"Total control of a population through accelerated moral decay"

I'll come back to that title in just a sec but first, let's set the table by linking to and excerpting this DailyMail piece by Steve Doughty:

The number of children being brought up by married parents has fallen to a historic low, official figures reveal.

Fewer than two in three grow up in a traditional family compared to nearly three quarters of children when Labour came to power.

The revelation comes only days after the head of the Government's family pressure group claimed that the state should not try to preserve the traditional family.

The figures, published by the Office for National Statistics in its annual report, Social Trends, found there were 8.3million dependent children living with married parents - a fall of 1.3million since 1997.

At the same time, the number of dependent children - defined as those under 16 or aged up to 18 if they are still in school - in cohabiting households went up from one million to 1.7million, while those staying with single parents rose from 2.7million to 3.2million.

The report also found children living with cohabiting parents were more likely to end up in single-parent households because of the higher break-up rate of these relationships.
 
The Social Trends study said: 'Children live in an increasing variety of family structures during their lives.

'If their parents separate they will typically live in a lone-parent family or a stepfamily.'

Despite research showing children from married homes do better at school, are healthier, get better paid jobs and are more likely to stay clear of drugs and crime, ministers continue to insist that it is not marriage but 'strong, stable relationships' between parents which count.

Last week, Katherine Rake, of the Family and Parenting Institute, was heavily criticised after claiming the traditional family model 'certainly isn't the norm now'.

Tory leader David Cameron - whose party is committed to supporting marriage - said Labour's dislike of marriage was 'pathological'.

Pathological indeed.  And families are paying the price.  Who's to blame.  Let's now come back to the title of the post and more particularly, this righteous retort to the piece I received from Garry H. via e-mail:

Notice the phrasing of this from the article:

The number of children being brought up by married parents has fallen to a historic low, official figures reveal.

It's worded in passive voice, "the number . . . has fallen," as opposed to a more active and more accurate phrasing, which might be something like "the government, through its punitive policies and enforcement, coupled with decades of concerted effort to undermine the traditional family, has successfully reduced the ratio of children born to married couples," reflecting the how of this state of things.

The number didn't "fall," it was pushed.

Total control of a population through accelerated moral decay is difficult to the degree that children are raised in traditional families.  To achieve the totalitarian ends of centrally managed citizen-serfs, a multi-pronged attack on the family is required to break down that unit and its influence over the upbringing of children.

When all children are perceived as belonging to the State, the desired condition exists for the complete regulation of individual lives.

Any governmental "hand wringing" about the decline of the family is as genuine as crocodile tears.  This is an objective, not a crisis.

If the actual methodology of this gradual dissolving of the family bond is of any interest, I would direct your attention to how government spends its money in staffing schools.  School psychologists are now accepted as the norm, with deep funding to expand their role.  Kids are more messed up than ever.  Roll back forty years.  Odd.  Kids were pretty much . . . well, kids.  And the insertion of school psychologists was just beginning.  We had one for the entire district.  They've gained tremendous traction since then.  Billions of dollars spent to improve the "mental health" of our kids.

Of course, nowadays schools blame the state of our youth on a lack of parental involvement.  However, should a parent become involved in the kids' education in any way not approved by the school administration, it is the parent who is threatened with punitive measures.

The moral decline of our children, the insertion of weird and toxic substitute moralities into their thinking, and the resulting breakdown of the family unit didn't just happen, it was engineered.

Someone want to substantively disagree with Garry, great... let's hear your arguments.

We'll wait.

Comments

[Morgan K Freeberg]

Not disagree. As one who is in the doghouse with the institution of marriage...or perhaps it is in the doghouse with me...I would be remiss in ignoring the point that matrimony has been a cudgel, itself, used to beat and bully the uppity peasants into line. This is part of a continuing trend by which the freedom-loving individual finds himself on a receding patch of ground, not unlike a shrinking iceberg. For him the question of marriage has become a damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don't proposition.

Try to find an unfortunate somewhere who has less freedom than the recently-divorced or soon-to-be-divorced guy. Hell, a homeless bum has more freedom than that.

But what's being done to our kids is far worse. Their daily lives represent the future of the rest of us. A prison made out of excessive freedom. No punishment. But lots and lots of finger-waggling. And if you're a "problem" you'll be therapy'd and medicated into line. Unless you don't want to be. Then smoke as much dope as you like, just don't breathe too much carbon into the atmosphere. And stay out of everybody's way, that's all we ask.

A more stifling community spirit, paradoxically, leads to a more bumptious demonstration of individualized urges, and the eradication of any genuine community feeling. Eventually we all end up like the kids in the opening scene of a "Stand By Me" movie; everyone just absolutely disrespectful of any & all authority, in our own little worlds, gossiping, achieving nothing.

Any governmental "hand wringing" about the decline of the family is as genuine as crocodile tears. This is an objective, not a crisis.

Dead freakin' on. And brilliant.

[Mommynator]

Those who will not govern themselves will be governed, and usually not by someone benign.

Morgan, a lot can be said negative about marriage, but it's still the best environment for children to grow, especially if the husband and wife are truly committed to each other and their family.

I don't see God using marriage as a metaphor for His relationship with us as a cudgel, but I can understand why someone burned would think that way. Please don't let your personal pain cloud what really is the founding government of all societies.

[Morgan K Freeberg]

God I trust, MM.

Things got sour when man started messing around in God's dominion, as they always do. You might say what God hath joined together, man now uses as a way to put together some money & power.

This is an ancient effort of ours, this drive to make free men into cattle. And the divorce assembly-line process has been a marvelously effective way to continue the tradition. Divorce rate has exploded, and like the piece says this isn't a disaster that happened, it was an event that was engineered.