The news is filled with politics right now, as the Republican hopefuls vie for a chance against President Obama. But the biggest story in Western culture is not receiving much attention, certainly not from politicians. In the West, both marriage AND sex are falling out of favor.
Marriage is weakening. In 1960, around the time the pill was introduced and the sexual revolution began, 72% of American adults were married. In 2010, that number was down to 51%! That’s a drop in ‘regulated sexual activity’ as well as a decline in ‘the best environment to raise children.’
The trend is most evident among minorities. In 1960, 74% of white adults were married. By 2010 only 55% were — a 26% decline. Hispanics have gone from 72% to 48% — a 33% drop; and blacks from 61% to 31% — a 49% decrease. A college education seems to dampen this decline somewhat, but attending college also reduces the production of children!
Why? Going to college and preparing for a career are among the reasons the current median age at first marriage has risen six years, up from age 20.3 for women and 22.8 for men in 1960. Many women are getting married toward the end of their reproductive lifespan, so their chances of having children or more than two children are smaller. Plus, with considerable effort (often involving ‘abstinence education’), the average age of sexual debut in the U.S. has been pushed back about a year and a half toward age 17 or 18.
As recently as 1920, the U.S. Census report listed girls aged 10 to 15 who were “married, working full time,” so this is yet another change toward shrinking pregnancy within the prime fertility window for U.S. women, and adding to our demographic dilemma. Thankfully, many people want to immigrate to the U.S., so the situation is not as bleak in America as it might be. However, the trend is not good when 28% of current U.S. households consist of only one person compared to only 9% in 1950.
In Japan, a greater dilemma is afoot. Sex is losing steam.
In 2010, the Japan Family Planning Association did a survey of 16 to 49 year olds. 36% of 16-19 year old males and 59% of like-aged females said they were “indifferent or averse” towards having sex (both somewhat up from 2008). Very few of these teens were married, so this statistic might strike some as virtuous. But to have babies, you’ve got to have sex. And to have sex, you have to want it. You must desire to meet, date, and perhaps marry to create babies. If enough ‘don’t care’ about all that, where will the babies come from?
There is no salvation from immigration — the number moving to Japan is tiny. And although Japan has a ‘sexy’ culture in many respects — ‘dirty comic books’ and websites abound, prostitution is seen as mostly OK — the interest in sex is still declining. One reason may be that ‘virtual sex’ is driving real sex out of many teenagers’ lives. Boys, especially, can become ‘addicted’ to porn and other sexual outlets, instead of chasing after the real thing.
In a society with a shrinking population, growing disinterest in sex is very disturbing news. The Japanese bedrooms of the married are ever quieter as well. 40% of the married said they had not had sex in the past month, compared to 36% in 2004. Top reasons checked for sexual quietude? “Reluctance after child birth,” “can’t be bothered,” and “fatigue from work.”
What does it profit a society to have lots of neat stuff and too few children?
Connection To Gay Rights
Like frogs in a kettle being slowly boiled to death, FRI frequently hears people — including those concerned about our cultural decline — suggest that the progress of gay rights is not worth a great deal of worry. After all, ‘the sky is not falling. The sun will always come up tomorrow.’ But no matter how ‘big’ or ‘small’ the crisis seems at the moment, the goal of proper social policy is to assure a future for society. As the birth rates of Western countries continue to fall, those who have supported gay rights seem oblivious to the contribution such ‘rights’ make to the decline. Even those who have ‘tolerated’ (or not vigorously opposed) gay rights do not seem to understand the implications.
But now the sky is starting to fall. From Xtra, a gay magazine in Vancouver, comes this:
“the gay rights movement is shifting norms in Canada. And with that comes a message to those who won’t evolve: your outdated morals are no longer acceptable, and we will teach your kids the new norm.” (10/20/11)
Canada produces 1.6 children/woman. Its future is thus doomed. Onward gay rights!
Led By The Child Who Simply Knew
That was the headline on the front page of the Boston Globe December 11, 2011. Consider the subhead:
“The twin boys were identical in every way but one. Wyatt was a girl to the core, and now lives as one, with the help of a brave, loving family and a path-breaking doctor’s care”
The Boston Globe serves one of the most educated populations of the U.S. — think Harvard, MIT, etc. Do these sophisticated folk want to be “led by a child?” Would they disrupt the lives of ‘regular kids’ to cater to a confused 4 year-old? Would they accept ‘as gospel’ the decisions of a program that started in 2007? Indeed, yes!
In one of the more incredible stories of subordination to the notion that ‘children know best,’ the same individuals, who denounce as ‘primitive’ beliefs statements such as ‘God created the world,’ disrupt society to cater to the whims of a 4 year-old!
[The whole story is on-line, and may well be worth your time to examine.]
At age 3,
“W favored pink tutus and beads. At 4, he insisted on a Barbie birthday cake and had a thing for mermaids. On Halloween, J was Buzz Lightyear. W wanted to be a princess.”
The parents
“decided to tell their story, they say, in order to help fight the deep stigma against transgender youth, and to ease the path for other such children who, without help, often suffer from depression, anxiety, and isolation.… We told our kids you can’t create change if you don’t get involved,”
says the father 53, “sitting in the living room of their comfortable home in a southern Maine community.”
When Wyatt was 4, he asked his mother: “When do I get to be a girl?’’ He told his father that he “hated his penis and asked when he could be rid of it.” Aged 5, at a “party for classmates and parents, W appeared beaming at the top of the stairs in a princess gown, a gift from his grandmother.” When first grade started, Wyatt carried a “pink backpack and a Kim Possible lunchbox.” Her parents eventually agreed to call ‘her’ Nicole instead of Wyatt. Precisely who is ‘disturbed’ here, the parents or the child?
When fifth grade started,
“Nicole showed up for school, sometimes wearing a dress and sporting shoulder-length hair. She began using the girls’ bathroom.… But one day a boy called her a ‘faggot,’ objected to her using the girls’ bathroom, and reported the matter to his grandfather, who… complained to the Orono School Committee, with the Christian Civic League of Maine backing him. The superintendent of schools then decided Nicole should use a staff bathroom.”
“To protect her from bullying at school, Nicole was assigned an adult to watch her at all times between classes, following her to the cafeteria, to the bathroom. She found it intrusive and stressful. It made her feel like even more of an outsider.”
Nicole and her parents filed a complaint with the Maine Humans Right Commission over her right to use the girls’ bathroom. The commission found that she had been discriminated against and, along with the Maines family, filed a lawsuit against the Orono School District. The suit is pending. “What Nicole and Jonas both went through in school was unconscionable,’’ says Jennifer Levi, one of the GLAD lawyers on the case. “Their one huge stroke of luck was having Kelly and Wayne as parents.’’
This madness is coming to your community. Who would ever have thought we would be ruled by children (and homosexuals)? Who could have imagined that the rights of normal kids and their parents would be trumped by the ‘rights’ of the sexually disturbed?