An editorial piece by Jennifer A. Marshall in last week's Gazette commented on a recent publication, The Marriage Index, by David Blankenhorn and Linda Malone-Colon. These authors purport to have their fingers on the pulse of the American Marriage, and they are here to tell us that the venerable institution is not doing well at all. As marriage goes, so goes the nation, they seem to say; if society does not find ways to prop up the institution, dire consequences will result.
Fear not. These brainy researchers have devised a set of indicators to test the health of the American marriage, such as duration of first marriages and birth rates to married persons. Out of a possible 100 points, today's marriages only score 60.3%, according to this model, versus a 1970 score of 76.2 I don't understand how the number of children a marriage produces relates directly to the happiness of that union, but never mind. In case you're wondering if this "research" proposes the support of all marriages, including gay ones, the publisher of this little nugget is the "Institute for American Values". So, probably not.
Marshall opines that when economic indicators take such a nosedive, as they have recently, "employers and policy makers responded accordingly". Well, sure, but their "responses" didn't support those who needed it most. She states that 70% of black children are born to unwed mothers because their fathers refused to get married. She also states that the percentage of all births to single mothers hovers around 40%. "Studies confirm", she says, that children of married parents fare much better in life than children of single parents.
This may be true, since it is easier for two people to raise children in this society than it is for a single person. However, it would be easier still for 3 or 4 people, yet there is a moral and legal ban on multiple marriage partners. Conservatives have always played the "nuclear family" card, offering the family unit up as a cure-all for society's ills. But how will sticking our collective noses into everyone else's marital business make a better society?
The authors offer a few tips. One is to form "local councils or committees that seek to strengthen marriage and family life". Another is to "teach school courses about marriage and love...through literature and art". How about a "new populist movement to empower marriage and families"? What does this gobbledygook mean, anyway? What school is going to teach "marriage" when they can't teach sex education and there's no money for gym and art classes? Will a local committee to check on the status of townspeople's marriages help strengthen society?
Poverty, lack of choices and a lack of education create more unhappy lives and marriages than lack of societal support of the institution itself. Marriages are made up of people, who have a right to work out their problems privately and for their own benefit. If entities like the Institute for American Values and the Heritage Foundation could study ways to support and empower people, I'll bet that the institutions they inhabit would benefit, as well.
Fear not. These brainy researchers have devised a set of indicators to test the health of the American marriage, such as duration of first marriages and birth rates to married persons. Out of a possible 100 points, today's marriages only score 60.3%, according to this model, versus a 1970 score of 76.2 I don't understand how the number of children a marriage produces relates directly to the happiness of that union, but never mind. In case you're wondering if this "research" proposes the support of all marriages, including gay ones, the publisher of this little nugget is the "Institute for American Values". So, probably not.
Marshall opines that when economic indicators take such a nosedive, as they have recently, "employers and policy makers responded accordingly". Well, sure, but their "responses" didn't support those who needed it most. She states that 70% of black children are born to unwed mothers because their fathers refused to get married. She also states that the percentage of all births to single mothers hovers around 40%. "Studies confirm", she says, that children of married parents fare much better in life than children of single parents.
This may be true, since it is easier for two people to raise children in this society than it is for a single person. However, it would be easier still for 3 or 4 people, yet there is a moral and legal ban on multiple marriage partners. Conservatives have always played the "nuclear family" card, offering the family unit up as a cure-all for society's ills. But how will sticking our collective noses into everyone else's marital business make a better society?
The authors offer a few tips. One is to form "local councils or committees that seek to strengthen marriage and family life". Another is to "teach school courses about marriage and love...through literature and art". How about a "new populist movement to empower marriage and families"? What does this gobbledygook mean, anyway? What school is going to teach "marriage" when they can't teach sex education and there's no money for gym and art classes? Will a local committee to check on the status of townspeople's marriages help strengthen society?
Poverty, lack of choices and a lack of education create more unhappy lives and marriages than lack of societal support of the institution itself. Marriages are made up of people, who have a right to work out their problems privately and for their own benefit. If entities like the Institute for American Values and the Heritage Foundation could study ways to support and empower people, I'll bet that the institutions they inhabit would benefit, as well.
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