Recently, I have been seeing more posts about patriarchy than I remember seeing in years past. It appears that in most societal circles, it is a foregone conclusion that patriarchy is evil and any forward-thinking non-neanderthal should already know this. So I looked into it. Why is it evil? Was it always evil? Is there a better option?
Definition
It is important to note the definition I will be using for this article. Patriarchy can be defined this way: A system of society or government in which the father or eldest male is head of the family. There have been branches formed off of this from emotion and protest, but this is the original definition.
So then, what really is a patriarchy? According to the original definition, males lead their families. On the surface, this doesn’t sound so bad. Males are often natural leaders. Their innate ability to assess a crisis intervention with rationality, calmness, and refusal to allow emotion to inform his decision, makes men born leaders. Men have elevated levels of testosterone, which creates more muscle mass and bone density. As a result, men are more aggressive, risk more, are typically taller, faster, and stronger than women. Men go towards danger, rather than seek safety. It has been noted in literature that with sociological and psychological research on gender studies, the axiomatic presupposition is that real gender equality is logically and ontologically impossible.1 The argument made is that patriarchy worked for centuries utilizing the strengths of both genders, rather than an attempt at equality, which cannot become reality. Now before you get into the zero-sum argument, we will deal with that in a minute. And before you get into the “But you’re a man, of course you’d say that!” arguement, women who can see this objectively and set emotions aside are saying the same things this article proposes. You can find such ladies Here and Here.
Benefits
What we know from history on patriarchal societies is that it has been historically successful. We know this because major cultures that dominate much of the global landscape have patriarchal history. Even major religions, Christianity, Judaism, Islam, and Hinduism come from patriarchal cultures. The innerworkings of patriarchy are that it is child centered. It is based on evolutionary biology. Patriarchy is designed to produce children and raise them to contribute to society. Patriarchy is others-focused. It is a social system of survival. Based on matriarchal societies, we know that matriarchy is individual based. You take care of you. I will take care of me. And we can thrive as a society if everyone does their part.
What Went Wrong
Patriarchy is still not sounding too bad so far. But along the way, things changed. Hierarchies in general are flawed systems. Hierarchies often displace those at the lowest level of the hierarchy. This requires the people, not the state, to lift those from the bottom. Historically, when this is done, the patriarchy survives and offers its finest benefits. As with any hierarchy, it has the propensity to devolve into a power-based structure. This is the entire reason for the U.S. Constitution and amendments. The founders understood this propensity and created documents that were designed to keep such power in check. Prior to the abatement into power-based patriarchy, our country was thriving in most areas. When men began abusing their power, limiting social mobility in women, and refusing to acknowledge women’s God-given abilities and contributions to society, exacerbated by the Margaret Sanger(s) and Kate Millet(s) of the world, touting pluralism, anti-monogamy, and the open intent on destroying the family through actions like promiscuity and prostitution, patriarchy began giving society good reason to abhor its existence.
One study “proved” that there is a bias against women in hiring STEM positions.2 However, this study was done using a sample size of 127. When another group ran the exact same study using a sample size of 1016, they failed to replicate the findings and actually found the exact opposite: People were not biased against women in hiring for STEM, they were biased in favor of hiring women.3
Society spends a great deal of time concerned about the disadvantages girls have in math and science. This is in the face of stats showing us that boys’ disadvantages in reading are a much larger scale. In fact. In the average school, boys are almost an entire grade level behind girls in English.4 The gender gap in college enrollment is now wider than prior to Title IX in 1972, with only 42% of males earning degrees.
The effects of underrepresenting males in attention to health issues throughout society has cataclysmic effects. Among victims of Intimate Partner Homicide (IPH), approximately 75% are female and 25% are male. But try to remember the last time you heard someone suggest we need to address any males being victims of IPH. Yet they make up 1 out of every 4 victims.
Are men important? If you ask around, look around, you would think not. According to recent polling, both sexes think it’s worse for a husband than a wife to have an affair – the opposite of the traditional double standard. We talk often about more women’s health funding, breast cancer awareness, battered women, hiring biases against women, and rightfully so. But we rarely, if ever, hear ways society can help men who are struggling to the point of taking their own lives. Meanwhile, daughters of single parents without the father involved are 53% more likely to marry as teenagers, 71% more likely to have children as teenagers, and 92% more likely to get divorced.5
One group studied couples separated into two groups. One group, the husband worked full time and the other group, the husband worked part-time or not at all. They found that the couples where the husband worked part-time or not at all were significantly more likely to get divorced.6 However, when the study was turned towards wives, there was no correlation whatsoever in how much the wife worked and likelihoods of divorce. Why the correlation for husbands but not for wives? Men reported becoming depressed from not working and isolated themselves while simultaneously the wives were becoming less attracted to their husband because he wasn’t being productive. Meaning, men need to be productive. But men don’t want to be productive and mocked for it at the same time.
Where To Go From Here
Am I suggesting we should stop focusing on women’s issues and turn the attention to men? Absolutely not. I’ll let Dr. Richard Reeves say it best:
“Gender equality cannot be a zero-sum game. We can do more for boys and men without doing less for women and girls. We can be passionate about women’s rights, and compassionate toward the struggles of boys and men.”
-Dr. Richard Reeves, Of Boys and Men
As Dr. Steve Stewart-Williams pointed out, no one is asking for the spotlight to move from one group to another, we are merely asking that the spotlight shine on a broader population to include both genders.
What if patriarchy was used to serve others, care for others, and resist power dynamics? Would you be opposed to that system? Am I suggesting that patriarchy is the best thing available? No. I am suggesting that it is the least bad system available, and our nation’s history proves it. Only when men abused their power was it a problem. And women stood up to such abuse, rightfully so. This doesn’t diminish the potential that lies within men to lead their families, thus making men better versions of themselves, which helps their family, community, and society thrive. True patriarchy is servant leadership. It is possible. But it will never happen as long as we are in love with a vitriol-filled rage against all things male.
Stay Classy GP!
Grainger
1 Mushfequr Rahman, M. (2021). Why Society Needs Patriarchy: A Scientific and Social Justification. Social Sciences (New York, N.Y. Print), 10(5), 229. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ss.20211005.14
2 Moss-Racusin, C., Dovidio, J. F., Brescoll, V. L., Graham, M. J., & Handelsman, J. (2012). Science faculty’s subtle gender biases favor male students. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 109(41), 16474–16479. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1211286109
3 Honeycutt, N., Careem, A., Lewis, N. A., Jr., & Jussim, L. (2020, August 18). Are STEM Faculty Biased Against Female Applicants? A Robust Replication and Extension of Moss-Racusin and Colleagues (2012). https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/ezp6d
4 Reardon, S. F., Fahle, E. M., Kalogrides, D., Podolsky, A., & Zárate, R. C. (2019). Gender achievement gaps in U.S. school districts. American Educational Research Journal, 56(6), 2474–2508. https://doi.org/10.3102/0002831219843824
5 Seidel, F. L. P. (2021). The proclivity of juvenile crime in fatherless homes: An urban perspective (Psy.D.). Available from ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global. (2628794018).
6 Killewald, A. (2016). Money, Work, and Marital Stability: Assessing Change in the Gendered Determinants of Divorce. American Sociological Review, 81(4), 696–719. https://doi.org/10.1177/0003122416655340
The issue of sexual misconduct is a dark subject. No one wants to hear about how awful some people can be. The primary distinction between sexual crimes and other dark and evil crimes is that it is done in secret. When one commits murder, there is open proof that a crime has been committed. When one steals, there is also proof. When one commits a sexual crime, they do so, often with a calculated, premeditated approach to ensure the victim does not reveal the crime nor the perpetrator. This is mostly done by scaring the victim into believing something very bad will happen if they reveal this dark information. Sexual crime is a secret crime. Sexual predators can continue their crime and often there is no open evidence of a crime having been committed.
This type of hidden malevolence invites any type of individual, not just the typical criminal. In murders, there are all types, but the most common are those killing for passion, status, or an addiction. These killings involve types. In theft, it is often for the same reasons. Also, these criminals have types. Usually, they are not the type of person that has a positive reputation, a job that requires a background check, and a close direct tie to their community and family they grew up around. Sexual predators do not have a type. It could literally be anybody. They can hide behind their perfect family, their cub scout leadership status, their money, and even their position at a church.
Before I go any further, it needs to be made abundantly clear, I despise sexual predators. They ruin entire lives, even if they don’t murder their victims after their sexual crime. The damage they do is lifelong and though it can be healed, the victim is never truly the same. Now that this is clearly established, let’s address the pendulum swing.
Many supporters of drag queens performing in libraries have decided to call out the hypocrisy of clergy committing sexual crimes. More about that in a minute. For now, let’s talk about children in libraries. There has been an attempt by parents to not allow drag shows to be performed in public places, particularly where children will be, like a library. First, the issue is not of hate, or even judgment. The issue surrounds children and their proper development. For centuries, we have known that children need to be exposed only to that which fits their current developmental stage. This exposure expands as they get more mature. But for some reason, there are a group of people that have decided that this exposure is perfectly acceptable for small children. The idea that someone with autogynephilia or gender dysphoria might have their feelings hurt is enough to risk the development of an innocent child. That is a problem.
Here’s also where part of the problem is: imposition. For decades now, many have been averse to the Christian religion, citing that they continue to impose their beliefs onto American society. Every time someone wants the Ten Commandments up in a public courthouse, they cry foul for reasons of imposition. This is where it gets quite hypocritical. Now, the T in LGBT wants to impose their beliefs onto our children. I know people in each letter. And I can assure you that the Ls, Gs and Bs do not impose their lifestyle on my children. But the Ts are certainly trying. Here’s what parents are truly saying, We want you to be happy in your lifestyle. We want you to love the way you wish to love. We just want you to honor and acknowledge centuries of child development understanding, and conduct your sexual life behind closed doors, or at least among consenting adults. Children do not belong in rated PG-13 movies, much less sexually charged dance shows. Do what you want, just leave our kids out of it. But there’s a new issue.
The hashtag “#notadragqueen” has become wildly popular lately. This is primarily concerning Christian clergy who have committed some form of sexual criminal activity. The sarcastic slogan basically suggests, “It may be a dark sexual crime against children, but at least it’s not a drag queen!” Or “This crime was not committed by a drag queen.” Obviously, this is intellectually dishonest. No one endorses sexual crimes against children… anywhere in the world. No one approves of anyone, especially someone in a place of power and influence, committing sick atrocities against children. But the hashtag suggests something more serious, it suggests an epidemic of sorts. Is it an epidemic? Are all pastors doing this? Well, let’s look at the numbers.
In America there are approximately 465,000 ministers, pastors, priests in America. What percentage of these clergymen do you think are committing these sexual crimes? If you said .001%, you’d be wrong. That’s too high. There have been approximately 7000 allegations of sexual abuse from a clergy member in America over the last 20 years, approximately 350 per year (Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 2007). In 2022, there were 10 pastors in Texas charged with child abuse. If you applied that number to all 50 states, there would have been 500 charges that year. This still equals .001%. This means, that using the highest year of sexual crimes committed by clergy, 464,500 members of clergy each year were doing the right thing, helping those they loved, honoring their commitment to God and God’s people, loving people where they are, sacrificing their lives to ensure those they serve are helped, and being attacked for doing so by people that simply don’t understand the life of a pastor.
But why pastors? Why leaders who preach against this? And why does it seem like it happens all the time? The reason it appears to happen all of the time is the media. The media covers it because it is an easy target. They don’t report that 21% of transgender women (men with gender dysphoria (GD): DSM-V, section II, vi, page 1059) spend time in prison (Movement Advancement Project). That’s an estimated 220,000 people in the US. They won’t report that over 70% of transgender prisoners in British jails are serving sentences for sexual and/or violent crimes (Rayment, S., The Telegraph, “More than 70 per cent of transgender prisoners in British jails are serving sentences for sex offences and violent crimes, February 2024). You will not see a report that says on average, 1 in 424 transgender women (again, men with GD) have been convicted of a sexual crime in the UK and New Zealand. I’m not suggesting that all drag queens suffer from GD, but almost all either do suffer from GD or autogynephilia.
I’m not suggesting that one is better than the other. They’re both awful. But the numbers on clergy don’t suggest an epidemic. To ensure I’m not letting the pastors off the hook, one of the primary reasons they are so prone to this is what I mentioned at the beginning of this article, secrecy. It is a hidden crime. They don’t deal with their issues because it will cause their power and status to come into question, so they commit a private, secret crime. There is never a reason that will be satisfactory to commit a sexual crime of any kind, especially against children. But for the T community to suggest that there is a huge problem with ministers committing sexual crimes against children (7000 over 20 years) without glancing into the mirror (220,000) is the literal definition of hypocrisy.
Most pastors are doing it right. Most are not predators. A very small number (<.001%) of sick miscreants do not represent an entire occupation. So while #notadragqueen is cute, gets emotions stirred up, and sends a virtuous signal that they possess moral superiority, this is #notarepresentationofchristian either. It’s just a small subset of sick people doing sick things.
Here is a fair question. How is that we have both a massive rise in mental health cases like never seen before and more mental health professionals than ever before? If we have more mental health professionals than ever before, then we should have fewer cases of mental health issues. That’s the logical assumption. But that’s not what’s happening. We have both an increase in mental health cases and more mental health professionals than ever before.
So how did we get here? To answer this question, we must look at the differences in the overall value structure in societies before the mental health crisis explosion and after. Because what we value is what we will espouse, pursue, and emit into the world. Our values point us towards an end goal, whether we realize what that goal is and regardless of whether it is a positive and uplifting goal or a negative and destructive one.
The value and belief system of yesteryear is one of simplicity. Boys and girls grow up in school together, use different bathrooms, understand that their issues are different, and respect and appreciate the inequality of boys and girls. The values and beliefs of the past espouse the notion that where I lack, my neighbor will fill in the gap until I can stand again on my own. The community raises our children. If there was a problem with a teacher, we were instructed that we were the problem (if indeed we were, and we were most of the time). We all play a part and live closely by the golden rule, “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” In the midst of this, if someone in our community was out of line, we stepped in to help right the wrong. If it hurt your feelings, so be it. You were better for it afterwards. Men could accomplish things that their wives couldn’t. And likewise, women could accomplish things their husbands couldn’t. And that was ok.
The values have shifted. Now, boys can go into girls’ bathrooms. Girls can join the “boy” scouts. Read that again. Now girls believe they can do anything a boy can do causing boys to react citing they can do anything a girl can do, neither of which is correct. Today’s values say take care of yourself because you can trust no one. Today’s belief system says that you can’t say anything to my children or there will be consequences. If there is a problem with a teacher, it has to be the teacher’s fault. Today’s golden rule is “He who has the gold makes the rules.”
Wives believe they can do absolutely everything their husband can do, allowing for no individualism, cooperation, negotiation, and contribution by both parties. As a result, this goal of “equality” emasculates their husband and leaves him feeling useless and worthless, which contributes to divorce. Men and women simply are not equal and appreciating that and utilizing one’s strengths where their partner is weak, and vice-versa, makes a relationship thrive long term. There is so much science that proves this.
Today we are so afraid of hurting anyone’s feelings that are willing to allow a total falsehood to control the narrative of human existence. We will deny thousands of years of objective science, thousands of years of learning and figuring out which way is the best way, and thousands of years of believing that we are not the highest being in the universe so that one person won’t have their feelings hurt.
How did we get here? We removed objective truthfrom our society. When I throw a ball in the air, it will come down. If a fetus has XY chromosomes, it will be male. Subjective versus objective can be explained this way: Merle Haggard is a great singer. That is a subjective truth. I believe that but my wife doesn’t. Merle Haggard has won multiple Grammy awards. That is objective. Regardless of how my wife feels about that, it is a verifiable, objective truth.
Some objective truths that we have let slip away include differences in sexes, appreciating the two genders, the family system is the best unit on earth for sustaining a society, the best possible environment for a child to be raised is in a low-conflict home with two biological parents, and the fact that religiosity balances, sustains, and causes any society to flourish. It promotes well-being, community, helping those in need, and unselfishness.
But we are so afraid of hurting someone’s feelings that we ignore these facts and tell outright lies. By “we”, I mostly mean mental health professionals. Although “we” as parents and societal members can also be included. And by outright lies, I mean telling society that a child being raised in a single-mother home is the same as being raised by two parents. My children don’t get to be in this category. I am divorced and remarried. That hurts my feelings. But it is a fact, regardless of how I feel about it. Or that males should be allowed to compete in female’s sports because we don’t want to hurt their feelings of being confused and qualifying for a mental health disorder, according to the DSM-V manual. This is where feelings override solid facts that point you towards healthier living. Healthier living requires that we die to one belief in order to make room for another. That requires that we hear something uncomfortable and are forced to acknowledge it and evaluate it for validity.
Regarding religiosity, when you believe you are the highest order of being in your universe, you are aware of your humanity, aware of the mistakes that you can and have made, and this frightens you. Therefore, you are either frozen in fear and refuse to take risks, or you are completely nihilistic about it and take far too many risks. Neither are good. When you believe in a higher power (God), you understand that you make mistakes but follow the One who doesn’t. You are willing to take risks, but not catastrophic risks. You understand that you have an ultimate goal to reach for, thereby making you better each day than you were the day before. You acknowledge your shortcomings, but chase the perfect One, which only makes you better, which makes your family better, which makes your community better, and so on.
We MUST return to a belief in an objective truth. Facts. Facts that say that discipline reroutes a child to success from where they were otherwise headed. Gentle parenting does not work. Facts that include teaching children that they are not the most important person in the universe and the world isn’t about them. It’s about others. Children are growing up believing they are so important that when they find out that they really aren’t, it is causing a mental health breakdown. These are measurable, scientific facts. There is an argument for and against objective morality. You can read that HERE.
Once we return to facts, even if it hurts someone’s feelings, objective truth, belief in something higher (God), we will begin to see the mental health crisis start to subside. Until then, we still have more mental health cases and more mental health professionals than ever before, which makes no logical sense. Bring logical sense back.
Upon choosing to enter college and earn a degree, I was aware that I would hear and see things that were being portrayed as true that were verifiably false. I knew I would have to simply keep quiet about factual evidence that debunked what was being taught in these classes in order to get a good grade. And as you can imagine, I was not disappointed. At the same time, there were some bright spots along the way. After all, I was attending a central conservative and central liberal school. It was not very radical on either side of political ideology. But then there is the sociology department. This paper documents this journey in the best way I can.
One thing I am noticing in sociology is that the overall view is to see what is happening in society and just react to it without any sort of aim at the best possible good. There quickly becomes a fear of hurting someone’s feelings if they suggest they should aim at the best possible way to go about life. Based on research, it is best to get married prior to cohabitation. The best possible environment for a child is to grow up with both of their biological parents. It is best for parents to get married before having children. This is all backed by science. But sociology says, “Well they are doing it, so let’s show how it is best now where it was not best in the past. Times have changed. Now marriage is outdated. Now family is overrated.” ALL WRONG! This paper primarily covers the topics of marriage, cohabitation, children, gender, and government. Each point throughout this paper is refuted with research.
Marriage
I had a few classes specifically on marriage and one overall theme was that marriage was outdated, overrated, and in some cases, needless. This was what they were teaching in every single “marriage” class I took. This would be in “Marriage and Family”, “Sociology of Families”, “Child Development”, among others. The question you must ask yourself as you read this is why. Why would one want to destroy the marriage institution? I will let you answer that as you read.
One of the first outright lies told was concerning education status and earning status among heterosexual couples. Keep in mind that there was no textbook, only articles plucked from various journals by the instructor. Here is a text from one such article: One of the dire predictions about educated women is true: today, more of them are ‘marrying down.’ Almost 30 percent of wives today have more education than their husbands, while less than 20 percent of husbands have more education than their wives, almost the exact reverse of the percentages in 1970. But there is not a shred of evidence that such marriages are any less satisfying than marriages in which men have equal or higher education than their wives. Indeed, they have many benefits for women.”LIE. There is a mountain of evidence that this presents an increase in the likelihood of divorce.
Research
One such piece of evidence was in a paper written by Alexandra Killewald for the American Sociological Review (2016). In this study, Killewald looked at data from different-sex couples ranging from age 18 to 55 years old from 1968 to 2013. What she concluded in her research was that couples where the husband worked part time or not at all were at a higher risk for divorce than couples where the husband worked full time. What was slightly more interesting than that was that whether wives worked full time, part time, or not at all had absolutely no effect on the risk of divorce, only the husbands (Killewald, 2016).
I pose two possible reasons for this. First, women do enjoy being provided for and protected. They value safety and predictability more than men. This is a verifiable biological fact. So, when the husband is earning a part time salary or not earning at all, it becomes very unattractive to the wives and the romance fades in concurrence with the time the husband is not earning a sustainable wage for the family. Another possible reason for this finding is that men are genetically wired to produce. When we are productive, it releases the proper neurochemicals in our brain. We get a release of endorphins, dopamine, serotonin, and oxytocin, as well as a healthy dose of testosterone that gets released into our system. When this is not happening, it contributes to a decline in mental health and brings on symptoms of depression. This depression can easily lead to divorce. Wives do not need any of that. They are just fine working, not working, working some of the time. It does not matter to them. Women want to be loved and men want to be respected. This plays out in our productivity and our educational status is the driving factor behind our productivity, in most cases. Therefore, there is evidence that relationships suffer when men are less educated and less employed than their wife. The solution there is to make sure the husband is employed full-time, regardless of what the wife decides to do.
Along the lines of dating/marriage, the issue of a truly egalitarian relationship was brought up. One question was posed: “How does this research shed light on why, after marriage, many women married to men find that their partnership is less egalitarian than they intended?” To which the answer was, “This research suggested that women feel the marriage is less egalitarian as a result of the dating process being unequal.” Unfortunately, this is also a total lie. When social inferences are completely removed (the literal definition of egalitarianism), all that is left is biology and research on this biology proves that women still prefer masculine men to protect them and provide for them. Many want to provide for themselves also but prefer a chivalrous and masculine man. This is laid out in many different research articles in reproductive biology.
Then there was a discussion about marriage being a luxury and that being the reason more and more couples do not marry. It was too expensive. I responded by saying that I was not sure where that notion came from because it costs little to get a license and very little to get a ring. The teacher’s response… Marriage is not a wedding. A wedding can be expensive or not, but the luxury idea is not about that event. Marriage is a social institution where couples involve the state in their personal lives because to be legally married you have to go to your local county to get a license. So the idea of marriage as a luxury is referring to the linking of financial stability and success with decisions to marry. The larger idea with marriage being a “luxury” refers to the pattern where people with education and financial stability are marrying later, staying married, and not having babies outside marriage.
Predictably, she had no real refutation and dodged the pure fact that there is no real financial difference. She kept linking bad decisions to get married too early, people that choose to get an education after high school and get married and have children later in life once they are more financially stable. These are all individual circumstances that have no bearing on the ability to get married, if a couple chooses to. It is not expensive at all. She completely dodged the fact that there is no real reason to not get married except that you do not want the commitment. You want to “try the other person out.” But if it were reduced to this, it would destroy the Marxist narrative the universities are pushing. The destruction of marriage is clearly one of the narratives.
Cohabitation
One of the ways we know this is a narrative is the overall push to promote cohabitation. Again, ask yourself why would someone promote cohabitation over marriage? Read on and answer it yourself. The first thing to note about cohabitation is the trends on premarital sex. This was plucked from an article for us to read: Contrary to the public perception that premarital sex is much more common now than in the past, research shows that almost all individuals of both sexes have intercourse before marrying, and the proportion has been roughly similar for the past 40 years. Thus, premarital sex is normal behavior for the vast majority of Americans and has been for decades. Abstinence-only sex education is problematic in light of these trends. So, the solution to premarital sex, which clearly causes problems with unwanted pregnancies, children growing up in poverty, and an increase in substance abuse among those parents, is to just eliminate the idea of teaching abstinence altogether. Got it. Am I the only one that thinks this is nihilistic and asinine?
In this next text, the writer lays out facts, decides to disagree with the facts and begins to lay out opinions rooted in individual disbelief of the facts he just proposed. It is quite remarkable the way the writer does a 180 and then contradicts himself in the same piece. Check this out:
These trends are troubling to some because nearly a dozen studies from the 1970s into the early 2000s showed that men and women who lived together before marriage were far more likely to divorce than couples who moved directly from dating to marriage. In fact, on average, researchers found that couples who cohabitated before marriage had a 33 percent higher chance of divorcing than couples who moved in together after the wedding ceremony. In light of those findings, some commentators have argued that reducing the stigma attached to living together outside marriage has been a mistake, leading many young couples to make decisions that put their future marriage at risk. This is called the normalization hypothesis. More on that later.
Here in the next sentence, he just disagrees with years and years of research. It turns out that cohabitation doesn’t cause divorce and probably never did.What leads to divorce is when people move in with someone – with or without a marriage license – before they have the maturity and experience to choose compatible partners and to conduct themselves in ways that can sustain a long-term relationship. Early entry into marriage or cohabitation, especially prior to age 23, is the critical risk factor for divorce. No one is questioning the various reasons why cohabitating prior to marriage increases your risk for divorce by 33%, we are just stating a fact that it does. But again, we cannot just have facts. We have to explain them away so feelings will not get hurt.
Lots of people keep asking, “Does living together before marriage increase your chance of getting a divorce?” In my recently published study, I finally answer this question with a definitive, No! So, again, we have facts followed by a statement of someone’s feelings and an opinion. No facts to refute other facts. Keep in mind that the above statement was written in 2016. Below, you will see research from 2019 directly contradicting this. But first, more text.
With the majority of couples now living together before marriage, if cohabitation somehow caused couples to divorce, you would think that divorce would be more common in recent generations of young adults, who were much more likely to live together before marriage compared to earlier generations. But recent research has found that for young adults born in 1980 or later, divorce rates have been steady or even declining compared to earlier generations. This genius stated something that has an obvious reason… it is because they never got married. That was not hard to deduct. It is hard to get divorced if you never get married. But the blatant dishonesty of his approach was fascinating.
My study found that the rest of the connection between divorce and cohabitation can be explained by one thing that previous researchers never took into account: the age at which couples moved in together. Cohabitors moved in together at earlier ages (on average) than couples that didn’t live together before marriage, and since living together at younger ages is associated with higher divorce rates, cohabitors are more likely to divorce. WAIT! You said they are not more likely to divorce. Now you are saying they are! Which is it?!? This writer has already contradicted himself in the same article. Amazing.
Research
So should you live together before marriage? Should you get married at all? That’s up to you! But living together won’t increase your chances of getting a divorce if you choose to go that route. Again, total lie. Here are the facts. One study (of many studies on this subject) came out in 2019 by researchers at Stanford University and was published in the Journal of Marriage and Family (Rosenfeld & Roesler, 2019). In this study, they looked at data for different-sex couples from 1988 to 2015 between the ages of 15 and 44 years. They specifically looked at the possibility of efficacy in the normalization hypothesis. The normalization hypothesis argues that as the negativity around cohabitating couples is reduced, the risk for divorce among couples who cohabitated before marriage should also decrease. The researchers in this study found no evidence for this hypothesis (Rosenfeld & Roesler, 2019). What they found was that couples who cohabitated before marriage had a higher relationship satisfaction rating during their first year. However, every year after the first year, the rating steadily declined and usually bottomed out during the fifth year of marriage. Divorces usually happened just after this fifth year, thereby showing the increase of risk for divorce among those who cohabitated before marriage.
While having kids “out of wedlock” used to be a serious taboo, today, 74 percent of people say it’s okay to have children while you’re cohabiting. “There is no negative norm against it, it’s accepted,” said Wendy Manning, the director of the Center for Family and Demographic Research at Bowling Green State University. “My question isn’t ‘Why have children as an unmarried, cohabiting couple?,’ but ‘Why not?’” “Shotgun weddings,” Manning told me, are quickly being replaced by “shotgun cohabitations”—in response to an unintended pregnancy, a couple is three times more likely to move in together than get married. So according to that, as long as I can attain it and society does not think bad of me, then it MUST be a good thing. Really? That’s the conclusion we have come to in academia?!
In the same class, but a different article, this text came up: “Cohabiting unions, however well-intentioned, are still far less stable than marriages. (So they admit it!) They lack what Kuperberg calls the “external barriers”—legal fees, formal paperwork, court processes—that stand between marriage and divorce. Compared to kids born into marriage, kids born to cohabiting parents are less likely to continue to live with both parents as they grow up. It’s clear that American families are changing, at least somewhat. Then again, maybe families with cohabiting parents aren’t all that different. “This (cohabitating parents) is the two-biological-parent family that everyone has been talking about forever,” Manning said. In many ways, she told me, it’s the familial “gold standard.” It just might take some time for everyone to see it that way.”
Once again, we are faced with facts followed by feelings that appear to supersede the facts as morally superior. Those pesky facts. Facts that show us that couples who cohabitate before marriage are at a higher risk for divorce than couples who go from dating to marriage. Facts that show us that a child raised in a low-conflict home with their two biological parents is the best possible environment for a child to be raised. This leads us to university’s approach to children.
Children
Another clear agenda of universities is the push to not have children at all. Here we go again. Ask yourself why would a university push their students to not have children? Every family class I took taught me that having children only posed a burden and caused me more problems than children were worth. They taught that if I was to have children, I should wait until I was in my late thirties or early forties, but really shouldn’t have them at all.
There was a document given to us to read for various assignments. It was called “Childfree Adults.” The document pushed for the idea of being child free as a morally superior thing. People interviewed in the text we were required to read said they were making sound decisions, unlike those that chose to bring a child into a crazy world. Another said they saw how much pollution children caused and knew they were better than that. Another said that population control was at the core of their beliefs.POPULATION CONTROL! There is not anything more nihilistic, Marxist, or tyrannical than population control. Ask China.
One question on a quiz was: According to the reading “Childless or Childfree”, non-parent couples are more likely to: a) Hold less traditional beliefs about gender, b) be less religious, c) be more highly educated, d) Work in professional and managerial occupations. The correct answer was D. So, they attacked parents as having traditional beliefs about gender, being religious (as though it is a bad thing), and being less educated. So here they are clearly pushing for not having children. But it gets worse. They spit out blatant lies in order to make everyone feel good about themselves.
Here is an excerpt from another text we were required to read and comprehend: Donald Trump stated children born during slavery were more likely to be raised by a mother and father in a two-parent home than children are today. This is a verifiable fact. But let’s continue. On the campaign trail in 2016, then-candidate Donald Trump described a nightmarish world for black Americans, rife with poverty, homelessness and crime, and asked for their votes by saying, “What do you have to lose?” Outrageous, yes, but not surprising. If your impression of black families comes mostly from what you see in the news — and not just Fox News — then you might think black families have it worse today than when they were enslaved. Yet another indication of a specific political ideological agenda. They could have mentioned any one of 30 media outlets, they chose Fox News. I am not a fan of Fox News either. But I hide it better than they do. There were many references to Fox being full of evil lies and CNN and MSNBC being the only place you can get truth. They consistently denounced any publication that leaned conservative in any way with total opinion, leading these teenagers to learn WHAT to think, rather than HOW. They were steered away from anything that the instructor did not agree with personally.
Research
Here’s another excerpt: “The multigenerational or two-parent family is not necessarily an improvement over single motherhood. This is a total lie. Studies have shown that children living with both biological parents are 20% to 35% more physically healthy than children from broken homes (Gillespie Shields, 2016). Following divorce, children are 50% more likely to develop health problems. A child raised in a married family can reduce the child’s probability of living in poverty by 82%. Studies show that kids who grow up in two parent homes have higher high school and college graduation rates as well as a higher likelihood of sustaining long term employment. Studies have also shown that growing up in a two-parent household is influential on reducing out of wedlock births (Gillespie Shields, 2016). Out of wedlock births are important because one study conducted by the Brookings Institution showed that in order for one to move from lower class to middle class and succeed, they needed to do three things: finish high school, get a full-time job, and wait until age 21 to get married and have kids within marriage (Haskins, 2013).
It continues, A true commitment to strong families and healthy children begins with a focus on the debilitating effects of poverty in the black community. This was said right after quoting single-motherhood stats and their negative effects on children. It continues, Living in a two-parent family does not safeguard children against poverty. True commitment to families requires critical analysis of the structural forces at work and gendered racism. Heterosexist, racist, and sexist agendas of getting black women married or molding black families to fit a two-parent ideal that rarely exists is not a solution for empowering families. So let me get this straight. Attempting to “mold” (black <not sure why that matters>) families into a two-parent ideal is not a solution for the issues that face all families, including black families? Well, I am all ears as to what might be the solution. Unfortunately, they offered no solution. Just that this was not a solution. The reason they could not offer a solution is because this is a solution. A standard to look to. A goal to reach. The problem is that they do not want to offend anyone or hurt anyone’s feelings if they did not grow up in that type of family structure. Unfortunately, this does not change the fact that the ideal family structure for a child to be raised in is the low-conflict two biological parent home. More on that.
Research
There are many studies that clearly show that the ideal environment for children to be raised is in a two-parent household. One study went a few steps further than that. Researchers at Ohio State University did such research that was published in the Journal of Marriage and Family (Sun & Li, 2011). In this study, they looked at disrupted single parent, disrupted two parent, disrupted stepparent, non-disrupted single parent, non-disrupted two parent, and non-disrupted stepparent families. When looking at children’s academic achievement, they found that children raised in non-disrupted stepparent homes performed better than non-disrupted single parent homes. They found that children raised in non-disrupted two biological parent homes performed better than those from non-disrupted single parent homes. And subsequently found that children raised in non-disrupted two biological parent homes outperformed all disrupted household types (Sun & Li, 2011). Therefore, it is statistically proven that the best possible environment for a child to be raised is in a non-disrupted two biological parent home. This is the goal to attain. The standard to measure society against. And yet another study came to the same conclusion. In this study, they showed measurements of higher emotional and behavior problems as well as chronic disease and overall physical issues among those in single parent homes as compared to two-parent homes (Rattay et al., 2014).
Another factor under the raising of children was whether a child was better off being raised by same-sex parents or nuclear parents. Here was one such text: Despite the above evidence that same-sex couples may be functioning better than heterosexual couples in terms of closeness and equality within the relationship… You NEVER put “evidence” in the same sentence with “may.” If it is evidence, there is no “may.” There is or there is not, by proof of evidence. Otherwise it is subjective, which is not evidential. This is the ongoing problem, a refusal to find an objective truth or reality. I found that while interacting with students, they had a very difficult time nailing down an objective truth, and objective morality, or a standard that was definitive. Everything was “up for debate.” And while I agree, like Socrates, that things should be questioned over and over again, there are some things that are certain and not up for debate. I will show you one such interaction in the next section.
But for now, here is another gem of a text that we were required to read: research on adolescents reared since birth by lesbian mothers found that youth with male role models were similar in psychological adjustment to adolescents without male role models. This is a total lie. My statement is backed by mountains of research.
Research
In one particular study, one significant finding was that youth living in fatherless homes have the highest levels of incarceration rates. However, for youths in homes where only the father is present, there was no difference in the rate of incarceration than that of youth living in two parent homes (Harper & McLanahan, 2004). Another study found that early on, not only is the absence of a father a clear predictor of an increased level of violent behavior, the presence of a father early on is a clear indicator of lowered levels of likelihood of violent behavior (Mackey & Buttram, 2012). This study was able to locate not only a cause of increasing the likelihood of violent behavior but also a cause of lowering the likelihood of violent behavior. I did an entire paper on the connection between juvenile delinquency and fatherless homes. And the results were staggering, repetitive, and easy to see in everyday life. Another study came to the conclusion that the only scientifically proven conclusion that has been reached on raising children is that children who are raised by their two biological parents are given the best possible opportunity to achieve the healthiest developmental outcomes (Finn, 2013). This does not state a guarantee of sorts, just that they have the highest chance for the healthiest developmental outcomes. They also concluded that there is zero evidence supporting the claim that there is no difference in the developmental outcomes of children from same-sex parents or two biological parents (Finn, 2013).
Here is another required text: With all due respect to Cheney and her partner, Heather Poe, the majority of more than 30 years of social science evidence indicates that children do best on every measure of well-being when raised by their married mother and father…” -James Dobson. This statement is empirically true. Yet the text says next, “although this kind of claim has been extensively repeated in the media by anti-gay groups, there has not been a shred of credible social science evidence that children raised by heterosexual mothers and fathers do better on any measure of well-being than children raised by lesbian or gay parents.” Nope. Wrong.
Research
One particular study showed that children from same-sex parents showed significantly lower psychosocial well-being than children not from same-sex parents (Potter & Potter, 2017). The results were less significant when comparing children from same-sex parents to children from single parent homes, but this only reiterates the fact that a biological two parent, low-conflict home is the ideal environment to strive for when raising a child.
The next article was literally titled, “Atlantic case against marriage.” I thought maybe by the title, it was an archived writing by Karl Marx. But no, it is recent. It stated, Regardless of this pruning of the tree of care, one of the main arguments in favor of marriage is that it’s still the best environment for raising children. If stability is what matters for kids, then stability, not marriage, should be the primary goal. The text was proposing the idea that marriage is not what we should strive for but rather stability. As we have seen, if stability is the goal, then the most stable environment is the nuclear family. But this may offend someone. So we withhold the hard truth for the easy lie. Professors are saying all the right buzzwords these days, like “critical thinking.” But telling them that children from single parents are just as well off as children from two biological parents is insanely irresponsible.
One name I was forced to read over and over again was Stephanie Coontz. One document stated: Stephanie Coontz has been among the most stalwart of marriage “progressives.” A historian whose name can be found in the Rolodex of countless reporters, she is the founder of the Council on Contemporary Families, which describes itself as a “humane and sensitive” alternative to family-values traditionalism. For years Coontz has argued: (1) that the traditional nuclear family is often an oppressive arrangement, especially for women; (2) that the decline of such families, along with the increasing acceptance of divorce, out-of-wedlock child-rearing, cohabitation, and gay unions, has been a liberating force and deserves public support; and (3) that traditionalists who fight these trends are suffering from an illusion, since the family model they prize was a short-lived artifact of the 1950’s. The nuclear family is oppressive, out of wedlock children should increase, and anyone who disagrees is archaic. Wow. All of this in direct contrast to clear research. Yet, this is exactly what they are delivering to 18-year-olds. At 18, I might have fallen for this nonsense. I learned quickly that this individual had a very Marxist and Nihilistic view of the world.
Gender
The subject of gender is both the utmost in fundamental objectivity and yet also the most misunderstood, primarily by people who refuse to find an objective truth and morality. The most common phrase I heard surrounding gender while in college was “Gender is a social construct.” This is an oversimplification, to put it mildly. Again, ask yourself why are universities ignoring biology? One statement made in one class was What we think of as appropriate behavior or characteristics of men and women are NOT natural but socially created. Again, this is false. But this was reiterated in every sociology class I took, particularly the classes on family.
There are portions of gender that are socially constructed. Men in ancient times wore skirts. Hair length for both men and women have changed over time to fit the current social climate. But to say that gender is a social construct is to leave out the rest of what gender is. Gender is an expression of an existing biological sex. It begins with XX or XY, then moves into interests. And interests, as you are about to see, are biological.
Research
The idea of interests being totally socially constructed has been proven false over and over again. One sexologist stated that what is determined as masculine or feminine is mostly culturally defined and therefore socially constructed (Soh, 2020). However, whether a person has tendencies towards the masculine or feminine is not. It is biological. Soh (2020) also covered the research led by James Damore noting that the differences in genders are driven by levels of exposure to prenatal testosterone. Damore found that this led women to mostly choose people-oriented jobs and men to choose thing-oriented jobs (Soh, 2020). You will see that theme again in a moment. Soh (2020) also mentioned that cultures with greater gender equality had greater differences in interest among men and women. Again, you will see more scientific research to back that up in a minute.
One particular study was done to show that while there are mostly overlapping interests among men and women, where the interests did not overlap, it was significant. Men had interest in things and women had interest in people (Su et al., 2009). The graphic below shows an idea of the results they found:
Effect size of RIASEC interests. R=Realistic; I =Investigative;
One study looked at gender preferences in interests as it pertains to economic development and gender equality in a specific country. What was discovered was that the higher the economic development and the greater the gender equality, the stronger the differentiation between genders in interests (Falk & Hermle, 2018). This means that in developed egalitarian countries, the differences in interests between men and women, where they do not overlap, are greater. This implies that when social “constructs” are removed, and the children are given trucks and dolls in a basket and not told which to play with, all social pressure to be a certain way is removed and all that you are left with is biology. This study shows that when biology is all that is left, their differences are more pronounced. There was another study that looked into a very similar issue and found the same thing. They found that in a very egalitarian community, when controlling for education, occupational class position, age, social and family status, and income, differences among genders were vastly different (Bihagen & Katz-Gerro, 2000).
Desistence is becoming more prevalent among youth with gender dysphoria. This was never discussed in classes, not once. They pushed for gender affirmation, regardless of any existential factors. Any time this was brought up, the response from teachers was always that we should affirm every single person and give them the care they need. And by care, she always meant surgical and hormonal. She made that clear at the beginning of the class. I guess we should ignore the fact that most kids desist at puberty (Steensma et al., 2011). Surgical and hormonal interventions were put ahead in priority of mental health, even though in this same study, they found that up to 90% of children desist by puberty and most grow comfortable with their bodies (Steensma et al., 2011). Another thing that was never mentioned was comorbidities. One study found that only 39% of the almost 600 subjects they studied that stated cross-gender identification actually suffered from gender identification disorder as a primary diagnosis. In the other 61%, the cross-gender identification was comorbid with other disorders and in 75% of that 61%, cross-gender identification was merely a byproduct of something else entirely (à Campo et al., 2003).
I mentioned an interaction with a student earlier. Here it is. The class was asked a simple question. Susan was born a female but identifies as a transgender man. Susan, who now goes by Scott, is attracted to women. Is Scott/Susan heterosexual or lesbian? This was the question. The answer is closed-ended. It has an “A or B” vibe about it. Yet these students just could not bring themselves to find any firm objectivity in their answers. And then came after me when I actually answered the question. Here was my answer: Susan would be lesbian. The reason for this is because while society’s idea of what determines masculine and feminine are socially constructed, one’s gender and biological sex are not constructed. They are rooted in biology, as pointed out in the text when it was mentioned that research indicates that levels of testosterone in fetal development will lead to interests that are more or less masculine, depending on the levels of testosterone the fetus is exposed to This is backed up by a neuroscientist and sexologist named Debra Soh, in which she confirmed through many studies that differences in interests and behavior are not due to postnatal environment but biology (Soh, 2020, p. 41). This shows that gender expression can result in more or less masculine interests while maintaining that gametes dictate sex and gender itself, resulting in Susan being gay. One student replied: I would be careful coming to conclusions too quickly about Susan/Scott! To which I replied, I answered the question. What is your answer to the question? Crickets. He just could not do it. He could not determine XX vs XY. That astounded me.
Government
Lastly, and maybe the scariest, the issue of government was addressed in multiple classes in the field of sociology. One question I had on a test in two different chapters back-to-back in a sociology class was A difference between capitalism and socialism is that: and the correct answer was, socialism forbids private profits that are fueled by greed and exploitation of workers. Exploitation of workers is common in the capitalist system. The first problem is the question assumed they KNOW the motivation behind every company’s endeavors. Assuming something is fueled by greed is always a bad idea in any social system. The next problem is that the extra sentence is a statement of opinion, not fact. This can be proven untrue in minutes. Therefore, it is not a fact, it is opinion. Again, ask yourself why would a university want to place a negative stigma on capitalism, promote socialism, and interpret every aspect of society in oppressed vs oppressor?
The instructor in one particular sociology class on government was great. Amazing, actually. The author of the material was not. A large portion of the material was opinion presented as fact. In every chapter, Karl Marx was mentioned and only in a very positive light. The author (again, not the instructor, he was great) never once mentioned his ideas were tried and subsequently caused the deaths of millions of people. Deaths came from forced labor, war, deportations, man-made hunger, and executions. Here are the number of deaths from the areas that have proposed Karl Marx’s ideas as utopian and attempted to implement them: 65M dead in China, 20M in Soviet Union, 2M in Cambodia, 2M in North Korea, 1.7M in Ethiopia, 1.5M in Afghanistan, 1M in Vietnam, and more (Courtois & Kramer, 1999). Pretty big thing to leave out.
I would probably leave it out too if the majority of students in universities across America believe that life and people are strictly divided on two lines, oppressed and oppressor. Sound familiar? You either are oppressed by your country or you have implicit bias. There is no third factor. You must fall into one of those. While there are many problems involving this delusion that somehow communism (masked as socialism or “starting all over again”) will now work when it has never worked throughout history, it seems that one of the biggest contributors to this problem are the universities. They are pushing out the idea that Karl Marx was one of the greatest minds in history. Intellect may be the only part that was great. His disdain for anyone who had something he wanted was heavily documented. Marx’s own father wrote him a letter and said, “I hope you can, just once, not display evil towards those around you” (Kengor & Knowles, 2020). When the ideas of Karl Marx were put into practice, close to 100 Million people died! There are no redeeming qualities here. Yet on each quiz questions were spun to reflect the greatness of Karl Marx.
So, to get questions right on these quizzes, all I had to do was remember these were bad: men, white people, America, capitalism, Christians. As long as I answered that those people and concepts were terrible, I got the question right. Every. Single. Time. This was nothing short of an agenda laced opinionated attempt at indoctrination. I presented this material to many free thinkers, and all agreed with me. One person objected, but he is anything but a free thinker. He also hates America, white people, men, capitalism, and Christians with incredibly tribalistic views. I subscribe to no one, no party. I think for myself. This course attempted to teach me WHAT to think rather than HOW to think. I cannot reiterate enough that none of this reflects the instructor. He was amazing in delivering the material and allowing the free flow of free-thinking ideas. But the mere fact that the instructor was more than likely forced to deliver this material as fact when it was clearly opinionated is sad and scary at the same time.
Conclusion
As you can see, it was very enlightening, just not in the way I thought it would be. Marriage is clearly being attacked by academia. In spite of clear research that you are at a higher risk for divorce, cohabitation is being promoted. Children are being viewed as burdens to society, not the future of a great society. Gender is becoming victim to subjective truth, despite centuries of objective science and common-sense knowledge surrounding gender. And our current republic is viewed in a very terrible light. Academia is pushing hard to hit the reset button and attempt socialism, communism, Marxism, or some combination of those.
Throughout this you were asked a series of questions: Why would one want to destroy the marriage institution? Why would someone promote cohabitation over marriage? Why would a university push their students to not have children? Why are universities ignoring biology? Why would a university want to place a negative stigma on capitalism, promote socialism, and interpret every aspect of society as oppressed vs oppressor? I am not going to attempt to define the answer here. I will leave that up to you. But one thing I can definitively say, this is NOT an accident. Take care of your children. Teach them to be free thinkers and be strong in the face of ideological nonsense. Teach them to know right from wrong and to have an objective morality by which they calibrate everything they do. If you do not, someone will teach them, but it will all be subjective, fostering total confusion and only making the mental health crisis worse, not better.
Courtois, S., & Kramer, M. (1999). The black book of communism : crimes, terror, repression. Harvard University Press.
Falk, A., & Hermle, J. (2018). Relationship of gender differences in preferences to economic development and gender equality. Science, 362(6412), eaas9899. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aas9899
Finn, T. (2013). Social Science and Same-Sex Parenting. The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly, 13(3), 437-444. https://doi.org/10.5840/ncbq201313325
Kengor, P., & Knowles, M. (2020). The devil and Karl Marx : communism’s long march of death, deception, and infiltration. Tan Books.
Killewald, A. (2016). Money, Work, and Marital Stability: Assessing Change in the Gendered Determinants of Divorce. American Sociological Review, 81(4), 696-719. https://doi.org/10.1177/0003122416655340
Mackey, W. C., & Buttram, H. D. (2012). Father Presence in a Community and Levels of Violent Crime A Dynamic Beyond the Arm of the Law. The Journal of Social, Political, and Economic Studies, 37(2), 222-248.
Potter, D., & Potter, E. C. (2017). Psychosocial well-being in children of same-sex parents: A longitudinal analysis of familial transitions. Journal of Family Issues, 38(16), 2303-2328. https://doi.org/10.1177/0192513X16646338
Rattay, P., von der Lippe, E., Lampert, T., & KiGGS Study Group. (2014). Health of children and adolescents in single-parent, step-, and nuclear families: results of the KiGGS study: first follow-up (KiGGS Wave 1). Bundesgesundheitsblatt, Gesundheitsforschung, Gesundheitsschutz, 57(7), 860-868. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00103-014-1988-2
Rosenfeld, M. J., & Roesler, K. (2019). Cohabitation Experience and Cohabitation’s Association With Marital Dissolution. Journal of Marriage and Family, 81(1), 42; 42-58; 58. https://doi.org/10.1111/jomf.12530
Soh, D. (2020). The end of gender : debunking the myths about sex and identity in our society (First Threshold Editions hardcover edition. ed.). Threshold Editions.
Steensma, T. D., Biemond, R., De Boer, F., & Cohen-Kettenis, P. (2011). Desisting and persisting gender dysphoria after childhood: A qualitative follow-up study. Clinical Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 16(4), 499; 499-516; 516. https://doi.org/10.1177/1359104510378303
Su, R., Rounds, J., & Armstrong, P. I. (2009). Men and Things, Women and People. Psychological Bulletin, 135(6), 859-884. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0017364
Sun, Y., & Li, Y. (2011). Effects of Family Structure Type and Stability on Children’s Academic Performance Trajectories. Journal of Marriage and Family, 73(3), 541-556. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1741-3737.2011.00825.x
The 1960’s were a wild time. Black people in America were still being treated as subhuman. Black children were still being told the most interesting and repulsive thing about them was the color of their skin.
Picture this scenario… A teacher had separated the class by color. Black kids were on one side and white kids were on the other. One child hears her teacher say, “You can’t sit there. That’s reserved for the children that don’t look like you.” She already knows she can’t drink from the same water fountain. She can’t sit at the same lunch table. Now the teacher is making sure she knows that she’s being judged by the color of her skin over her personal qualities that make her unique. And in the great words of Jake Tyler Brigance (Matthew McConaughey), “Now imagine… she’s white.”
I’m fully convinced that if MLK Jr was alive today, he would be repulsed at the idea of segregating people (especially children) by the color of their skin. He would be disgusted at the idea of judging someone’s morality and intent by what color their skin is. My statement is based on his own words.
I truly can’t imagine any non-racist free thinker believing that a person’s skin color is more important than who they are as a person, how they treat others, and their contribution to society and the free market.
I also can’t imagine thinking that the answer to wrongs from one group over 200 years ago towards another is to enact those wrongs towards the descendants of that group. There is no good outcome of this. Not one good thing can possibly happen by enforcing policies on a group of people based on things that happened 200 years ago.
Anytime one group is oppressed, it leads to revolution. The oppressed group will only stand by for so long before they’ve had enough of wrongful oppression. We saw this with women’s suffrage. With the Supreme Court decision in 2015 to federalize gay marriage. The groups had enough and fought until they had equal rights. This applies to any “group”. If you oppress them, they will fight back.
As you can see above, the goal of CRT goes directly against the goal of Martin Luther King Jr. One was helpful. One is not.
We have to implement systems that refuse to oppress anyone and allow for equality of opportunity with the full knowledge that it will NOT lead to quality of outcome. The obvious reason for this is because some will take the opportunity and some will watch it pass by. Individual responsibility is the cornerstone of any great society.
Reading history is 100% free. And learning from it is an opportunity that some will take and some will pass by and be destined to repeat. Marxism as a core beliefs system revealed the effects of one group of people having too much power and thus globally racked up a body count of almost 100 million people. Even the most devout followers saw the error of its ways. Thomas Sowell was one of them. He now sees how that was a terrible idea. We must learn from history.
The Holocaust didn’t happen overnight. It was a series of changes that were made over time like: segregating people into groups, taking guns away from citizens “for their own safety”, propaganda given through media and controlled by the government, supporting groups who shame other groups that they disagree with. Sound familiar?
Not knowing you have an enemy gives the enemy the automatic win. Sitting silent is not an option for those that want to live and thrive in a free country. Understand that, right now, Marxism (that includes CRT and the destruction of the nuclear family) is your enemy. What will you do about it?
Parents of small/young children, I’m begging you to read this.
The issues I’m seeing the most among parenting young children these days are:
We plant seed before we till the ground
Tilling includes
Teaching them how to obey the first time.
Teaching them that we act differently in public than we do at home
Too much autonomy
We make the child too important
Tilling obedience.
I see many parents of young children spend a great deal of time plotting out how they are going to do creative things to help their little one grow emotionally, intellectually, and spiritually. And these are good things. But if we haven’t taught them to first obey you the first time you speak, the other things you teach them will be for nothing because a) they believe the world is all about them and b) they don’t really respect you or they’d obey the first time. Asking a kid to do something is not always a good thing. Sometimes it is, but not always. Sometimes, I dare say most of the time, it is a better idea to tell them to do something, rather than to ask. Telling them or asking them multiple times shows a few things. It shows they really don’t respect your authority. They don’t believe there is a consequence to deliberately ignoring your request or demand. It shows that they believe they are so important, they don’t have to listen to you. It also shows they don’t believe you really want them to do whatever it is you’ve told them to do.
Tilling how to act in public.
I see this all the time. Actually, every time I go out. Kids are not taught to act differently in public. Therefore, they act exactly the same way in public as they do at home. There is a clear difference on how to act to not disrupt social interactions. I understand that society has defined this. I also understand that if your child is to succeed in this world, they must learn social aptitude and develop social intelligence. Teaching them that it is rude and wrong to kick the back of a chair on the plane or at the movies is necessary. Teaching them when it’s time to sit calmly and quietly and when it’s ok to run and have fun is necessary. Teaching them that destroying their dinner table at a restaurant is rude and won’t be accepted… is necessary. Teaching them not to interrupt is necessary.
Too much autonomy.
“But why can’t I go to this party? Everyone I know will be there! I should be able to make my own decisions!” My response was, “At 14 you can’t operate a vehicle. At 15 you can but with someone else in the car. At 16 you can operate a vehicle without anyone in the car, but you can’t vote. At 18 you can vote, but you can’t buy a glass of wine. At 21 you can buy a glass of wine, but you can’t rent a car. At 25 you can rent a car. Even the government knows that with age comes the ability to handle responsibility and make better decisions.” She didn’t like that, but it’s not my job to worry about what she likes.
Children are being given way too much autonomy. They are being allowed to make way too many decisions. I understand the need to let them make some decisions so they learn how to make good decisions. That isn’t an issue. The issue is in our best effort to teach them how to make good decisions, we let them make decisions they aren’t ready to make. If their chances of making a good certain decision is 0%, they’re not ready for that decision and the parent needs to make it for them. Children shouldn’t be deciding where you’re going, when you’re going, and when you’re leaving. They shouldn’t be deciding where you (or they) go to church or dinner. With each birthday, they get to decide more, but in very small increments. But this leads to the last point…
Too important.
Children are being taught that they are way more important than they really are. They are NOT more important than their teacher, their coach, their principal, their boss. They are making those decisions we just talked about because they believe they are the most important person in any room. There are serious consequences to believing this and it going unchecked by their parents.
Repercussions:
The results of these not tilling the ground before you plant the seed is that the seed will fall on ground that won’t let the seed grow. They will not take the seed seriously. Therefore, the seed is planted in vain because the ground wasn’t tilled first.
The results of too much autonomy is they don’t really learn how to make a good decision because all they do is make bad ones. It also teaches them false social interactions. They believe their way is the right way and no one tells them otherwise and when they are confronted with this in the social world, they’re met with great opposing force and don’t know why. “Mental health issues” are to follow.
The results of them being too important is simple. It puts them in a place to believe something about themselves that simply isn’t true and prohibits them from succeeding socially.
Other results include being a total disruption to your home and any social interactions you may have as a parent with other adults. Some may read this and say, “well why are we treating social aptitude with greater emphasis than self-worth?” Good question. Self-worth will come when they realize where their REAL place is in this world. If they are not believing those in authority, making too many decisions too early, and believing they are more important than they really are, they are set up for disaster, not success. I’m firmly convinced that social intelligence is FAR more valuable than self- worth, self- esteem, and academic knowledge. When you are socially apt, the rest of those attributes fall into place. Liberty resides within a set of boundaries. Without the boundaries, there is no liberty. If you want to free your children, create boundaries.
