John Hawkins, who blogs at Right Wing News, has a new post up at Clash Daily in which he lists 7 reasons why marriage is in decline.
Here are his reasons:
- The Sexual Revolution
- The Inability Of Many Poor Men To Support A Family
- A “Marrying Up” Gap
- No Fault Divorce
- Increased Economic Options For Women
- Marriage has become a much less attractive option for men
- Children have become more of an economic hindrance than a help
And here is one in detail:
6. Marriage has become a much less attractive option for men: There was a time when the man was expected to provide for his wife and kids and in return, he was treated as the king of the castle. Now, men are often treated more like partners than kings. Moreover, if there’s a divorce, men know they may not be treated fairly by the court system. Almost every man knows a guy who has had access to his child used as a bargaining chip, who has to pay Draconian child support payments or who has otherwise been generally treated unfairly because of his gender, not the merits. No man wants to end up as the guy paying a huge chunk of his income to a woman who broke his heart while he wonders if he’ll be allowed to have access to his own child.
As far as I can tell, the response to men’s lack of incentives to get married has been to legislate and spend even more to help women. In fact, I’m not even sure if most people understand what Mr. Hawkins outlined about male needs. Do women realize that one of the major reasons why men might like to get married is because then they would have a little team to protect, provide for and lead? Men don’t like it when government steps in and steals half their earnings, teaches their children bad ideas, and prevents them from protecting their family by disarming them. Maybe women can get men to be more interested in marriage if they think about why men would want to get married, and then make marriage more like what men want. That might involve rolling back feminism and socialism, and it might involve women changing who they are. There are two people in a relationship, and both of them have needs.
WINTERY KNIGHT 
One of the primary motivators for a man is respect. Our modern culture has systematically robbed men of this basic need. Look at sitcoms and commercials, how they treat men with derision. I think this is one of the reasons why Islam is making inroads in America, particularly amongst blacks; Islam provides a harsh, medieval system of male supremacy that appeals to someone who has been undervalued for much of their lives.
LikeLike
Especially if they are growing up with a single mother who is the sole authority in the house, and not because she is necessarily working, but just because the government hands her a check. That must be soul-killing for young men, who expect to derive their authority and respect in the home from their ability to be a provider. Here’s the government coming in and turning that right upside down by subsidizing fatherlessness by choice. Basically rewarding women who intentionally deprive their sons of a working man as a role model. And the leftists know this – they don’t want men having that authority in the home. They view male leadership with suspicion.
LikeLike
Boys and girls are different, that’s for sure. ;)
LikeLike
And here’s another reason (caution: PC-alert): woman’s suffrage.
My mother always used to say that it was responsible for a lot of division in many families she knew.
LikeLike
It seems to me that voting/politics is just another issue on which a couple can disagree, just like finances, how to raise children, what to eat for dinner, etc. A lot of times, the real problem is that the married couple is really living separate lives. The division is already there. Voting is just another thing that highlights how separate they really are. If Woman’s Suffrage seems like a problem, it is only because now if husband and wife disagree, and now, because they both have a vote, they have no reason to talk about it, and try to resolve their differences.
LikeLike
Exactly,
Well said Roger. I don’t mean to imply we should necessarily have one-vote families again. However, that system did force husband and wife to come to an agreement they could both live with, and in it’s way this did provide some sense of unity and cohesion.
LikeLike
This reminds me: my wife was grading writing exams for fifth graders that asked the children to write a narrative about them waking up twenty years older. Interestingly, most of the boys talked about their wife and kids and having to take care of them. The girls, however, rarely mentioned marriage and kids and if they did treated it with derision.
LikeLike
I wonder how their views will be different when they are much older.
LikeLike