One of the hallmarks of American exceptionalism, sad to say, is the US leads the world for children reared in single-parent households. For that dubious distinction we can in part thank President Lyndon Johnson. He turned loose a pack of "pointy-head college professors who can't even park a bicycle straight" (per Gov. George Wallace) who had a field day experimenting on America's downtrodden. Seems those 'best and brightest' didn't have a clue about welfare dependency.
However, LBJ's failed Great Society solidified America's welfare class into a critical mass of grateful voters (and broken homes). They've been a rock-solid part of the Democratic Party's base ever since.
Also, much of the anti-family consumerism, entertainment, popular culture and wokeism that has flooded the world is of American origin. It makes money, so it must be fine. Everyone on board with that?
But after years of going along to get along, guess what? Pushback. Corporate media called it culture war. Things had been peachy-keen progressive until those 20th century troglodytes turned to community, homeschooling, and alternative media. Globalism demands fealty. Those pesky Christian types and associated malcontents were leaving the plantation. Culture War!
Then the internet opened Pandora's Box. The powers-that-be responded with name-calling and cancel culture. Too little, too late. Nonetheless, falling fertility, declining living standards, woke culture and wars-without-end have wrought incalculable damage.
But - could a cultural correction be in the cards?
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has just published "Births: Final Data for 2022." Gloom-and-doomers eagerly awaited the release. Bad news means good clickbait, and reporters know how to spin anything. Do they teach that in journalism school?
The report primarily covers demographic change from 2021 to 2022:
Still with us? Did you notice that bit about birthrates increasing for married women?
Along comes the intrepid Institute for Family Studies. Call 'em culture warriors 'til the cows come home, but you can't knock them off-task. Veritable blood hounds, those folks. At the IFS blog, scholar Patrick T. Brown accentuated the positive in "Good News About Married Fertility in the US:"
New 2022 data confirm a trend that has been slowly evolving since 2007; namely, that the great decoupling of marriage and parenthood that exploded in the second half of the 20th century is starting to be rolled back. That's because while America is having fewer babies, the babies that are being born are more likely to be born to married parents.
That is good news. Always the family-friendly find the silver lining.
The birth rate among married women... has been in the range of 80 to 90 births per 1,000 [since the 1990s]... [I]t hit a new low of 80.8 in 2020. But 2022 shows a continued, if modest, rebound to a birth rate of 84.2 among married women.
So family formation is good for fertility. Who'd a thought? Are families coming back? Will getting hitched once again become the "in" thing for up and comers? Anything is possible:
The shift in fertility patterns post-Great Recession suggest a future in which fertility, like marriage, becomes the cherry on top of a successfully-completed young adulthood. Johns Hopkins' sociologist Andrew Cherlin dubbed this changing view of marriage the shift from a "cornerstone" to a "capstone" model. Perhaps something similar is happening with parenthood. [Emphasis added]
The CDC report includes a tidbit in accord with the above: The decades-long decline in birthrates for the under 25 cohort is "counterbalanced by a notable increase among women in their 40s." This is a phenomenon we've all seen.
Cornerstone, capstone or whatever, so many women, intelligent as all get out, with successful careers, finally figure out that if they want children, they'd better get busy. This is by no means letting the men off the hook. Family is all about priorities. It is extremely helpful, essential even, for husband and wife to be on the same page. Two compatible gender-affirmed, binary cisgender individuals joined in Holy Matrimony can work wonders.
Mr. Brown concludes by raising the distinction between strict pro-natalism advocating for more children (e.g. Elon Musk) and pro-family advocacy, favoring more children within marriage. From his recent piece in the neocon National Review:
If you're concerned about declining fertility, you must be concerned about declining marriage. Reshaping the cultural narrative about marriage, and making it financially easier and more culturally acceptable to marry earlier, will give the most couples a better chance to have more children. A natalism that underemphasizes marriage will fall short.
Indeed. Family is embedded in Creation (nature). Faith affirms that. Is marriage becoming chic? Are the young'uns once again discovering the obvious? Through the millennia younger generations occasionally stumble upon, through no particular discernment of their own, the distinction between knowledge and wisdom. That enables the rediscovery of old truths, which are rebranded anew. That is, shall we say, "normal," and could be happening yet again. Truth is stranger than fiction.
And that, my friends, just might be some good news. Meanwhile, don't let your guard down in the culture war but be patient all the same. Patience imbues optimism. As the old saying goes, "good things come to those who wait."