yes. One thing that struck me, watching this film 20 years later, is the movie's strong insistence that divorce happens for no reason that anyone can understand. One of Diane Keaton's daughters, clearly distressed, asks her why the marriage is breaking up. Her answer: "I don't know." Albert Finney's father-in-law asks, "What the hell is going on?" Finney's answer: "I don't know." Later, the daughter asks Finney the same question. His answer: "I don't know." No one knows. The closest we get to an actual answer is when Diane Keaton tells the daughter: "It's no one's fault. There's no one to blame. It's just -- time." These two people are affluent, successful, educated, charming, sophisticated, attractive. They live in a beautiful home in beautiful Morin County California with four beautiful daughters. Nothing seems to be amiss except that they have been stricken with permanent gloom regarding their marriage -- a gloom which they cannot explain and over which they have no control. "Shoot the Moon" came out in 1981, probably the year, according to demographers, in which the divorce rate in the U.S. reached its peak. Fourteen years earlier, in 1967, Albert Finney had starred in "Two for the Road," another celebrated film that took an unsparing look at a marriage in trouble. Only in that movie, the couple ends up choosing to stay together. To chart some of the main intellectual shifts in our society from pro-marriage to pro-divorce, you could worse that compare those two movies. EMINEM: FATHER OF THE YEAR, proclaims Chuck Eddy in the Village Voice. The article is somewhat of a puff piece (reflected in the graphic depicting Eminem as the Madonna), heavily based on an interview with Em�s great-grandmother, who sees no evil in her great-grandson, though he speaks plenty o� evil on his records. The article reflects the common view that being a good father is essentially unrelated to being a good husband. But the most striking excerpt is this candid admission: Ever wonder why people are so determined to reach for white picket fences, supposed normalcy, a nuclear family? Well, try growing up without one.Here is my own, more skeptical take on Eminem and fatherhood (written before the Voice piece) entitled, �Eminem: Father of the Year?� I�d whine that Eddy ripped me off, but I doubt he reads the National Fatherhood Initiative�s newsletter. [Note: The Voice article includes profanity; mine makes liberal use of ellipses...] The Guardian reports: Every Christmas, thousands of frustrated young couples are put into separate bedrooms while staying at their parents' homes. They may have lived together for years but to their parents they're still tremulous virgins who need to be parted in case unclean urges should overtake them. Parents must suspect that their offspring, who has a home and a job, is having sex regularly. But, unwilling to admit that they can't cope with acknowledging their adult child's sexuality, many fall back on the dusty excuse of "morality", which automatically trumps "common sense" in any argument.Now that's a bumper sticker: "Morality": the dusty excuse. The Boston Globe editors on paid family leave. The Democratic Leadership Council makes the same argument. Sunday, December 29, 2002
Someone emails to suggest that the Dalton WaPo article (below) on parental overinvestment is partly explained by lower fertility rates, as discussed here (NYTs, requires registration). I think that's probably one part of the explanation. Interesting article by Patricia Dalton in the Washington Post about parents who devote themselves earnestly to doing everything for their children, and making sure that their children have everything, only to find that these children never become self-sufficient and turn into young adults who are takers, not givers. I'm not sure that she frames the issue precisely -- parents who believe that "it's all about the children" can still, as a part of that idea, establish limits and teach good values -- but she is clearly on to something. People who worry professionally about the weakening of the family seem to talk mainly about the consequences of parental selfishness and child neglect, but the problem she is describing is quite different, and worth some serious attention. Most grandparents I know, even the doting ones, would agree wholeheartedly with her view that something is out of balance in many of today's most earnestly child-centered families. I've also heard Judith Martin, the "Miss Manners" columnist, describe this phenomenon with great insight and humor, and when she says it's a trend, it is. |
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