Posted by
DFMJR on Wednesday, July 09, 2008 10:00:00 PM
I recently read a couple articles that
dealt with the changing role of the family for an English assignment.
Of course they were assigned articles, so I was unable to do my own
research of the topic, but was forced to write solely on the
information provided to me. But, I am not confined to such a narrow
view point here, so I looked up some information.
The two
articles I read were Karen Lindsey's "Friends as Family," and Barbara
Kingsolver's "Stone Soup." Both articles are supposed to offer a
perspective on the changing image and concept of family in the United
States. However, both articles offer the same perspective of the
concept of family in the United States, and more importantly, both are
ridiculous.
Karen Lindsey's argument begins and ends in the
opening sentence of her essay. She states simply that "the traditional
family isn't working." This kind of brevity is unparalleled in the
world of research. Surely, if her essay was any good (which it is not),
she would have won the 1981 award for "shortest and most profound
research completed by a feminist," at the annual National Organization
for Women's awards ceremony.
Lindsey goes on to say divorce
rates are high, and even those that stay married do so "under grim
conditions." She cites domestic abuse rates to uphold her theory that
marriage is worse for women than being single. The statistics say
differently. For example, The U.S Department of Justice records the
highest per capita rates of intimate violence towards women, between
the years 1993-98, were among women ages 16 to 24. Currently the
average age at marriage in the US is 26.8 years for men, and 25.1 years
for women. This would mean that more women experience domestic abuse
before they are married then they do after they are married.
Besides
that, intimate partner violence only made up 22% of the violent crime
against women between 1993 and 1998. This leads one to think that
perhaps those, like Karen Lindsey, are trying to use violence against
women to attack the family, as opposed to actually helping women avoid
other forms of violent crime.
Also important is that Lindsey did
not include any statistics that dealt with factors such as poverty
rates among single parent households, or graduation rates among
students in single parent households versus those in two parent
households, or drug and alcohol abuse by children in single parent
households versus children from two parent households.
According
to the U.S Department of Commerce, nearly 60% of children living with
just their mother were below or near the poverty line. Similarly, about
45% of children raised by divorced mothers and 69% of those raised by
never-married mothers live in or near poverty.
The
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services states that "fatherless
children are at a dramatically greater risk of drug and alcohol abuse.
Even more startling, 75% of teenage suicides occur in households where
a parent has been absent.
These statistics are absent from Lindsey's essay.
Another
Issue that Lindsey raises in her essay is the concept of "the new
narcissism." That is to say, the concept that people, since the 1960's
are only concerned with themselves and their own pleasure or well
being. This theory, which I am inclined to believe, is written off by
Lindsey as a lie. She writes that the theory of "new narcissism" is
only used by "apologists for the family," and it is "more than a myth.
It's also a lie." After this, Lindsey goes on to address the
differences between a myth and a lie, never fully explaining her
statement.
Kingsolver, while never officially discussing the
concept of the "new narcissism," does admit that "we're social
animals." This is an interesting choice of words to describe the human
need for interaction. Typically, when one thinks of an animal, one
thinks of an organism obsessed with its own survival or well being; an
organism that pursues groups because it is safer for them, not because
they enjoy the company of other animals. This is why you typically see,
on the Discovery Channel, a pack of Coyotes fighting each other for a
scrap of food, but uniting in each others defense against an external
threat.
In the end, neither essay offers a very good, or even
acceptable answer to the many questions about the concept or image of
the family in American society. Lindsey's essay distorts reality with
one sided statistics, while denying most, if not all, aspects of the
opposing viewpoint. That reason, among others, is most likely why her
book, from which this essay is taken, went out of print a year after it
was initially released. Yet it is still used in college english classes. This is, to say the least disheartening.