Where did the anti-family vibe come from?

[Maryann_C]

Glad your happy but statistics show that men are typically happier in marriage and women typically less happy than before. .

who’s statistics ?? source please?

You guys are all describing the symptoms… but it’s not normal though, is it? It’s like this crazy sickness has invaded society. How could you get so many people to believe in something being bad, when it’s actually good? It’s so socially and historically bizarre.

For those who have decided to bash the OP because they do not feel the same way about marriage, or their experience has not been the same , please let us use logic. He is right you know the NORM is for a heterosexual couple to come together to have children- whether you believe as a Christian that this was one of God’s first commandments to man " go forth and multiply" **or not **because ,without this BEING the norm we would not exist …simple as that ,evolutionary nature would have taken it’s natural course …we would be extinct as a race. SO at its simplest level heterosexual coupling and the making of children IS THE NORM.

I agree with the other comments that the advent of effective contraception is what unleashed the changes which the the OP describes. But I think the introduction of “The Pill” simply unleashed pre-existing desires. Humans throughout history have desired sex without children. Once that was possible, so was the possibility of sex without marriage. Marriage and parenthood used to be markers of becoming an adult, but the advent of effective contraception made those two things merely options to be chosen at one’s pleasure.

As always Dale is very wise and measured but I am curious Dale do you know how far back that we have proof that 'humans throughout history have desired sex without children"? my bold.

The desiring of sex I do not deny but I argue that it is the natural inbuilt hormonal drive to multiply ( have children) that has consciously or subconsciously charged the human sex drive. The resulting hormones that are released during intercourse in humans ( and indeed in some animal species) , especially women are so called ‘bonding hormones’ which then explains why long term bonding is found from very early on in human history- I ,as a Christian believe that this is how God designed things therefore that IS His intent for His human creation- beyond all the theological stuff. Scientifically however, this can not be denied either.

There is a very interesting new book out called “Girls Uncovered- New research on What America’s Sexual Culture Does To Young Women” by Joe McIlhaney MD and Freda McKissic Bush MD which I highly recommend to anyone who is serious about finding out the whys of alot of what is going on with our culture right now or anyone with girls and boys of any age.
In chapter 2 they start off by contradicting what Dale states , because they say " Western society has what a fair minded observer might conclude is a schizophrenic attitude toward girls. On the one hand , we celebrate their potential and …encourage their aspirations" and " we fiercely protect them against anything that could…knock them off course" …like babies IMHO. “Yet on the other hand , we display a curious lack of concern about a certain vital area in their lives. We are failing to guide them in male -female relations, romance, love, sex, commitment, marriage …” “Throughout history , most societies have carefully protected their young women from potentially harmful sexual involvement. Parents…would give their daughters reasons to avoid sex until they settled down, generally with one man.” My bold.

 

[Calliso]

I got married 5 years ago to my wonderful wife and now we have 2 beautiful children. We have a nice house with a big backyard in a neighborhood full of other kids and we have a great sense of community here. I’m not rich (enlisted military) but I make a decent amount and it’s stable so I can keep my family well taken care of. I love life. Seriously, this is the happiest I have ever been.

I wrote that not to brag, but to lay out the next part of my post. Why on earth would anyone be against this kind of life, or not want it, or make disparaging remarks and prefer to be single or at least married-with-no-kids? I just don’t get it, it totally boggles my mind. There is such a strong anti-family sentiment especially amongst younger people and intellectual types.

I don’t understand this general idea prevalent in society, in some parts more than others (IMO, the attitude is more widespread in non-Latin Europe), that glorifies being single and living for yourself. How does such an unnatural and abhorrent ideal come to be so widely accepted?

It’s just not normal- pretty much all other cultures in the world glorify family and hold it to be life’s greatest good. I studied Chinese for 3 years in college and the character for “good” consists of a woman, a child, and a roof. I’m not making this up.

It doesn’t make sense historically, nor does it make sense experientially… I love my kids. Sure they irritate me sometimes, but I love them beyond words and they bring so much joy to my life. How could anyone not want joy, love and happiness and prefer self absorption and a very shallow kind of autonomy? So many people seem to want to hang on to a teenage lifestyle well into their 30s now, what a depressing existence!

Please… someone help me understand where this idea came from, why so many people believe in it, and what the heck is wrong with the world!

I can just speak formyself but I guess as a childfree married woman I just want different things then you. I mean yes you paint a nice picture of a family and it does sound appealing. And you know if that was what family life was all about heck I would probaably want kids as well. Truth be told though having kids is a lot of work and more so a whole lot of stress and often disappointment. My job is stressful enough and drives me up the wall enough as it is. But at least at the end of the day I do get to go home and destress and wind down if my day wasn;t so good. With kids that really would not be an option. There is no taking a break from being a parent. I am not living some lavish lifestyle either. So its not like I don’t want kids because it would interfer with having a lush lifestyle and going on vacations. My husband and I haven;t had a vacation with just the two of us since we got married nearly 7 years ago. However I do enjoy my freedom and the time time being childfree gives me to relax.

 

[Calliso]

Glad you’re able to diminish a childless couple to two simple adjectives. The fact is there are plenty of people who have children for selfish reasons. To feel loved, to fit in, to feel like the only way they can have any meaning is life is to have children over and over again. And as is on display here to feel better than other people.

Yep I am tired of the claims of selfishness being thrown in when in truth both parents and those that choose not to be parents can be selfish.

 

[Dale_M]

Dale do you know how far back that we have proof that 'humans throughout history have desired sex without children"? my bold.

The earliest known description of contraceptive methods are in the Kahun Gynaecological Papyrus, which dates back 4000 years ago.

There is a very interesting new book out called “Girls Uncovered- New research on What America’s Sexual Culture Does To Young Women” by Joe McIlhaney MD and Freda McKissic Bush MD which I highly recommend to anyone who is serious about finding out the whys of alot of what is going on with our culture right now or anyone with girls and boys of any age.
In chapter 2 they start off by contradicting what Dale states , because they say " Western society has what a fair minded observer might conclude is a schizophrenic attitude toward girls. On the one hand , we celebrate their potential and …encourage their aspirations" and " we fiercely protect them against anything that could…knock them off course" …like babies IMHO. “Yet on the other hand , we display a curious lack of concern about a certain vital area in their lives. We are failing to guide them in male -female relations, romance, love, sex, commitment, marriage …” “Throughout history , most societies have carefully protected their young women from potentially harmful sexual involvement. Parents…would give their daughters reasons to avoid sex until they settled down, generally with one man.” My bold.

Hmm… I am not sure they said anything to contradict me. Certainly parents have always been worried about their girls getting pregnant. I don’t think that has changed. despite all other changes in our society and culture. And I agree that most parents feel that girls need to be protected more than boys from harmful relationships. However, I think the reasons for that may also involve emotional and physical differences unrelated to sexual involvement.

 

[Contra_Mundum_1]

I can just speak formyself but I guess as a childfree married woman I just want different things then you. I mean yes you paint a nice picture of a family and it does sound appealing. And you know if that was what family life was all about heck I would probaably want kids as well. Truth be told though having kids is a lot of work and more so a whole lot of stress and often disappointment. My job is stressful enough and drives me up the wall enough as it is. But at least at the end of the day I do get to go home and destress and wind down if my day wasn;t so good. With kids that really would not be an option. There is no taking a break from being a parent. I am not living some lavish lifestyle either. So its not like I don’t want kids because it would interfer with having a lush lifestyle and going on vacations. My husband and I haven;t had a vacation with just the two of us since we got married nearly 7 years ago. However I do enjoy my freedom and the time time being childfree gives me to relax.

I think you paint a perfect picture of the ideology the OP is trying to understand. Me, my free time, my job, my right to relax, my freedom. **Me. Me .More me. **
I think this is the answer to the question.

 

[mschrank]

Some interesting responses here. I do want to apologize however to couples who can’t have children or those who have not found a spouse. My original post was never intended to question them. So, if I offended anyone in those categories or similar I want to apologize for the misunderstanding I caused.

The older I get and the more I learn, the less I think I actually understand. When I was in college I could have pulled some theory out of my ear and told you about the sexual revolution, etc etc, but ideologies are just models for understanding reality they don’t define it neither are they ever the whole story.

I see a culture where people are, figuratively speaking, eating mouldy TV dinners from the microwave and actually turning up their nose at (insert your favorite food here). It would be disgusting but tolerable if they wanted to eat their swill and be left alone, but they look down at me for eating real food. They also look down at every other culture in the world for eating their own real fare. I guess that’s part of my problem too, I do want a large family some day, and I know I’ll pay for it with lots of snyde comments and discrimination.

I don’t care though, as some smart person said once, the best revenge is living well. I’ll enjoy life with my large family. Some of that enjoyment I’m sure will take the place of a well cooked meal (I love cooking), with my family seated on my handmade furniture (a another hobby of mine). I know who I am, I need no validation from ‘society’ or the idiot box.

 

[BlueEyedLady]

I think you paint a perfect picture of the ideology the OP is trying to understand. Me, my free time, my job, my right to relax, my freedom. **Me. Me .More me. **
I think this is the answer to the question.

I guess my question is why Calliso’s free time, resources, and energy are all owed to children who don’t exist? It would be a selfish attitude if children were being neglected, but I’m not convinced not having kids in the first place is wrong, or anyone else’s business for that matter. And there is a difference between being child-free and anti-family.

 

[mschrank]

I guess my question is why Calliso’s free time, resources, and energy are all owed to children who don’t exist? It would be a selfish attitude if children were being neglected, but I’m not convinced not having kids in the first place is wrong, or anyone else’s business for that matter. And there is a difference between being child-free and anti-family.

That’s a good question, and it got me thinking- so I think if I could go back in time I would ask the question differently… not so much “why don’t people want kids”- we all know the various answers people give. It’s not so much having kids is right or wrong, or a duty or what not- but that its even something people discuss. From the dawn of man some 150,000 years ago (yes, I believe in evolution) to about 40 years ago, children were considered to be nothing but a gain. A married couple not wanting kids, or able bodied adults being ‘afraid’ of marriage and family, was unthinkable.

A better question that I should have asked is “how did society’s attitudes towards the family change and how could people be convinced that something as unnatural as two married people living for years without children, or living as a solitary individual indefinitely, is somehow preferable to having a family”?

Was it a social engineering project? Did it just happen? Was there a guy (or woman) who plotted day and night, petting a cat and laughing a very evil laugh in a cave somewhere… was it a gradual thing caused by a bunch of different factors? It amazes me how fast this change actually took place, really, it just took one- the baby boomers started it and its been the norm ever since.

 

[Contra_Mundum_1]

I** guess my question is why Calliso’s free time, resources, and energy are all owed to children who don’t exist**? It would be a selfish attitude if children were being neglected, but I’m not convinced not having kids in the first place is wrong, or anyone else’s business for that matter. And there is a difference between being child-free and anti-family.

Because she explicitly says so. Of course, it is nobody’s business, but we are discussing this phenomenon on this thread, so her statment invites a comment.

As for not having kids and morality, as an atheist-secularist you have a very different idea of what is good and right from what Catholics believe. My guess is that your idea about human nature is different from ours (if you believe in human nature at all - it is all just a social construct, no?) and that the idea of lifestyle choice is your god. One thing is as good as any other since there is no universal and objective criteria to follow.

 

[andremiguel]

If you wern’t supposed to marry for love then why does then the Priest shouldn’t be asking if you will ‘Love and Cherish’ until death do you part. I wouldn’t want to marry without love.
God Bless
Rye

Go back to my post and read it carefully. Look at what Love meant in Romanticism. Do you agree that love is passion?
Not me!

 

[andremiguel]

well, last time I checked this was an internet forum but if you are only interested in people validating your life I will gladly move on.

The OP just stated the option of couples of having no kids(one). He did not throw himself into couples with infertility problems (two).
Now, what is your opinion about these 2 situations?

 

[Dale_M]

From the dawn of man some 150,000 years ago (yes, I believe in evolution) to about 40 years ago, children were considered to be nothing but a gain.

I don’t think that is true. Fornication isn’t new, and children would have been regarded as as an undesired result just as much earlier in history as now. And even within a marriage, childbirth was a major killer of women/ For example, colonial America:

Childbirth in colonial America was a difficult and sometimes dangerous experience for women. During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, between 1 percent and 1.5 percent of all births ended in the mother’s death as a result of exhaustion, dehydration, infection, hemorrhage, or convulsions. Since the typical mother gave birth to between five and eight children, her lifetime chances of dying in childbirth ran as high as 1 in 8. This meant that if a woman had eight female friends, it was likely that one might die in childbirth.

Death in childbirth was sufficiently common that many colonial women regarded pregnancy with dread. In their letters, women often referred to childbirth as “the Dreaded apperation,” “the greatest of earthly miserys,” or “that evel hour I loock forward to with dread.”

digitalhistory.uh.edu/historyonline/childbirth.cfm

Then there is a possibility of having more children than one can support, sometimes crudely put as “another mouth to feed.” Infanticide by mother or father is not a new practice.

The desire to limit the number of children one has is not a new thing.

 

[Calliso]

I guess my question is why Calliso’s free time, resources, and energy are all owed to children who don’t exist? It would be a selfish attitude if children were being neglected, but I’m not convinced not having kids in the first place is wrong, or anyone else’s business for that matter. And there is a difference between being child-free and anti-family.

Yeah thats what I really donlt get. I mean I am not neglecting anyone. I donlt have children so how is it being selfish to choose to spend my time how I want to? And yeah childfree doesnt have to mean antifamily. I mean I donlt go around saying people shouldn;t have family and I do love my own family meaning my parents relatives and sister I just have reasons far more then I listed in this thread for not wanting to start a family of my own. I do see how that is selfish I am not wronging anyone or neglecting anything.

 

[Calliso]

Because she explicitly says so. Of course, it is nobody’s business, but we are discussing this phenomenon on this thread, so her statment invites a comment.

As for not having kids and morality, as an atheist-secularist you have a very different idea of what is good and right from what Catholics believe. My guess is that your idea about human nature is different from ours (if you believe in human nature at all - it is all just a social construct, no?) and that the idea of lifestyle choice is your god. One thing is as good as any other since there is no universal and objective criteria to follow.

Umm where do I say that?

 

[BlueEyedLady]

Because she explicitly says so. Of course, it is nobody’s business, but we are discussing this phenomenon on this thread, so her statment invites a comment.

As for not having kids and morality, as an atheist-secularist you have a very different idea of what is good and right from what Catholics believe. My guess is that your idea about human nature is different from ours (if you believe in human nature at all - it is all just a social construct, no?) and that the idea of lifestyle choice is your god. One thing is as good as any other since there is no universal and objective criteria to follow.

So after calling Calliso selfish and explaining why I see the world differently than you do you mind just answering why she owes all of these things to people who don’t exist and why she is obligated to have children?

 

[akela135]

I am just recently married and while I don’t want children I don’t view myself as anti-family. I’ve always had a great relationship with my parents and with my younger brother and even now I work hard to help them out when I can. The same with DH, he loves his parents and his sister and her family, he has babysat for his niece before and thinks she is a very cute kid but doesn’t want any children of his own either.

The biggest part is I’m not ready to be a parent, and by that I mean not mature enough. I could give you the reasons I don’t want children, some of them well thought out, but I guess the bottom line everyone would conclude is that I’m selfish. I put DH before me, every day. I put my friends before me, and I put my family before me, which is why I’d argue I wasn’t selfish, however I have to realize that putting others before me isn’t a defense because I’d put others before a baby. I’d put DH before the baby, I’d put my friends before the baby, and I’d put my family before the baby. That is what makes me selfish.

I always wonder about people who are able to put their children before their spouse, how did you reach that point and what am I doing wrong to prevent from also getting to that point? I know as I am now I could never do that, I love DH to much to consider putting anything or anyone before him. If both DH and a baby needed me at the same time I’d go to DH first. If a friend called and said it was really important that I was there for them and my child said the same thing I’d be there for my friend first, after all we’d share a history and it would be selfish to abandoned them now because my choice of a having a child was getting in the way of being the best friend I could be. I guess this is my biggest concern, would the choice to have a child sabotouge all my relationships and prevent me from being there for all the people that need me? How could I let my choice to have a child harm so many other people? Isn’t that the most selfish I could be, to know I’m in the position to help and be there for many people and just toss it out the window to attend to a child that only exisit because I brought it into the world? So as I said, I’m still too immature to have a child so I feel I should wait until I’d be willing to make those sacrifices to have one.

 

[KostyaJMJ]

So after calling Calliso selfish and explaining why I see the world differently than you do you mind just answering why she owes all of these things to people who don’t exist and why she is obligated to have children?

You’ve been around here long enough to have had this discussion before, haven’t you? Catholics believe the main purpose of marriage is the creation and upbringing of children. If you aren’t called to have children, then you aren’t called to marriage. So attempting to get the benefits of a marriage while avoiding the responsibility is seen as selfish.

 

[Calliso]

You’ve been around here long enough to have had this discussion before, haven’t you? Catholics believe the main purpose of marriage is the creation and upbringing of children. If you aren’t called to have children, then you aren’t called to marriage. So attempting to get the benefits of a marriage while avoiding the responsibility is seen as selfish.

Yeah true, of course I admit I didn;t go into marriage with the intention of not having children. That decision only came after much thought and consideration. Not only of myself but of my spouse and any “potential” children. So if people want to call that selfish so be it.

 

[BlueEyedLady]

Because she explicitly says so. Of course, it is nobody’s business, but we are discussing this phenomenon on this thread, so her statment invites a comment.

As for not having kids and morality, as an atheist-secularist you have a very different idea of what is good and right from what Catholics believe. My guess is that your idea about human nature is different from ours (if you believe in human nature at all - it is all just a social construct, no?) and that the idea of lifestyle choice is your god. One thing is as good as any other since there is no universal and objective criteria to follow.

Yeah true, of course I admit I didn;t go into marriage with the intention of not having children. That decision only came after much thought and consideration. Not only of myself but of my spouse and any “potential” children. So if people want to call that selfish so be it.

It’s far less selfish than bringing children in to the world that for whatever reason you can’t parent and raise properly just because you feel you’re supposed to.

 

[Calliso]

It’s far less selfish than bringing children in to the world that for whatever reason you can’t parent and raise properly just because you feel you’re supposed to.

Yep exactly I mean would people rather people like me that wouldn;t be good parents have a kid anyway out of obligation? I mean I am already married so thats not going to change.