Marriage and Society
Can't deny the facts about marriage. And yet another example of why government screws up just about everything it touches...
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Why is this question asked?
1. To justify easier abortion which cuts the number of children born to single mothers.
2. to increase 'funding' to government agencies who take away (steal) children from single mothers.
I would like to add to the observation made by Mike Marotta: Having stable family units does not cause a civilized society. That being said, given that the culture is already a civilized society, having young males get married is the best way of reducing violence in that most violent subset of our society.
It is my supposition, based on reading Ian Morris' books on the evolution of social structure (related to technology and measured by calories/day/person) is that we are now evolving out of the 'industrial' model and into something else. The 'agricultural' model of society (which lasted till about 1850 in the US) evolved into the 'industrial model by 1950 (more egalitarian; less tolerance of violence). Each 'type' of society has its own set of characteristics, and I think that the type of society into which we are evolving may not have traditional families.
Jan
That being said, assertions of 'truth' of a particular datum (on this and other sources of information) often fail this simple test; this article did not fail that litmus test. Thus my response to this post did NOT begin with a charge of factual inaccuracy or source bias (NB blarman is generally good about his accuracy and sources).
I do not have sufficient interest in the topic to pursue its data source further. My main point is not to validate the current article's assertion (other than to check that it is not BS) but to suggest that existing statistics may not reveal an ongoing change in the basic model of society, which idea I thought would be interesting to the folks on this list.
Jan
Jan
I do agree that society is changing. As you said: "It is my supposition, based on reading Ian Morris' books on the evolution of social structure (related to technology and measured by calories/day/person) is that we are now evolving out of the 'industrial' model and into something else. "
Just one factor is that the information economy allows the smartest youngsters to earn considerable incomes.
Although it is generally true that to work in IT as a professional, you need a university degree, that is not absolutely true. The greatest majority of my co-workers are college graduates -- but not all of them.
In the John Delorean biography, On a Clear Day You Can See General Motors Delorean's father was a tool and die man in Detroit in the 1920s. They were independent skilled workers whose "resumes" were in their tool boxes -- not the tools they bought, but the tools they made. IT is still like that: no unions; no government regulation. Your resume is not so much your job history (though that counts) but what you have on Github. So, despite the institutionalization of the occupation, it is still vibrant.
That has social consequences.
There is another effect, these "good" homes are better at suppressing court proceedings and for getting easier sentencing. Thus interpreting stats becomes harder.
(You took a -1 for that. I gave you back a plus.)
The entire computer field was built by people who did not major in computer technology in college because such an education did not yet exist. When there were only a few programming courses available, and not much else, there was no such thing as a degree in computer engineering or science. Bright students were able to pick it up and build and industry without using much at all of their formal education. Much of what is still taught is quickly obsolete or of little use for the latest innovations. But what does this have to do with families?
Urban society is different than that and capitalism is impossible except in an urban environment. It is literally civilizaiton.
jlc's point (and I agree) is that the post-industrial, information economy is different from the industrial one before and may bring different family structures.
The fact that the inventors are self-taught was true of the steam engine, of course. They were also unregulated. They had no guilds. Eventually, they did. The ASME, ASCE, and other engineering societies lobbied for government regulation. So, invention moved away from them - just as innovation moved off the farm. George Washington used the same kind of plow as Moses. But historically, farming was innovative and required complex legal structures. Fred Flintsone had no need for the Code of Hamurabi.
We still have people who live by hunting. (Rocky Mountain Pirate was an early participant here in the Gulch.) We still have famers. We still have factories. We probably always will have families... and coined money... and churches... and public streets... and wear clothes in public, too. Old social forms do not just disappear. But changes in technology cause changes in society. A world of unregulated individualst economic enterprise could be very different from whatever we might imagine now.'
I wonder if families money, churches, and streets might be so different in a few hundred years that they will be almost unrecognizable.
I think Enlightenment leads to plenty and to individual rights. I imagine hunter-gatherer tribes using socialism because they barely subsist and it feels right to our ancient human sensibilities to share with our tribe. It also feels rights to seek revenge, which served as a crude criminal justice system. It feels right to force girls of conquered tribes to become wives. These things are wrong but genes that make them feel "right" were successful. Agriculture, industry, and now automation/IT drastically increase production and allow people to produce more, making it harder to sell the idea that good people must share because means of production are finite. People in the modern world feel a natural right to go their own way, keep what they produce, and we find most practices of antiquity to be completely beyond the pale.
OTOH, plenty (i.e. high production) led to the idea of communism, and the increased production associated with automation/IT will lead to more socialism. I frequently hear the argument that automation/IT increases return on investment and decreases the price of human labor and if the trend continues the only choice will be a system of handouts to pay for everyone to live a comfortable life while machines do all the work. It's a recurrent theme in sci-fi. I think (and hope) it won't happen though. I see it as another form of "let's go back to the old ways of simpler times," which can be in the form of romanticized views of hunter-gatherer tribes and romanticized views of family at the time of the industrial revolution.
The vocal fans of Ayn Rand will tell you it's simply a case of evil Toohey-like people selling an evil philosophy. Then, like online commenters at the end of a news story about an abused child saying they certainly would never abuse children, they masturbate about how crappy the world supposedly is due to Emmanuel Goldstein's undermining the good people like themselves. Maybe this is a good way to let off steam.
I think it's dangerous, though, because we don't know if the changes from increase technology will be positive for individual liberty. As MM laconically said, "[It] has social consequences."
It does seem that at every increase in productivity, some people claimed that we have plenty now and can afford to share freely. In other words, they can take whatever they regard as your "extra."
But sharing is generally about social status. It is why we have brand names for property. I wonder how it would be accepted if patents and copyrights were controlled by the govenment so that ownership is secret, though immense wealth were still possible.
I would actually cite early examples of colonialization of the United States to directly refute this. Jamestown nearly died out and was almost abandoned entirely because of their early charter conditions - which ensconced socialism. The only reason they survived was because they finally abandoned it and moved toward private industry. Same with several of the Massachusetts Bay Company excursions (which brought us the current incarnation of Thanksgiving). The one place where socialism was used in the Old World was feudalism where the lords owned and controlled everything and the peasants worked for them. And that is the model much of the self-appointed European elites seem to want to gravitate back to. That is the globalist movement. They like technology because of the perks but if you look at it critically, their efforts at all the global warming nonsense are to control exactly whom has access to all this wonderful technology. It isn't worth much if you don't have the power/energy to run it...
"Agriculture, industry, and now automation/IT drastically increase production and allow people to produce more, making it harder to sell the idea that good people must share because means of production are finite."
I agree with the first half but not the second. I would actually argue that one can not give away what one does not already have. If one is scraping by, one has nothing to impart to anyone else and whatever wealth one may have earned represents a large proportion of their time and resources. With the advances in technology, we have more leisure time than ever precisely because we can spend fewer hours providing for our needs and the rest goes toward wants. We have more affluence than at any other time in history. We have so much more opportunity to give because there is so much more excess. We don't give because of personal choice and priorities - not because we don't have anything to give.
"I frequently hear the argument that automation/IT increases return on investment and decreases the price of human labor and if the trend continues the only choice will be a system of handouts to pay for everyone to live a comfortable life while machines do all the work."
It's an interesting theory, but it assumes two major ideals which I find disturbing. The first is that machines can determine what is best for the individual. This is necessarily assumed under such a model and it is a fatally flawed for the same reason that socialism/communism/feudalism/big government is flawed - it undermines the notion of personal responsibility. The second is that somehow work is not necessary for the human condition. Those who do not learn the value of work develop the same kind of self-entitled mentality that is currently destroying society. The theory of machines doing everything for us (humans) proposes that somehow we can avoid self-entitlement by living an entitled life. Work is not a disease, it is the cure.
I found Galt's Speech online here:
https://amberandchaos.net/?page_id=73
As products of the split between man’s soul and body, there are two kinds of teachers of the Morality of Death: the mystics of spirit and the mystics of muscle, whom you call the spiritualists and the materialists, those who believe in consciousness without existence and those who believe in existence without consciousness. Both demand the surrender of your mind, one to their revelation, the other to their reflexes. No matter how loudly they posture in the roles of irreconcilable antagonists, their moral codes are alike, and so are their aims: in matter—the enslavement of man’s body, in spirit—the destruction of his mind.
That said, though, yes, here and now - and in Atlas Shrugged - both nominal conservative and liberals take one side or the other, usually inconsistently.
Technically it would be possible to identify the voters along with the post, that would reduce it, but would introduce other problems.
blar: “I would actually cite early examples of colonialization of the United States to directly refute this.”
I think we may be misunderstanding because your example supports what I’m saying. A settlement that employed socialism barely subsisted, in your example, did not prosper. Freer people prospered amazingly well.
Bar:”That is the globalist movement “
CG: This just sounds like an epithet to indicate dissatisfaction with the fact that it’s easy to transport people, goods, and services around the globe.
Bar: “They like technology because of the perks but if you look at it critically, their efforts at all the global warming nonsense are to control exactly whom has access to all this wonderful technology. “
There are always people trying to exert control over others. In the modern world, people are freer from controls than in the past. We are far from utopia. US is in some ways a beacon of freedom and is still far from perfect. People always use crisis to grab power. Global warming is serious, but it’s nowhere near the magnitude of WWII. And we don’t see internment camps, price freezes, and 80%+ marginal tax rates. My point is things could be much much worse now.
Bar: “ If one is scraping by, one has nothing to impart to anyone else and whatever wealth one may have earned represents a large proportion of their time and resources. “
This is a good point. It’s what I was getting at about return on equity due to automation being an argument (which I disagree with) for socialism.
Bar: “ We don't give because of personal choice and priorities - not because we don't have anything to give. “
I didn’t understand this. Are you saying “when we don’t give,” or that people are less generous despite prosperity? I think the prosperity makes it easier for people who so desire to give to humanitarian causes.
Bar: “ two major ideals which I find disturbing. The first is that machines can determine what is best for the individual. “
They are not saying this. They’re saying that machines are getting better, making more money for people who own the means of production and eliminating jobs for people who sell their labor. They say as this trend continues, there will be very few jobs, but lots of production. They say the answer is to give some wealth the poor since selling labor is no longer viable. I disagree with their argument.
Bar:”The second is that somehow work is not necessary for the human condition. Those who do not learn the value of work develop the same kind of self-entitled mentality that is currently destroying society.”
I know. If you told people in an agricultural society that one day technology would allow a tiny fraction of society to work 50 hours a week and provide so much food people eat whatever food they want year-round and most people get a little fat, they would worry, “what will everyone else do if we can provide for everyone by 10% of the people working.” They wouldn’t be able to dream of the industrial revolution and the information revolution… with the poorest people getting cheap cures for diseases that would have produced a slow death… with the average citizen travelling anywhere in the word in a matter of a day, and being able to travel without regard to his tribe, accent, sex, or other physical attributes.
“Work is not a disease, it is the cure."
In our mythology, our creator offered us a life of no work. The only requirement is we remain children, without knowledge of good and evil. We couldn’t resist the knowledge. In the myth, we chose a life of toil but with knowledge.
I think you are assuming that a hunter-gatherer type of subsistence living could exist using socialism. My point about the colonial efforts was that it could not. Socialism is self-destructive at its most fundamental level. If anything, the only reason socialism can exist is due to technology - not in spite of it.
"This just sounds like an epithet..."
Think about it. The capitalist movement seeks to make more products and services available to more customers with lower barriers to entry. Everything the globalists do is to limit production of goods and services, limit the customer base, or throw up barriers to entry for entrepreneurs in the form of taxes and regulations. That is what all this climate change brouhaha is about. It is why the Europeans (and other globalists) are trying to push birth control on Africans. It is why they throw up barriers to Africans building their own factories (for a prime example see the manufacture of chocolate).
"I think the prosperity makes it easier for people who so desire to give to humanitarian causes."
I completely agree. What I was pointing out was that people choose not to give not because they do not have, but because they do not want to give. What is also very interesting is that a socialist society necessarily devolves into a stratified society of "haves" and "have-nots" where the "haves" choose not to give. A simple comparison of the common European vs the common American confirms this: Americans personally give far more to charitable causes.
"They are not saying this. They’re saying that machines are getting better..."
One can't argue on the one hand that machines are going to provide for every need of a human being without also arguing that in so doing they will necessarily have to determine on behalf of the human being what he/she wants. That is the flaw in the argument.
"They say as this trend continues, there will be very few jobs, but lots of production."
And yet when one examines what has actually happened, what we find is that this is both a gross simplification AND a gross distortion of the truth. The automation of things comes with a cost: we automate so as to lower costs but the cost of automation must be equal to or lower than the costs of human operation. The most obvious current example of this is with the automation of fast food restaurants in cities with a very high minimum wage. That cities with a low minimum wage still employ humans illustrates perfectly the trade-off which occurs and the investment needed before human jobs are actually replaced.
The other major distortion which comes is that the number of jobs has actually increased with greater technology - it has just shifted to employment which requires more education. The total number of jobs has grown and jobs in computer science and similar disciplines outpaces supply - even while low-skill jobs are taking a beating. I believe this is what you are alluding to in your disagreement to the third-party argument and I concur with your assessment.
"In our mythology, our creator offered us a life of no work. The only requirement is we remain children, without knowledge of good and evil. We couldn’t resist the knowledge. In the myth, we chose a life of toil but with knowledge."
That's an interesting viewpoint, but certainly not one I share. I am curious just who you think proposes such a notion because it is not in concordance with any of the major religions (or atheism) I am familiar with.
According to the Book of Genesis in the Old Testament (which both Jews and Christians acknowledge as authoritative history), Adam and Eve were forbidden from eating of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. That last part is significant. They were warned specifically that the choice to eat came with a severe consequence: that if they did eat they would die - they would be separated from God and they would become mortal.
The serpent (the Devil) beguiled/deceived Eve into eating the fruit. Then she gave to Adam and he ate as well. Then there comes a conversation between God and the pair in which they acknowledge their actions. Several notable things happen here. #1: the serpent is cursed for being an agent of the Devil. #2: the Earth is cursed for Adam's sake so that he must now work for his sustenance rather than simply eating what grew spontaneously in the Garden. #3: Adam and Eve "fall" and become mortal wherein their once-perfect, immortal bodies become mortal and imperfect.
One more thing of interest happens and it has to do with another tree: the Tree of Life. It is guarded from Adam and Eve so that they can not partake and live as immortal beings in fallen/imperfect bodies.
Now there is a tremendous amount of theology present just in this small section comprising only until the end of the Third Chapter of Genesis. I can not do it justice in a simple forum posting - if at all. But taken in context with other beliefs from the Judeo-Christian tradition, it is reasonable to surmise the following:
1. If God is all-knowing, then there would have been no surprise to Him (especially given the presence of temptation) that His command would be disobeyed despite His clear warnings as to the consequences. Thus the Fall (as it is known) was a completely predicted event.
2. Note that the "punishments" inflicted on Adam were already known to him (Adam): they had been predefined in God's warning. That they were allowed to occur demonstrates a commitment by God to the principle of Justice: cause and effect.
3. There was a mechanism - also predefined - by which the consequences of Adam and Eve's actions could be compensated for shows again the foresight and also the mercy of God. The culmination of Judeo-Christian teaching being the necessity for a Savior to compensate for Adam and Eve's actions. (The difference being that the Jews believe that Savior has yet to manifest while Christians assert that Jesus Christ was the promised manifestation.)
4. That after Adam and Eve gained the knowledge which allowed them to be like God, that knowledge was not revoked. Indeed, God enabled them to further expand their knowledge by allowing them to continue to exist in a state perfectly suited for their investigation into the realm of good and evil - a realm which would be temporary but fully available to the presence of both good and evil influences. Furthermore, through their separation from God, their experience became that much more effective and dependent upon their own choices and experiences by not imposing the presence of a perpetual "Big Brother".
5. That the possibility for immortality will not be through the mechanism of the fruit of the Tree of Life for those who are mortal and imperfect. Thus arises the notion of resurrection in Judeo-Christian teachings.
Given this brief study, I re-iterate my claim above: that the notion of some religious tradition entailing "life without knowledge" is not in any actuality part of either the Judeo-Christian tradition nor is it a part of any other major religion (and I include atheism) I am conversant with. Those who attempt to teach or otherwise attribute such ignorance as the hallmark of at a minimum the Judeo-Christian ethos are themselves wholly ignorant (at best) of the first three chapters of Judeo-Christian literature and fundamental doctrine. (I note that this ignorance certainly may extend even to purported clergy of the various Judeo-Christian sects - as the very presence of those sects is in large measure due to various erroneous interpretations of scripture.)
Interesting. I imagined, maybe naively, that more primitive societies were more socialistic. I thought primitive societies subsisted, with limited production, and religious leaders urged people to share the finite wealth somewhat equally. I imagined this being true in hunter-gatherer societies and in agricultural societies.
Although Marxism doesn't appear until industrialization, so those earlier societies either weren't collectivist or were so collectivist they had no need for a collectivist revolutionary struggle. This is a basic area of anthropology that I don't know about.
“Everything the globalists do...”
Who are they? It just sounds like an epithet even more so after that explanation.
“One can't argue on the one hand that machines are going to provide for every need of a human being without also arguing that in so doing they will necessarily have to determine on behalf of the human being what he/she wants.”
I suppose so. The whole argument I was quoting (i.e. technology necessitates socialism) is flawed, so whatever flows from it doesn’t makes sense to me.
CG:“In the [Biblical creation myth], we chose a life of toil but with knowledge."
“That's an interesting viewpoint, but certainly not one I share. I am curious just who you think proposes such a notion because it is not in concordance with any of the major religions (or atheism) I am familiar with.”
It’s what I took from the story. I also may have heard this view from my UU church. It’s also a recurrent theme in Star Trek, esp the original series. I actually thought mainstream Christians interpreted the story this way.
Although Marxism doesn't appear until industrialization, so those earlier societies either weren't collectivist or were so collectivist they had no need for a collectivist revolutionary struggle. This is a basic area of anthropology that I don't know about."
One thing to keep in mind is that most earlier societies were monarchies - not egalitarian societies. (The Magna Carta and reform in British society didn't start until the 1200's and it took several more centuries to really take hold.) That plays a large part. To a certain degree one may associate monarchies with socialism insofar as there was significant stratification in society, but it wasn't based on precisely the same social theory. I can see how one would call them socialist societies even though it is an imprecise term according to the way we use socialism today which implies an elected leadership.
I think your observation about the appearance of Marxism and industrialization deserves significant attention. I do not believe it is coincidence.
"Who are they? It just sounds like an epithet even more so after that explanation."
Do you deny any of the rationale I gave which is used to limit the actions of the free market? A globalist is identified by what they do to restrict the free market. Whether you like the portrayal is irrelevant.
"It’s what I took from the story. I also may have heard this view from my UU church. It’s also a recurrent theme in Star Trek, esp the original series. I actually thought mainstream Christians interpreted the story this way."
See my response to Lucky below. While I love Star Trek myself (and have been enjoying The Orville, I would never pretend to the notion that most Hollywood writers are anything but antagonistic toward religion in general. I think it would be a gross error and disservice to assume that their portrayals of religious values are accurate without some confirmation from a respective religious authority.
I think probably one of the most accurate scenes regarding religion in Sci-Fi was on an episode of Babylon 5 where there was a "culture week" and everyone went around investigating all the alien religions from Mimbari to Centauri, etc. When they got to the Earth one, there was a room with a huge line and the alien cultures were introduced one by one to representatives of a wide range of sects - illustrating the vast collection of ideals held by the peoples of Earth.
All interesting thoughts.
"A globalist is identified by what they do to restrict the free market. "
I think I just do not like the word globalist. It just sounds like a word for people to introduce restrictions to the free market to protect their olive trees (by Thomas Freedman's definition) from the fact that technology easily moves people, goods, and services over geographic barriers. Maybe that's not what it means, but it's a confusing word. It's easier to talk directly about policies that restrict or don't restrict markets.
One of the root benefits of industrialism that really blossomed in the information age was the fact that it takes brains, not brawn, to bring home the bacon. You do not need a man in the home.
In a primitive village, everyone is controlled, the children no less than the adults. Kids do not just run free, forming gangs as they do and long have in cities.
Jan
Families that stay together despite irrational behavior and lack of shared values are not a value. The article's vague reliance on 'statistcs' ignores cause and effect and the differences between the kinds of different individuals.
Past frowning on divorce, to say nothing of religious proscriptions, did enormous damage in discouraging or preventing more rational behavior correcting mistakes. That it is easier and acceptable today to obtain a divorce is good.
1. Several decades ago, a lady friend of mine was divorced, with 2 children (not mine). The government stepped in and gave her a year old house for around $150/month in house payments (I paid $500/month for my first house). There was one stipulation...as long as she was single, she paid $150...if she remarried, her payments went to $450/month. If this wasn't a government incentive to remain single...I don't know what was.
2. Concerning marriage...there are definite differences in being married and merely co-habitating. After living with my future wife, for a period, we made the move and got married. For those of you who've never married...there IS a big difference. Overnight, I became a "responsible" partner in our relationship. I stopped hanging around with my pot smoking friends and became a dedicated supporter of my new bride. Nobody will ever convince me that we did not undergo a major shift in our relationship, once that ring was slipped on her finger.
When you simply "live with" another person, you have no "official" ties to that person. When you marry, you actually enter into a partnership, of sorts (unless you're into one of those "open" marriages, which only seeks to legitimize merely living together). Yes, it is a societal kind of thing that makes people frown if you step out on your wife, but look the other way if you step out on your girlfriend. That's just the kind of society we live in and I'm good with that.
It is rare that a child who grows up without positive male and female role models survives emotionally and intellectually stable. A one parent family takes extra effort to give children a healthy social environment. Substituting the state in a collective social structure is void of the example of parents to help a child develop a healthy character. A child without parental or state support is in a precarious situation, preyed upon for sex or labor, unable to develop meaningful relationships, devoid of trust for anyone.
Nuff said.
Of course the Satanic Luciferian Deep state has pushed to breakup families. This is evident in the black community whose single parent home numbers have gone from low teens to close to 70% since LBJ’s “great society” remember he LBJ said “the democrats would have the niggers vote for a hundred years”.
It is slavery to have people vote for food.
These people, the kakistocracy that has brought the US to the brink of insanity only know destruction. Regardless of color 2 competent parents are able to handle the task of raising children better than one. Good grief!
See my reply to Lucky above.
The other side says, we want to do it our own way and want you to be more socially responsible.
I say, let them do it their own way, and be personally responsible for their results.
Usually, as in this case, the conclusion comes first then the data is collected to suit.
Read "Horatio Alger" stories. Consider "LIttle Orphan Annie" or Gail Wynand. In the days of capitalism, kids lived on their own in the city. They could find work they could do, running errands, selling newspapers.
I’d say that the many growing government dependency programs do that. The more there are the worse it gets.. As if it was by some diabolical design.
As to the definition of family, I thought that was very clear: the traditional nuclear family. That could have been easily garnered from the context where she talks about divorce or the welfare of children.
So, the Waltons would be an example of a failed family?
If you look in your local communities, however, I'll bet you find examples of traditional families who just go about their business. They don't hold themselves up as examples because they have their struggles just like any of us. I have a traditional family and come from a traditional family and we have enjoyed a lot of stability and success despite our challenges. I compare my family to my neighbors, however, and it is night and day: a grandmother raising twin daughters alone because the mother is a drug addict and in jail most of the time.
I have another neighbor where the parents are divorced but the father has custody because he can provide a house - even if it is really his brother's. He ignores the children, doesn't even have a full-time job, and demands that his oldest girls babysit during the day so he can shack up with his girlfriend.
Or there's the two girls whose grandparents do more to try to raise them than their actual parents - who live just down the street. The grandparents try to take them to church and be a positive source of influence and love. The parents would rather not be bothered by the two girls.
Having seen the black and white difference between the traditional nuclear family and the options society attempts to provide and there is zero doubt in my mind which one is better for everyone.