Tag: Family

Holding Penn State Responsible

~ Evan Lenow

Back in November, I posted this article about the lost ideas of personal and corporate responsibility at Penn State University. This morning, the NCAA held a press conference announcing the sanctions against the university (and particularly the football program). In light of what I wrote 8 months ago, I want to evaluate the actions of the NCAA to see if they will actually serve the purpose of reinstating the ideas of personal and corporate responsibility.

Here are the sanctions imposed by the governing board of college athletics:

  • $60 million fine, roughly equivalent to one year’s gross football revenue, to be placed in an endowment for “external programs preventing child sexual abuse or assisting victims and may not be used to fund such programs at the university.”
  • 4 year ban on postseason appearances
  • Reduction of scholarships from 25 to 15 per year for 4 years
  • Vacating all wins from 1998-2011 (111 total wins)

The NCAA also put in place measures to change the culture of the university. The university must create a compliance committee and have quarterly reports from an independent monitor to make sure that athletics do not overwhelm the priority of academics at the university.

Let me recount the major faults that I saw in November. First, the university (and the individuals involved) lacked a respect for the dignity of the victims. There seemed to have been a concern for the personal interests of the perpetrator and those with knowledge of the crime, but there was no concern for the dignity of the boys. As each person up the chain of command refused to take personal responsibility for alerting the authorities, they diminished the opportunity for the university to take corporate responsibility.

The fine and intended use of the funds goes a long way to help address this problem. The NCAA acknowledges that the endowment cannot correct what has happened in the past, but they are at least attempting to recognize the dignity of the victims and their families.

Second, the problem at Penn State is that the university saw its own “family” interests as more important than protecting the institution of the family. These boys have been assaulted, abused, and scarred for life. Their family structure has been permanently altered because they have been subjected to a version of sexuality that is distorted far outside God’s design. There was absolutely no respect for the institution of the family on the perpetrator’s part, and there was indifference to the institution of the family on the part of the university.

On some levels, the punitive actions taken by the NCAA address this problem. With the reduction of scholarships, postseason ban, and vacated wins, the NCAA put Penn State and other universities on notice that their “family” cultures were not more important than society’s family culture. While it is not a clear admonition for supporting the family, the underlying problem is being addressed.

Finally, a fair and effective system of law and government is crucial to a healthy society. In this case, that system was in place to handle the problem, but no one alerted the proper authorities.

I believe this is the issue addressed in vacating wins, particularly as it has a huge impact on the record books. 111 wins will be removed from the record books. Perhaps more significantly, 111 of 409 wins will be removed from Joe Paterno’s record of the most wins in college football history. Coach Paterno will no longer hold that record. His failure to act in properly reporting the accusations against one of his assistant coaches to the police have tarnished his legacy on many levels. Now future generations will not even see his name near the top of the list of coaches with the most wins. The system of law and government has spoken in the case of Jerry Sandusky, who will now spend the rest of his life in prison. The NCAA has spoken regarding the failure to use that system on the part of the university.

The actions of those involved in the scandal at Penn State University are reprehensible. When given the opportunity to stop the perpetrator, the university failed to act and failed to take responsibility. Only after the egregious behavior was allowed to continue for 13 years has the university been held responsible. I applaud the NCAA for their actions, but I only wish they had not been necessary. I wish the university has stepped up in 1998 to stop the problem. Responsibility is best taken on one’s own initiative rather than forced by the governing authorities.

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Evan Lenow, “Penn State and the Lost Idea of Personal Responsibility,” November 10, 2011.

“Penn State sanctions: $60M, bowl ban,” ESPN, July 23, 2012.

Good Reading: Robert George on Marriage and Religious Liberty

~ Evan Lenow

Robert George, McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence at Princeton University, offers an insightful look at the tension between religious liberty and the redefinition of marriage. Here are a couple of highlights:

It was only yesterday, was it not, that we were being assured that the redefinition of marriage to include same-sex partnerships would have no impact on persons and institutions that hold to the traditional view of marriage as a conjugal union? Such persons and institutions would simply be untouched by the change. It won’t affect your marriage or your life, we were told, if the law recognizes Henry and Herman or Sally and Sheila as “married.”

Those offering these assurances were also claiming that the redefinition of marriage would have no impact on the public understanding of marriage as a monogamous and sexually exclusive partnership. No one, they insisted, wanted to alter those traditional marital norms. On the contrary, the redefinition of marriage would promote and spread those norms more broadly.

George then shows how those “assurances” were false and questions why those supporting traditional marriage ever bought into such assurances. He continues:

I must say, though, that I still can’t fathom why anybody believed any of it—even then. The whole argument was and is that the idea of marriage as the union of husband and wife lacks a rational basis and amounts to nothing more than “bigotry.” Therefore, no reasonable person of goodwill can dissent from the liberal position on sex and marriage, any more than a reasonable person of goodwill could support racial segregation and subordination. And this, because marriage, according to the redefiners, consists principally of the emotional union of people committed to mutual affection and care. Any distinctions beyond this one they condemn as baseless.

Since most liberals and even some conservatives, it seems, apparently have no understanding at all of the conjugal conception of marriage as a one-flesh union—not even enough of a grasp to consciously consider and reject it—they uncritically conceive marriage as sexual-romantic domestic partnership, as if it just couldn’t possibly be anything else. This is despite the fact that the conjugal conception has historically been embodied in our marriage laws, and explains their content (not just the requirement of spousal sexual complementarity, but also rules concerning consummation and annulability, norms of monogamy and sexual exclusivity, and the pledge of permanence of commitment) in ways that the sexual-romantic domestic partnership conception simply cannot. Still, having adopted the sexual-romantic domestic partnership idea, and seeing no alternative possible conception of marriage, they assume—and it is just that, an assumption, and a gratuitous one—that no actual reason exists for regarding sexual reproductive complementarity as integral to marriage. After all, two men or two women can have a romantic interest in each other, live together in a sexual partnership, care for each other, and so forth. So why can’t they be married? Those who think otherwise, having no rational basis, discriminate invidiously. By the same token, if two men or two women can be married, why can’t three or more people, irrespective of sex, in polyamorous “triads,” “quadrads,” etc.? Since no reason supports the idea of marriage as a male-female union or a partnership of two persons and not more, the motive of those insisting on these other “traditional” norms must also be a dark and irrational one.

This article is worth your time, especially in light of the current public discussion of Chick-fil-a’s support of traditional marriage. George lends credence to the Cathy family’s stance but explains why they are taking a beating in the media and social “elite.”

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Robert P. George, “Marriage, Religious Liberty, and the ‘Grand Bargain,'” The Public Discourse, July 19, 2012.

The Impact of Marriage on Income Inequality

~ Evan Lenow
Source: Vital Statistics Birth Data, 1990 and 2009, Via ChildTrends.org

An article ran in The New York Times over the weekend about the impact of marriage on income inequality. The journalist followed the lives of two mothers who work at the same company—one is married and the other is a single mother. What he found, along with conclusions from research, was that marriage plays a significant role in determining on what side of the income inequality divide a family will be.

With a presidential election upon us in a few months and the political machines in full swing lobbing ad hominem attacks back and forth, one of the major issues is income inequality. While both political parties blame one another, research has demonstrated that there may be other causes at play than just the tax code.

The NYT reports:

Estimates vary widely, but scholars have said that changes in marriage patterns—as opposed to changes in individual earnings—may account for as much as 40 percent of the growth in certain measures of inequality. Long a nation of economic extremes, the United States is also becoming a society of family haves and family have-nots, with marriage and its rewards evermore confined to the fortunate classes.

There are a number of factors that play a role in the discussion of marriage, family, and child-rearing on a societal level. For instance, the education level of the mother influences the likelihood that she will have a child out of wedlock. Even though the national numbers across educational levels show that 41% of all children are born to unwed mothers, only 8% of births to college-educated mothers are outside of marriage. The numbers for mothers with high school education or less are around 60%. In addition, these trends transcend racial lines.

The staggering changes in family structures witnessed in the United States in the last few decades have impacted people dramatically during the recent recession. The article notes:

Economic woes speed marital decline, as women see fewer “marriageable men.” The opposite also holds true: marital decline compounds economic woes, since it leaves the needy to struggle alone.

“The people who need to stick together for economic reasons don’t,” said Christopher Jencks, a Harvard sociologist. “And the people who least need to stick together do.”

Changes in family structure do not explain the gains of the very rich—the much-discussed “1 percent” and the richest among them. That story largely spills from Wall Street trading floors and corporate boardrooms.

But for inequality more broadly, Mr. Western found that the growth in single parenthood in recent decades accounted for 15 percent to 25 percent of the widening income gaps. (Estimates depend on the time period, the income tiers and the definition of inequality.) Gary Burtless of the Brookings Institution found it to account for 21 percent. Robert Lerman of the Urban Institute, comparing lower-middle- and upper-middle-income families, found that single parenthood explained about 40 percent of inequality’s growth.

There are other intangible, non-economic factors in marriage that contribute to the stability of the family. Having two parents in the home means that there are more people to spend time with the children. While single parents find themselves pulled between jobs and children’s school and activities, two-parent families can “divide and conquer” when necessary. This lowers stress levels and promotes working together in the family.

In addition, the presence of both parents in the home brings a positive influence for the entire family. Brad Wilcox and Carlos Cavallé report:

For children, marriage matters. Children reared outside of an intact family are significantly less likely to acquire the human and social capital they need to become well-adjusted, productive workers. Those from intact, married families are more likely to succeed in school, graduate from college, and be gainfully employed as adults. And men who get and stay married work harder, smarter, and longer hours, and they earn between 10 and 24 percent more money. This is the case in countries as varied as Israel, Italy, Mexico, and the United States. For men and women alike, marriage fosters financially prudent behavior, including higher rates of savings and greater accumulation of assets. In these ways and many more, marriage is an important generator of social, human, and financial capital for economies around the world, and countries that enjoy a comparatively strong marriage culture—such as China, India, and Malaysia—are likely to reap long-term economic dividends.

It is always fulfilling to see when secular social science confirms God’s intentions for the family—even when they don’t set out to do so. In Genesis 2:24 we read, “For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother, and be joined to his wife; and they shall become one flesh.” From this point forward, God clearly communicates that his design for the family is one man married to one woman for a lifetime. They work together to rear their children and provide lasting stability to their family that will hopefully be reproduced in the next generation.

Of course we encounter the fall of mankind in Genesis 3 that creates new difficulties for subsequent generations to fulfill this God-given design. However, we can even see in this article that God’s design is the best plan for marriage, family, and economic well-being.

As we endure the burdensome political process leading up to the election in November, we will hear politicians proclaiming they have the answers to our society’s economic woes. Most of their “solutions” will revolve around taxes, job creation, and government programs. Perhaps they should look at something else—the intact family.

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Jason DeParle, “Two Classes, Divided by ‘I Do,’” The New York Times, July 14, 2012.

W. Bradford Wilcox and Carlos Cavallé, “The Sustainable Demographic Dividend,” in What Do Marriage & Fertility Have to Do with the Economy? (National Marriage Project, 2011).

Good Reading: The Perils of Polygamy

~ Evan Lenow

Christopher Kaczor has an interesting article on The Public Discourse entitled “The Perils of Polygamy.” He breaks down the problems with polygamous societies and examines the difficulties that accepting various forms of polygamy can create for families, children, and civil society. Here is an excerpt:

In a polygamous marriage, the man does not give himself qua husband entirely to his wife. A polygamous husband gives himself qua husband to however many wives he has. Wives, by contrast, are expected to reserve themselves in a sexual way for their husband alone. Moreover, wives face inequality among themselves as “senior wives” enjoy rank above “junior wives.” The polygamous relationship can never attain the mutual and complete self-donation of spouses in monogamous marriage because it is intrinsically impossible to reserve oneself in a sexual way entirely for one person and at the same time reserve oneself in a sexual way entirely for a different person (or persons). Marriage understood as a comprehensive union can exist only between two persons, and never more than two persons. Society, therefore, has good reason not simply to proscribe polygamy, but to endorse monogamy.

The discussion surrounding the political/legal definition of marriage going on in our society today has mostly focused on same-sex marriage. However, the debate has also opened the question of polygamous marriage. Kaczor has exposed many of the problems with polygamous marriage and why society should not go down that path even though nearly 85% of all societies in history have practiced polygamy. Take some time to read the article–it is worth your time.

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Christopher Kaczor, “The Perils of Polygamy,” The Public Discourse, May 21, 2012.

Analysis: Marriage and the Presidency

~ Evan Lenow

Robert George is one of my favorite philosophical and political thinkers. He has co-authored a short analysis of President Obama’s recent comments regarding same-sex marriage. George, Ryan Anderson, and Sherif Girgis demonstrate two competing views of marriage in society. The first is the historic, conjugal view as they describe below:

Marriage as a comprehensive union: Joining spouses in body as well as mind, it is begun by commitment and sealed by sexual intercourse. So completed in the acts by which new life is made, it is specially apt for and deepened by procreation, and calls for that broad sharing of domestic life uniquely fit for family life. Uniting spouses in these all-encompassing ways, it also calls for all-encompassing commitment: permanent and exclusive. Comprehensive union is valuable in itself, but its link to children’s welfare makes marriage a public good that the state should recognize, support, and in certain ways regulate. Call this the conjugal view of marriage.

The other option is the revisionist view. They describe this view as:

Marriage as the union of two people who commit to romantic partnership and domestic life: essentially an emotional union, merely enhanced by whatever sexual activity partners find agreeable. Such committed romantic unions are seen as valuable while emotion lasts. The state recognizes them because it has an interest in their stability, and in the needs of spouses and any children they choose to rear. Call this the revisionist view of marriage.

The brief analysis the authors provide is also very important. Here are some highlights:

Now that the president has disclosed his view, he — like all revisionists — must confront some tough questions. And he, like they, will run into a problem. Something must set marriages as a class apart from other bonds. But on every point where most agree that marriage is different, the conjugal view has a coherent explanation — and the revisionist has none.

President Obama, like most, surely thinks that marriage is inherently a sexual union. But why must it be, if sex contributes to marriage only by fostering and expressing emotional intimacy? Non-sexual bonding activities can do that. Why can’t the tender platonic bond of two sisters be a deep emotional union, and therefore a marriage? Or, if marriage is primarily about the concrete legal benefits — of hospital visitation, or inheritance rights — should these benefits be denied two cohabiting sisters just because their bond can’t legally be sexual? To all this, the conjugal view has an answer.

Again, if marriage is essentially about emotions and shared domestic experience, why should it be limited to two people? Newsweek says the U.S. has half a million polyamorous households — where emotions and experiences are shared with multiple partners. Surely three people can be emotionally united, and some say that the variety of polyamory fulfills them as the consistency of monogamy can’t. So if marriage is about emotional fulfillment, why stop at two? The conjugal view has an answer.

Finally, if marriage is distinguished just by being a person’s deepest bond, her number one relationship, why should the state get involved at all in what basically amounts to the legal regulation of tenderness? The conjugal view has an answer. The revisionist has none.

The debate over the nature of marriage is one that will play a key factor in this year’s Presidential election. However, it is not merely a political issue. It is a theological issue. It is a societal issue. It is a human issue.

Please read the full article from George, Anderson, and Girgis. It is well worth your time.

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Ryan T. Anderson, Robert P. George, and Sherif Girgis, “Marriage and the Presidency,” National Review Online, May 10, 2012.