What Happened To Mom, Pop and the Traditional American Family? (Guest Post)

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traditional-familyDo you ever look around at modern day America and have a nagging feeling something is wrong? It’s just – well, things aren’t what they used to be. Let’s take the bedrock of America, the family unit. Seems nowadays, millions of Americans are struggling to create lasting, fulfilling happy marriages. Mom, Pop and the kids are in real danger of becoming obsolete.

One of the most turbulent decades in US history is the 1960s. In just ten years, the moral values and traditions that shaped America were turned upside down. The swinging sixties gave birth to the sexual revolution which changed the game of love dramatically, and the family unit, once the strong bedrock of the nation, has suffered the consequences.

When you compare how things were before the sixties to how they are now, it’s as though you’re comparing two totally different worlds. In those bygone days, couples met in their tightly-knit communities. They shared the same moral values and traditions, firmly grounded in Judeo-Christian doctrine. Prior to the sexual revolution, religion in America played a far more prominent role than it does today.

Back then, there was a sense of duty to something higher than the self. Marriage was regarded as a sacrament ordained by God and couples married young and had large families. During the wedding ceremony, they took serious vows of commitment to each other before their God. For better, for worse, richer or poorer, in sickness and health till death do us part.

But the role of marriage meant so much more. For the woman, it gave her love, security and a protector and provider for her children. Being married with children gave her respect and dignity. Just imagine how hard it would’ve been for a woman to raise a child on her own. Remember, there was no welfare state back then.

For the man, it gave him love, support, stability and a caring nurturer for his children. Their roles were clearly defined as man, the breadwinner and protector; woman the nurturer of the children and the homemaker. Both made sacrifices for the sake of the relationship, for mutual benefit but more importantly, for the children. Such a strong foundation enabled values and traditions to be passed on by continuation of the bloodline. The husband and wife complimented each other, a balance of feminine yin and masculine yang.

It sounds amazing but in those days, sex before marriage was deeply frowned upon again due to strict Judeo-Christian morality and certain sexual behaviors were criminalized. Homosexuality for example was outlawed. Many other sexual acts now considered normal were regarded as perverted and depraved.

Should a woman have fallen pregnant outside wedlock, she was stigmatized and the child regarded as illegitimate – a “bastard” – a terrible insult back then. Abortion was regarded as murder.

In those stricter moral times, loose women weren’t desirable partners. Promiscuity was regarded as toxic to both society and individual and the virginity of a bride was valued by both sexes. Women who didn’t save themselves for marriage were regarded as “easy” and branded as sluts, tarts, whores, hussies and many other similar and equally demeaning insults. All hammering home the sense of shame associated with ungodly promiscuous behavior.

Sexuality was regarded as a taboo topic, not to be openly discussed. Even cursing in public was regarded as inappropriate. It really does seem like a world apart and remember, we’re going back just over sixty years ago.

Then along came the “swinging sixties” and the sexual revolution. The rise of the second-wave feminist movement brought demands for equality of the sexes. Feminists regarded marriage as oppression of women and anti-marriage propaganda made marriage undesirable. They promoted independence for women and more young women entered the workplace. Today, millions of women – and men to be fair – place a career above marrying and having children.

The invention of the contraceptive pill gave women the sexual freedom denied to their mothers and grandmothers. Against the backdrop of the Vietnam War, the flower power movement adopted liberal attitudes towards sexuality. Their mantra was “make love not war” and it heralded the era of free love. Promiscuity was strongly encouraged and enthusiastically practiced as more and more young people rejected traditional Judeo-Christian sexual morality and indulged in sex before marriage.

As the sixties progressed, public demand for softcore and then hardcore pornography increased. In the twenty-first century, porn is now a multi-billion dollar industry. Sex mad customers can watch people engaged in all kinds of full on sexual acts in the privacy and comfort of their own homes. Virtually every porn movie features sexual acts previously considered criminal and most of these acts were decriminalized during the sixties, including homosexuality. Every year in cities across America and throughout the West, gay pride parades will feature homosexuals, bisexuals, transgender and lesbian people all happily celebrating and flaunting their sexuality without restraint.

Gay marriage has just been legalized and in today’s America, Christians who refuse to tolerate homosexuality will be criminalized.

It’s not just homosexual people who openly flaunt their sexuality. Couples fondle and pet each other in public spaces with scant regard for others. They couldn’t give a hoot who sees them, any sense of shame or embarrassment long-since abandoned.

Abortion became legal in America in 1973 and since then, more than 58 million unwanted babies have been aborted. Recently representatives of Planned Parenthood were caught not once but twice discussing the sale of body parts from aborted babies.

Millions of people in America and throughout the entire West embraced all of these liberal attitudes as enlightened and progressive. I confess: I was one of them. I honestly believed in equality of the sexes, I was non-judgmental of people for their sexuality and I even regarded exclusivity in a relationship as morally wrong. I firmly believed people had the right to grow as they like, including exploring their sexuality. My mantra was unconditional love because I believed conditional love and exclusivity were sado-masochistic.

So what brought me out of my liberal fantasy Shangri-La? By the time I reached thirty-five years of age, I’d had three serious relationships and all of them had failed. The last one ended very badly and at that point, I knew something was wrong. It was pretty uncomfortable but I had to face up to the hard reality that my “enlightened” beliefs weren’t working for me. But I also realized they weren’t working for millions of other people either.

I started to look at what was happening to the family unit and I’m sad to say, I found out that it isn’t in a healthy state at all. All of the dramatic changes to society discussed here are having serious consequences for the family unit.

Take marriage, once a cornerstone of society. The marriage rate in America has decreased by a whopping sixty percent since 1970 and the US has the highest divorce rate in the Western world. Between forty and fifty percent of first marriages, sixty-seven percent of second marriages and an incredible seventy-four percent of third marriages will end in divorce.

It is estimated that thirty-three million Americans are living alone and in 2013 the birth rate hit an all-time low.

Children are feeling the effects. In today’s America, one in three children is living without a father. Without the balance of a feminine and a masculine influence in their lives, many kids turn to delinquency and are more inclined to indulge in violence, criminality and alcohol or drug abuse.

Thanks to the promotion of promiscuity in schools and universities, children are becoming sexualized at a younger age. Forty-seven percent of high school students have had sex. Every year there are twenty million new sexually transmitted infections. Shockingly, one in four teenage girls has had at least one sexually transmitted disease.

As you can see, the traditional family unit in America – and it’s in a similar sorry state throughout the West – is in severe decline. All of the dramatic changes that have occurred since the sexual revolution of the sixties have had a toxic effect on what was once the bedrock of Western civilization. It may well be that the legacy of the sexual revolution will be the end of the traditional family unit and with it, the end of America as we know it.

Perhaps that was the real goal all along. If you compare the America of the 1950s to the America of today, then you’ll see with your own eyes the true toxic legacy of the sexual revolution and its destructive impact on the traditional family unit.

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Kudos.for writing this piece.

Christopher, worthwhile article, thank you.

Morals and principles have vacated too many corners of our society, from top to bottom.

On every single block of this continent, gated communities or slums, hard drugs are present. Drugs are infecting and affecting too many families, and with the PR machine of Hollywood this has become an acceptable reality. All schools in the Nation, including primary schools, have pushers in every classroom. The kids know who they are. And yet, almost nothing is being done about them.

These are prime suspects for the gas chamber, and yet, the liberal insanity does not want them touched.

Some society we are leaving to our grandchildren. It’s an embarrassment.

“I’m mad as hell and I’m not
going to take this any more!”
with gratitude to Paddy Chayefsky

Over 200 years ago Historian Edward Gibbon wrote a (now) six-volume set titled, ”The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.”
If only we would read and study history.
Then we wouldn’t have had to repeat so many of the same mistakes previous civilizations have made.
Clearly Gibbons showed so many of our bad policies as they worked out in destroying Rome.
From over-taxing to devaluing money, from open borders to open marriages, all those things contributed to Rome’s fall before they were dusted off and put into practice here.

Hello Nanny G,
I am familiar with the title but I have not read the volume. However I am going to download an e-book if available. I particularly enjoy Roman History, even the fictional stuff like Graves’ I Claudius, or the BBC series Rome. I have also read Suetonius and some of Marcus Aurelius. I am looking forward to Gibbon. It should have been in my library already since it is so renowned.

The divorce rates over the last century are revealing. It is sad to view the spike occurring immediately after WWII. The war was still inflicting casualties, long after the last shots were fired.

If we encourage young people not to create their own misery by making poor choices, some will listen.

This article actually attempts to promote a positive lifestyle and hopefully, we will see more like this in the future.

“Back then, there was a sense of duty to something higher than the self.”

Indeed. Narcissist self-ism that has likely become a mainstream mindset those days is a source of most trouble, not only in family life. Every liberal worshiper is all apesh#t about him/her/itself without a slightest regard even to common sense, let alone nation and country.

Family Values Josh Dugger Clean Comedy Bill Cosby
We need every child to get a real education that can lead to a job that pays a decent wage.
I grew up in the 50’s ” America’s not what it used to be and it never was.” Peanuts