NYT Article on "Rise of Single-Parent Families is Not a Good Thing"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But let's continue to act like abortion services is about evil slutty women... Our society makes no sense. Two parent households are better, but we're going to force you have this baby and become a single mother (leaving the father off the hook entirely as we continue to deride single mothers as the problem) and then we're going to shame you for it by conducting a study that says you've done parenthood all wrong, when you may not have wanted to do it at all.

In other words Americans are hypocritical schizophrenics who have no idea what they want, what they value, or how to better their lives. Which, in turn, makes them very susceptible to all sorts of con men/women.

News at 11.

Abortion has been readily available for quite some time. Yet there are so many single parents. They didn't choose abortion, so that's not the issue here. It's weird that someone is assuming they would have aborted their child rather than raise in a single parent household when they had the chance and didn't.

No, abortion has never been “readily available” in many places, even pre-Dobbs. Nor has birth control.

Medicaid covers birth control. It is free almost everywhere. Can’t get people to make the trip to the pharmacy for their FREE medications every 90 days. It isn’t about access. Source: worked for a Medicaid health plan. Frankly most Medicaid recipients have access to a broader formulary than the commercially insured.

Can you go to the pharmacy to get an IUD inserted? I must have missed that. Can a 16 year old girl in rural Mississippi snap her fingers for an OB-GYN appointment to get a pill prescription? Must have missed that too.

https://powertodecide.org/what-we-do/contraceptive-deserts

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But let's continue to act like abortion services is about evil slutty women... Our society makes no sense. Two parent households are better, but we're going to force you have this baby and become a single mother (leaving the father off the hook entirely as we continue to deride single mothers as the problem) and then we're going to shame you for it by conducting a study that says you've done parenthood all wrong, when you may not have wanted to do it at all.

In other words Americans are hypocritical schizophrenics who have no idea what they want, what they value, or how to better their lives. Which, in turn, makes them very susceptible to all sorts of con men/women.

News at 11.

Abortion has been readily available for quite some time. Yet there are so many single parents. They didn't choose abortion, so that's not the issue here. It's weird that someone is assuming they would have aborted their child rather than raise in a single parent household when they had the chance and didn't.

You don't know how many would be single moms aborted instead. Whether now or 100 years ago.

Is it better to kill the unborn or support women who find themselves facing this choice?

The point is we at least need to get back to acknowledging this is a bad choice. Too many people are choosing this path because they have been to do whatever they want, every choice is good and valid and there is no difference in outcomes. Do what makes you happy!

What is a bad choice?

Drinking too much and having unprotected sex with multiple partners.

Are speaking from experience? Is this your story?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Women are the ones giving birth and they have no rights on their own body and reproductive choices. Are we going to encourage our teen DDs to have sex and wear revealing clothes or study hard?

We are so confused in the messages we send our daughters and how we raise them.

I encourage my girls to use birth control, wear what they want, and study hard. I also spend a lot of time educating them on how to reduce their chances of sexual assault.

I think maybe it's not the daughters who need educating.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But let's continue to act like abortion services is about evil slutty women... Our society makes no sense. Two parent households are better, but we're going to force you have this baby and become a single mother (leaving the father off the hook entirely as we continue to deride single mothers as the problem) and then we're going to shame you for it by conducting a study that says you've done parenthood all wrong, when you may not have wanted to do it at all.

In other words Americans are hypocritical schizophrenics who have no idea what they want, what they value, or how to better their lives. Which, in turn, makes them very susceptible to all sorts of con men/women.

News at 11.

Abortion has been readily available for quite some time. Yet there are so many single parents. They didn't choose abortion, so that's not the issue here. It's weird that someone is assuming they would have aborted their child rather than raise in a single parent household when they had the chance and didn't.

You don't know how many would be single moms aborted instead. Whether now or 100 years ago.

Is it better to kill the unborn or support women who find themselves facing this choice?

The point is we at least need to get back to acknowledging this is a bad choice. Too many people are choosing this path because they have been to do whatever they want, every choice is good and valid and there is no difference in outcomes. Do what makes you happy!

What is a bad choice?

Drinking too much and having unprotected sex with multiple partners.

I'm sure you never had premarital sex, or unprotected sex, or an unwanted pregnancy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:While I am 100% pro women's reproductive rights, I think this argument is a bit of a strawman here.

This lessening emphasis for two parent households and the rise in support of single parent families has been happening long before the striking down of Roe v Wade.

+1

[Anonymous]

Oh course the rise is not a “good thing” for families or for children individually.
But we have spent so long trying to put a stamp of approval on prioritizing adult happiness (and defining it hedonistically in the short term) and on valuing every choice equally within society that there is now a generation of kids and young adults who do not see the point of marriage and will very likely die alone in their 80s.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There are lots of things that are "ideal" in parenting. People just do the best they can.

You can't control other people, including spouses who decide to cheat or leave. I think everyone knows that two parent families are ideal but that doesn't stop adults from the selfish pursuit of whatever. And I don't think it ever did.

Agreed. You can lead a horse to water, but.... There are just too many choices in America and not a lot of punishment for bad ones. With freedom comes responsibility and Americans don't like responsibility. They just like freedom.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:While I am 100% pro women's reproductive rights, I think this argument is a bit of a strawman here.

This lessening emphasis for two parent households and the rise in support of single parent families has been happening long before the striking down of Roe v Wade.

How do you think babies are accidentally made by unmarried people? Not because of “lessening emphasis for two parent households. It’s because people have s*x without birth control and no, there was not sufficient access pre-Dobbs.

I don't think that the availability of abortion has anything to do with this trend, which has been trending for decades. Birth control has been readily accessible. Birth control pills are free in many states below a certain income level, Medicare or no. Condoms are prevalent everywhere.

This is a discussion where abortion access can be somewhat relevant but only somewhat. It's a far larger question than just that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Oh course the rise is not a “good thing” for families or for children individually.
But we have spent so long trying to put a stamp of approval on prioritizing adult happiness (and defining it hedonistically in the short term) and on valuing every choice equally within society that there is now a generation of kids and young adults who do not see the point of marriage and will very likely die alone in their 80s.

Yeah, I agree. We won't see the fallout of this for a few decades to come though.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But let's continue to act like abortion services is about evil slutty women... Our society makes no sense. Two parent households are better, but we're going to force you have this baby and become a single mother (leaving the father off the hook entirely as we continue to deride single mothers as the problem) and then we're going to shame you for it by conducting a study that says you've done parenthood all wrong, when you may not have wanted to do it at all.

In other words Americans are hypocritical schizophrenics who have no idea what they want, what they value, or how to better their lives. Which, in turn, makes them very susceptible to all sorts of con men/women.

News at 11.

Abortion has been readily available for quite some time. Yet there are so many single parents. They didn't choose abortion, so that's not the issue here. It's weird that someone is assuming they would have aborted their child rather than raise in a single parent household when they had the chance and didn't.

You don't know how many would be single moms aborted instead. Whether now or 100 years ago.

Is it better to kill the unborn or support women who find themselves facing this choice?

The point is we at least need to get back to acknowledging this is a bad choice. Too many people are choosing this path because they have been to do whatever they want, every choice is good and valid and there is no difference in outcomes. Do what makes you happy!

What is a bad choice?

Drinking too much and having unprotected sex with multiple partners.

I'm sure you never had premarital sex, or unprotected sex, or an unwanted pregnancy.

PP here. Never drank too much or had unprotected sex with multiple partners. Married to my husband for 20+ years and have 2 adult kids. You may not like it, but it's true.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Oh course the rise is not a “good thing” for families or for children individually.
But we have spent so long trying to put a stamp of approval on prioritizing adult happiness (and defining it hedonistically in the short term) and on valuing every choice equally within society that there is now a generation of kids and young adults who do not see the point of marriage and will very likely die alone in their 80s.

+1 And hard truth...not every choice is okay.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Oh course the rise is not a “good thing” for families or for children individually.
But we have spent so long trying to put a stamp of approval on prioritizing adult happiness (and defining it hedonistically in the short term) and on valuing every choice equally within society that there is now a generation of kids and young adults who do not see the point of marriage and will very likely die alone in their 80s.

I’ve spent the last 8 years doing hospice work. Pretty nearly everyone dies alone in their 70s/80s/90s, because they’ve been predeceased by their spouse or were divorced or because, shocker, some folks never married. And plenty of the folks who did marry and had kids weren’t visited or cared for by their kids in their final years. Finally I have listened to many elderly men and women lament the decades they wasted on their long and unhappy marriages - I can count on one hand without needing all the digits the number of elders I cared for who spoke of happy marriages. I’ve also seen spouses clearly still abusing their terminally ill spouse.

The idea that marriage and kids will bring happiness and a warm fuzzy death surrounded by loved ones is tenuous as best. This board is full of the evidence disproving the notion. I see a lot of folks on this board trying desperately to convince themselves by harshly judging the people who choose another path.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:While I am 100% pro women's reproductive rights, I think this argument is a bit of a strawman here.

This lessening emphasis for two parent households and the rise in support of single parent families has been happening long before the striking down of Roe v Wade.

At the end of the day, the rise of single parent households is due to systemic economic factors: decline of real wages, unaffordability of housing, men opting out of education, rise of welfare state to fill the gap that has some perverse incentives for mothers to remain legally "single," rise of carceral state that removes men from families/work force, lack of universal healthcare, lack of mental health care/inpatient services, etc. So many of these factors are inter-related - e.g., rise of carceral state stems from the dismantlement of mental health services, which itself stems from employer-based health care framework.

At the very least, Roe gave women some semblance of control of their circumstances in the face of these glacial economic challenges. But if you un-do Roe the main effect will be the increase in single parent households, which leads to suboptimal social consequences.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Daniel Patrick Moynihan said this 60 years ago and was derided for it. Turns out, he was a prophet.

💯

DPm is a democrat

Back when democrats weren’t hijacked by crazies

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:While I am 100% pro women's reproductive rights, I think this argument is a bit of a strawman here.

This lessening emphasis for two parent households and the rise in support of single parent families has been happening long before the striking down of Roe v Wade.

At the end of the day, the rise of single parent households is due to systemic economic factors: decline of real wages, unaffordability of housing, men opting out of education, rise of welfare state to fill the gap that has some perverse incentives for mothers to remain legally "single," rise of carceral state that removes men from families/work force, lack of universal healthcare, lack of mental health care/inpatient services, etc. So many of these factors are inter-related - e.g., rise of carceral state stems from the dismantlement of mental health services, which itself stems from employer-based health care framework.

At the very least, Roe gave women some semblance of control of their circumstances in the face of these glacial economic challenges. But if you un-do Roe the main effect will be the increase in single parent households, which leads to suboptimal social consequences.

Asia is poorer than the us for the most part but has a lot less single parents

You are underplaying culture in your list of reasons