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Re-valu-ing
the Family, Part Twenty-three: What We Wish Larger Institutions
Would Do
by
Richard and Linda Eyre
(www.valuesparenting.com)
Note: In this
twenty-six part column, Richard and Linda Eyre explore the recent
revolution of the family from the honored centerpiece of society
to a disrespected and seemingly redundant appendage to the larger
corporate and cultural institutions of our new world. Re-valu-ing
the family, the Eyres believe, is the only alternative to America's
demise. The sequence of the column is: A. Re-valu-ing the family
(part I); B. sThe "crux" (parts 2 and 3 -- why family is the foundation
for everything, including happiness); C. The "curse" (parts 4 and
5 -- the social problems that plague our society today); D. The
"crisis" (parts 6 and 7 -- the breakdown and breakup of families
that allows and leads to the social problems); E. The "cause" (parts
8, 9, 10, 11 -- the reasons our families are failing); F. The "culprits"
(parts 12, 13, 14, and 15-- how our new, large institutions are
destroying the small, most basic institution of family); G. The
"cure" (parts 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21 and 22 -- what you as a parent
can do about it); H. The "case" (parts 23, 24, and 25 -- a case
for government and big corporations to pay more positive attention),
and I. Finding or forming a family support group (part 26).
The
Case:
The things we wish larger institutions would do!
Case
(ks) n. A set of reasons or supporting facts advocating something.
The argument for something.
While the
"bull's eye" is families fixing themselves, the "outer rings" should
be reorienting themselves to protect and support the nucleus that
they can't exist without.
Families are
the cure! And the cure is possible and available in every home in
America. But fixing our own families doesn't mean we can't also
cry out to larger institutions -- asking them in every forcible
way we can think of to stop any practice or policy that threatens
families and to start giving us more help in raising the children
that are their future as well as ours.
Right now,
as we've discussed, the larger institutions of our society, as they
pursue their own preservation and expansion, are undermining, superseding,
and otherwise destroying the basic institution of the family in
a hundred ways. This destruction takes many forms, from demanding
loyalties that take parents from children to promoting materialistic
anti-family values . . . from overtaxing married couples to making
divorce too easy and too "normal." These larger institutions, from
banks to businesses, from media to manufacturers, and from government
agencies to news agencies to ad agencies must come to realize that
as they weaken and undermine families they are ultimately destroying
themselves. None of them can exist without the foundation of stable
households which are the demand-engine and the end consumer of every
good or service that the larger institutions produce and provide.
The survival of all the large institutions we have created depends
entirely on the survival of solid individual households and families.
Some argue
otherwise: Who needs families they say? Individuals are consumers,
individuals are employees, individuals can make up the larger institutions.
Who cares if they are married or if they live together as families?
Statistics
and common sense provide the answer. Married individuals earn more,
produce more, and consume more than single individuals -- thirty
percent more. Try to imagine any business school or government surviving
a thirty percent decline in sales, in production, or in tax base.
And try to imagine a society reproducing and successfully raising
its work force and its consumer base without functional, nurturing
families.
Parents then,
provide a huge service to society by raising its next generation,
its next work force, its next tax payers, its next universe of consumers.
Current estimates of the cost of raising a child to age eighteen
are around $150,000.00. Yet society (or our larger institutions)
do little to repay families. In fact there are punishments ranging
from higher taxes to job and career disadvantages.
In earlier
times, children were an economic advantage to parents -- they helped
on the farm and with the other manual labor of households. Today
children are a huge economic drain on their parents and neither
government nor business does much to ease the burden or support
the effort.
The bottom
line is that we all depend on families. And as surely as we depend
on them individually, we depend on them institutionally.
When larger
institutions have policies or practices that weaken or harm families,
it is almost always a classic example of trading long-term viability
for short-term gains. It is a macro example of choosing instant
gratification over permanent stability.
A bank makes
credit too easy and increases short-term profits but generates bankruptcies
and family financial instability that diminishes long-term deposits
and profits.
A business
downsizes, reduces family related benefits and thus raises its current
income . . . but suffers in the long run because it loses employee
loyalty and morale and stability.
A movie focuses
on violence and irresponsible, recreational sex and produces a box
office hit with a relatively low budget. But life imitates art and
kids make mistakes that hurt them economically as well as emotionally
and theaters as well as every other part of commerce eventually
pays the price.
A TV news show
focuses on the seamy and the shocking -- and gives much more attention
to "alternative life styles" than to family life style. Curiosity
and titillating helps the Nielsen rating . . . but undermines the
families that we're counting on to provide the next generation of
viewers.
A merchandiser/advertiser
disguises wants as needs, helping create a narcissistic, hedonistic
society of instant gratification. People buy more and product companies
earn more in the short term . . . but it is at the expense of family
stability and long-term prosperity, both in households and in businesses.
A business
refuses the options of flex time, job sharing, and maternity leave
to avoid disruption and inconvenience . . . but ends up losing some
of its most competent employees who decide to put family first.
A neighborhood
sports team (or a college or pro league) decides to schedule more
of its games on Sunday to increase attendance . . . but makes parents
choose between sports and family time or church time, eventually
weakening families and community.
A legislature
creates a marriage tax penalty (makes it so a married couple is
taxed more than the same two individuals living or filing separately).
It increases short-term tax reserves . . . but undermines the family's
ability to raise the next generation's tax base.
A high school
teaches every imaginable class related to career and occupation
but pays no attention to family or parenting skills or to ethics.
Kids are prepared to go out and get a job but not to raise the kids
or establish the home that will support and supply the school and
the general economy.
A law firm
encourages and supports and recommends divorce as the common solution,
lining their pockets with fees . . . but splitting the families
that make up the communities in which they exist.
Even before
we get to the things larger institutions should start doing for
families we should all conclude that the first order of business
is to get them to stop doing things that hurt families.
We once
attended a church congregation where the lay Bishop was, by profession,
a plumber. Despite his lack of training, he did his best to counsel
and advise his parishioners. In the same congregation was a high
priced, highly educated therapist/psychiatrist who had many congregation
members as his paying clients. On several occasions people dropped
him as their doctor and therapist, stating that the plumber/bishop
was helping them more. Finally, in frustration he went to the bishop
and asked him his secret. "How do you, without any training, help
people more than I do? What do you tell them to do?
The bishop
gave a typically blunt and simple answer: "It's what I tell them
not to do," he said. "I just ask them questions until I figure out
which of the commandments they are breaking. Then I tell them to
stop it."
Similarly, the
first message we need to get to larger institutions is "stop it."
Stop undermining and sabotaging the family! Put an end to any policies
or practices that weaken or threaten families in any way.
Keep in mind
that none of these institutions intend to damage or weaken families
-- at least not directly. But the goal of their own preservation
and expansion occupies them and is not consciously or conceptually
tied to the necessity of the strong family base. It is that consciousness
of mutual dependency that we need more of in our larger institutions.
If it were possible to wave a magic wand and change one thing, the
most productive wave would be to cause the policy makers of every
larger institution to be conscious and responsible about the impact
of their actions and policies on families. This one focus, this
one awareness ("How does what we are doing impact families?") could
literally change the world and protect and preserve our larger institutions
by saving our foundation of real homes and stable households.
It is interesting
(and almost inspirational) to imagine each of the other sectors
operating with the conscious goal of supporting, strengthening,
and bolstering the family. In this vision, the outer rings transform
and revitalize themselves by returning to their original purpose.
1. Community
and Voluntary Ring: Neighborhood organizations and churches teach
parenting skills and orient every auxiliary, from scouting to Little
League, toward family participation and involvement. Ministers take
strong stands for marriage partners staying together and for restraint
and responsible sexual behavior among youth. Civic clubs focus on
helping and supplementing families, and service organizations encourage
parents and children to volunteer together to help other families.
Extended families and genealogical societies work to give members
a sense of roots and heritage.
2. Private
Sector (Business) Ring: Employers adopt family friendly policies
for maternity and paternity leave, for transfer practices, for flex
time and job sharing, and even for education and elderly care assistance
(which policies are more profitable over the long run, anyway).
Marketers and advertisers replace the tone of self-fulfillment and
instant gratification with a slant toward the warmth and joy of
family and commitment (which sells better, anyway); media creators,
producers and participants opt for themes of love and loyalty and
the striving for family solidarity rather than the obsession with
greed, sleaze, and dysfunctionality (which ultimately draws more
viewers and sells more tickets anyway).
3. Public Sector
(Government) Ring: Every policy, law, judgment, and priority is
weighted by the question, "Is the family served?" Public codes from
tax law to welfare policy are rewritten and interpreted with the
promotion of stable families as the goal. Education policy is shaped
to give families choice and input and control and to actually teach
ethics and values and marriage and parenting skills in supplement
to what kids learn at home. Marriage and adoption laws are rewritten
to prioritize staying together and growing together. Politicians
campaign on family issues and propose family-strengthening ideas
at the heart of their campaigns.
We see glimpses
of these directions in all three sectors, yet their full fruition
still looks like some sort of unobtainable utopia. It can come about
only through a consistent, wide overlay of family consciousness,
a clear awareness of family consequences by larger institutions.
This will not come about easily. We've been moving away from it
for decades. And no specific list of recommendations would cover
the full breadth of the problem. Nevertheless, the suggestions in
the next section even partially adopted and implemented, could make
a difference to families and make it easier for us all to turn
our hearts.
Next
column: Some recommendations for employers and the media.
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Magazine. All Rights Reserved.
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