Tag Archives: The Negro Family: The Case For National Action

A Study in Entropy

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Entropy is defined as the trend of the universe toward disorder. Entropy is illustrated by what happens to a farmer’s field if he ignores it for a few years. It is also what happens to a tractor or wagon that is left out in a field unattended. Crops do not automatically grow in straight lines, and weeds do not pick themselves. It is not a good idea to let children raise themselves. It takes human effort to keep things moving forward.

Does entropy apply to nations? If freedom and liberty are not carefully nurtured, do they degrade? If the culture is not properly guarded and maintained, does it degrade into unhealthy places?

Recently there was something of an uproar about a commencement speech given by a National Football League player. In his speech, Harrison Butker praised the virtues of motherhood. He praised his wife for the role her support has played in his success. He stated that many of the women in the audience that day will eventually become mothers. They will struggle with balancing their roles as wives, mothers, and corporate employees. All those roles are important, but has our culture devalued the role of wife and mother? A poem by William Ross Wallace states, “The Hand That Rocks the Cradle Is the Hand That Rules the World.” In the past, children learned basic foundational things from their mothers—baking cookies, shopping, language skills and values. In a world where career is valued over motherhood, children may or may not learn these things at daycare. There is nothing wrong with daycare, but I can guarantee that a child’s daycare provider does not love the child the way his/her mother does. I understand that in today’s economy staying home with your children is something of a luxury, but it can be done. Is devaluing motherhood a step forward or a step backward?

The speech given by Harrison Butker would have merely been a statement of the obvious in 1970. What changed?

The programs of the Great Society and the War on Poverty came into their own in the 1970’s. In 1965, “The Negro Family: The Case for National Action, the Moynihan Report,” was written by Daniel Patrick Moynihan. He warned against the collapse of the black family unit, noting a rise in single-parent families. The Great Society programs exacerbated that problem by making payments to women only if there was not a man living in the house. The destruction those programs created in the black population later spread to the white population. The 1970’s also gave rise to the Feminist movement and created what was then the cottage industry of daycare—now a billion-dollar industry. This further weakened the family structure—the foundation of a healthy society.

The overspending of the 1960’s and 1970’s and beyond created an inflationary cycle that forced many women into the workforce. One positive aspect of this is that educational and professional opportunities for women increased. That at least was a positive thing.

Is America now experiencing a state of entropy? How many Americans voted in the last primary election? How many Americans voted in the last Presidential election? Are you willing to take an active role in your government? What impact will the dramatic increase in population from places that do not share our culture have on our own already degrading culture?

If Americans want to save our country from entropy, they need to stand up and fight for the values and culture that made this country great. If we do not do that soon, we will go the way of Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome.

Truth Doesn’t Change–Even When Society Does

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Today’s Wall Street Journal posted an article about next month’s 50-year anniversary of Daniel Patrick Moynihan‘s report on the black family. At the time the future Senator was serving as assistant secretary in Lyndon Johnson‘s Labor Department. Senator Moynihan (he was first elected to the Senate in 1976) was concerned about the increasing number of fatherless homes in the black community.

The article in the Wall Street Journal reports:

“The fundamental problem is that of family structure,” wrote Moynihan, who had a doctorate in sociology. “The evidence—not final but powerfully persuasive—is that the Negro family in the urban ghettos is crumbling.”

For his troubles, Moynihan was denounced as a victim-blaming racist bent on undermining the civil-rights movement. Even worse, writes Harvard’s Paul Peterson in the current issue of the journal Education Next, Moynihan’s “findings were totally ignored by those who designed public policies at the time.” The Great Society architects would go on to expand old programs or formulate new ones that exacerbated the problems Moynihan identified. Marriage was penalized and single parenting was subsidized. In effect, the government paid mothers to keep fathers out of the home—and paid them well.

This, of course, made the problem of fatherless families worse–not better.

The article reminds us that we are also approaching the 50-year anniversary of the 1965 Voting Rights Act, which ensured that the black minorities were able to vote.

The article points out:

With a twice-elected black man now occupying the White House, it might be difficult for younger Americans to appreciate this milestone. However, in 1964, three years after Barack Obama was born, black voter registration in Mississippi was less than 7%, the lowest in the South. By 1966 it had grown to 60%, the highest in the South.

Today black voter-registration rates in the South, where most blacks still live, are higher than in other regions of the country, and for the first time on record the black voter-turnout rate in 2012 exceeded white turnout.

So what have The Great Society and the Voting Rights Act accomplished?

The article concludes:

But even as we note this progress, the political gains have not redounded to the black underclass, which by several important measures—including income, academic achievement and employment—has stagnated or lost ground over the past half-century. And while the civil-rights establishment and black political leaders continue to deny it, family structure offers a much more plausible explanation of these outcomes than does residual white racism.

In 2012 the poverty rate for all blacks was more than 28%, but for married black couples it was 8.4% and has been in the single digits for two decades. Just 8% of children raised by married couples live in poverty, compared with 40% of children raised by single mothers.

One important lesson of the past half-century is that counterproductive cultural traits can hurt a group more than political clout can help it. Moynihan was right about that, too.

The country needs voters of every ethnic group–but they need smart voters–voters who will vote for things that will strengthen the family and foundations of society–not voters who support the undermining of those things.