{"id":3774,"date":"2007-10-25T12:00:57","date_gmt":"2007-10-25T19:20:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.amptoons.com\/blog\/archives\/2007\/10\/25\/the-fifties-werent-better-the-effect-of-feminism-on-family-values\/"},"modified":"2007-10-25T12:00:57","modified_gmt":"2007-10-25T19:20:45","slug":"the-fifties-werent-better-the-effect-of-feminism-on-family-values","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/?p=3774","title":{"rendered":"The Fifties Weren't Better: the effect of feminism on family values"},"content":{"rendered":"

A few days ago, Amanda wrote a comment on a thread at Pandagon<\/a> that I thought was so smart that I wrote her and asked if I could make it a post on Alas.<\/p>\n

The context: Amanda and other commenters were involved in an argument with anti-feminist Dana (male), during which Dana trotted out a lot of assumptions about how feminism is opposed to family values. Amanda went through each of Dana’s claims and debunked them — feminism is not breaking up marriages and causing teen pregnancy rates to skyrocket. Instead, as we see feminist values filter into society, we see that real family values are actually boosted.<\/p>\n

Amanda:<\/p>\n

\nThe divorce rate has actually declined since the 70s, which means that your way\u2014the stifling culture of the 50s\u2014was the way that “broke homes”.<\/p>\n

Also, this<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Dana assertion that “our way” has led “kids” to have children at younger and younger ages. Survey says:<\/p>\n

In 1970, the average age of a new mother was 21 years old. By 2000, the average age was 28.<\/p>\n

Dana claims that “our way” is what leads children to live in poverty. Survey says:<\/p>\n

One dire consequence was that one in four Americans in the mid-1950s lived in poverty. By the end of the 1950s, one in three American children lived in poverty\u2026..<\/p>\n

Today, the rate of poverty is half what it was in the 1950s. In fact, now if a husband is the sole breadwinner the family is four times more likely to be poor than one in which the wife brings home an income too. Dual income homes earn nearly two-thirds more than that of families in which the husband alone works. Consequently, the percentage of children living in poverty has decreased 50 percent since 1959. Money may not be everything. But it’s something.<\/p>\n

Dana says that our way leads to unhappy and broken marriages. Survey says:<\/p>\n

Not surprisingly, researchers in the ’50s found that less than one in three married couples reported being happy or very happy with their relationship. Compare that to today, when 61 percent of married Americans report themselves to be “very happy” in their marriage. Part of the sour spouse problem of the ’50s was that many couples didn’t really want to be married to each other. Often, they were trapped into marriage by unintended pregnancy.<\/p>\n

Dana claims that feminism and pro-sex philosophies have led to a surge in teenage pregnancy. Survey says:<\/p>\n

With no sex-ed, no birth control, no legal abortion \u2014 the exact legislative agenda of today’s pro-life movement! \u2014 teen birth rates soared, reaching highs that have not been equaled since: there were twice as many teen mothers in the ’50s than today.<\/p>\n

Conclusion: Dana is full of shit. And if you want happier, healthier families and situations where girls delay childbirth until they’re ready and the divorce rate to go down, there’s only one solution.<\/p>\n

Embrace “our way”.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In our email conversation, Amanda also mentioned feminism’s positive effect on the economy, which in turn leads to positive effects for families:<\/p>\n

It’s worth noting that the poverty issue has more to do with feminism than an improved economy—I’ve seen it noted by a lot of social scientists that women joining the workforce in large numbers has been the saving grace of the middle class. Without those women’s incomes, “free market” capitalism would have shrunk the middle class considerably and we’d probably be worse off than we were in the 50s.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Amanda’s facts lead to a couple of conclusions:<\/p>\n

1) Feminism would be worthwhile even if it did cause divorce and teen pregnancy because women’s equality is a non-negotiable moral good. However, as we’ve known for a long time, increasing the wealth and happiness of women increases the wealth and happiness of families, so feminism is a win-win situation.<\/p>\n

2) When “family values” are a code word for the religious right, they really have nothing to do with increasing the value and health of the family. They have to do with reinforcing the patriarchal model of family. If so-called “family values” proponents were actually concerned with the health of families (which include women as well as children and fathers), the conversation about family would look very different than it does now.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A few days ago, Amanda wrote a comment on a thread at Pandagon that I thought was so smart that I wrote her and asked if I could make it a post on Alas. The context: Amanda and other commenters … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[116,31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3774","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-families-structures-divorce-etc","category-feminism-sexism-etc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3774","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3774"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3774\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3774"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3774"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3774"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}