Is it just coincidental that the moribund U.S. economy died in 2008 and has been stiffening ever since at the same time that biblical marriage has fallen to its lowest nadir yet?
I say nay (via Newsmax Insider):
Marriage rates in the United States have been declining for decades and the share of adults who have never wed is now at a record high.
In 2012, one in five Americans ages twenty-five and older, about forty-two million people, had never been married, according to a Pew Research Center analysis based on the most recent Census Bureau figures.
In 1960, just 9% of Americans in that age range had never been married.
Men are more likely than women to have never been married — 23% of men and 17% of women hadn't wed in 2012, compared to 10% of men and 8% of women in 1960.
"The dramatic rise in the share of never-married adults and the emerging gender gap are related to a variety of factors," Pew observed. "Adults are marrying later in life, and the shares of adults cohabiting and raising children outside of marriage have increased significantly."
Marriage has its....pleasant compensations, shall we say. It also provides emotional satisfactions - "He/she picked me! Forever!" - and stability. For men it channel are base instincts - aggression, ambition, lust - in constructive directions, as our energies and appetites are absorbed in loving our wives, having kids, and providing for our families. But it's the mutual commitment - making yourself part of something bigger - that lifts us out of our solipsism and selfishness and, by extension, elevates society as a whole. Or, in other words, the same reason leftists tout totalitarian government.
Take away that common value of commitment to a, and the, marriage bond, and society unravels. Culture falls apart. It should be no surprise that ever larger percentages of men have bailed on doing what's right; if a guy can get as much free tail as he can bugger, why bother putting in the patient effort to court a lady and win her over and persuade her to spend the rest of her life with you? Particularly when five years from now she may decided to turn you in on a different model?
The result? Plunging marriage rates, the institution itself falling into parody and disrepute, and its desiccated husk being picked up and violated by militant homosexuals who don't believe in it either but are using it as a weapon to eradicate what's left of evangelical Christianity.
But that's not all. Note as well the concomitant rise of the welfare state over the past half century, which began its dismal march in lockstep with the infamous "sexual revolution". Half a century later, here we sit, society in fractal, literal [BLEEP] chaos, and the economy as a whole is in the same IC ward right alongside traditional marriage:
The mood in America is decidedly pessimistic when it comes to personal finances, a new survey reveals.
Just 7% of Americans report that they are in "excellent" financial shape, according to the 2014 American Values Survey from the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI).
In addition to those in excellent shape, 34% report that they are in "good" shape financially, while the majority report that they are in "poor" (20%) or "fair" (37%) condition financially.
The most commonly cited economic hardship Americans face in their daily lives is food insecurity — 36% of survey respondents say they or someone in their household had to reduce meals or cut back on food to save money over the past year.
Only 42% of Americans believe that the American Dream — if you work hard, you'll get ahead — still holds true today, while 48% say it once held true but does not anymore, and 7% say the American Dream never held true.
And nearly half of Americans, 49%, believe their generation is better off financially than their children's generation will be, the PRRI found.
Question: Why are that many Americans in such poor economic condition? Many reasons, actually, but one prominent one is that few save anymore. You know, the metaphorical piggy bank, socking dough away for the proverbial "rainy day". Living "paycheck to paycheck" is a foolish proposition, because what happens when there are no more paychecks? You're overextended; you're exposed. You've lived beyond your means, and now the piper is coming to collect, and your "barns" are empty.
The Jewish patriarch Joseph said it well in Genesis 41:25-37:
Now Joseph said to Pharaoh, “Pharaoh’s dreams are one and the same; God has told to Pharaoh what He is about to do. The seven good cows are seven years; and the seven good ears are seven years; the dreams are one and the same. The seven lean and ugly cows that came up after them are seven years, and the seven thin ears scorched by the east wind will be seven years of famine. It is as I have spoken to Pharaoh: God has shown to Pharaoh what He is about to do. Behold, seven years of great abundance are coming in all the land of Egypt; and after them seven years of famine will come, and all the abundance will be forgotten in the land of Egypt, and the famine will ravage the land. So the abundance will be unknown in the land because of that subsequent famine; for it will be very severe. Now as for the repeating of the dream to Pharaoh twice, it means that the matter is determined by God, and God will quickly bring it about. Now let Pharaoh look for a man discerning and wise, and set him over the land of Egypt. Let Pharaoh take action to appoint overseers in charge of the land, and let him exact a fifth of the produce of the land of Egypt in the seven years of abundance. Then let them gather all the food of these good years that are coming, and store up the grain for food in the cities under Pharaoh’s authority, and let them guard it. Let the food become as a reserve for the land for the seven years of famine which will occur in the land of Egypt, so that the land will not perish during the famine.”
Now the proposal seemed good to Pharaoh and to all his servants.
Joseph told Pharaoh to live within his means and save far a faminey day. To think beyond the present. To plan ahead. Pharaoh listened. And when the famine came, every other country starved, but Egyptians were sustained and able to help their neighbors.
Here's another question: Which is more likely to consider and plan for the future as opposed to only "living in the moment": the married man and woman or their single counterparts? Rhetorical question, isn't it? Not that the former are always steeped in prudence and frugality, but they have self-evident reasons and incentives to look beyond the now and the "stupid, hungry self," whereas single people have the diametric opposite incentives. If you're not committed to anything except self-gratification, why bother "thinking about tomorrow"? "Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we (may) die". And if we get in a jam, we can always tap Barack Obama's "stash," right? And when that doesn't work out, well, it's all the fault of those evil rich Republicans, correct?
When you're married, you have "skin in the game"; when you're single, all you're concerned with is "skin". And biblical marriage is being, for all intents and purposes has already been, discarded.
Two closing quotes to take with you into the long night ahead:
Due to a declining labor force participation among men, there are now only about sixty-five employed unmarried men per hundred unwed women.
Mrs. Hard Starboard and I had to wait a year beyond our originally intended wedding date to finally tie the not twenty-six years ago because....she was still in school and it took me that long to find a job. Which is a roundabout way of saying that Obamanomics is adding to the disincentives already warring against biblical marriage.
And finally:
Recent Pew Research Center survey data show that Americans are divided over the role of marriage. Half of survey respondents believe society is just as well off if people have priorities other than marriage and children, while 46% say society is better off if people make marriage and children a priority.
But 67% of younger Americans, ages eighteen to twenty-nine, agree with the former assertion, while 55% of those ages fifty and older agree with the latter.
So if "no-fault divorce" and sham "open" marriages and militant homosexuality and all the other corrosive tactics of the Left don't succeed in finally murdering biblical marriage, generational neglect ultimately will.
And they'll take the forlorn, fragmented ashes of the U.S. economy right along with it.
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