On Men and Marriageability
Responding to Richard Reeves and Melissa Kearney
I think of Richard Reeves of
as engaged in a parallel project to Other Feminisms. I’m interested in how women are shortchanged when we try to stick to a generic, “neutral” human type, which tends to skew male.Reeves, especially in his book Of Boys and Men, is asking the same question but from the other side—where do we shortchange men by having a narrow, falsely neutral, generic idea of what it means to be human.
I find myself most strongly in agreement with Reeves that schools, in particular, are female-normed. In expectations of stillness, in the timing of when school starts, in the increasingly risk-adverse culture for children, it is easier for girls (on average) to fit into the generic model of “student.” (see below).
Schools Are the Wrong Shape for Boys
Last week, I published a piece at Deseret on Ron DeSantis’s stunt flying migrants to Martha’s Vineyard. The key piece: “DeSantis didn’t bring the border to the north. He sent people to Martha’s Vineyard without bringing any of the support structures that have been built up at the border.” Our immigration system is broken, and relies on the invisible inf…
But at Fairer Disputations, I’m sparring with Reeves a little on where I think he’s selling men short. Given how many children are born out of wedlock, Reeves would like to see a more robust model of fatherhood outside of marriage. I raised some of my objections first at Other Feminisms (“Fatherhood Requires Fidelity”) and I expanded on them for Fairer Disputations here.
wrote a very gracious reply, which concluded:Men need to know what they can uniquely contribute to their family. The abiding presence of a father isn’t replaceable by their paycheck, their banked sperm, or their weekend visits. Men and women both are impeded in knowing themselves and the full potential of their relationship when fathers are treated as trivial.
[W]e must be very careful not to make the perfect the enemy of the good. Two out of five children are now born outside of marriage, and there’s little sign of that number dropping. Whether we like it or not, we have to find a way to reboot fatherhood for the world as it is, rather than the world as it was. This will take time, for sure. The social and economic changes of recent decades have been so dizzyingly fast that it is no wonder we are all struggling to make sense of them. But I’m hopeful it can be done. After all, fatherhood has been around for about 750,000 years, and the first recorded marriage was only about 4,000 years ago. None of this is to knock marriage. Marriage is a beautiful, sacred, precious institution. It is simply to say that fatherhood is all of those things too, even outside of the married state.
The crux of our disagreement is that Reeves is looking retrospectively (how can we help men do their best given the choices they’ve already made) and I’m looking prospectively (what expectations should be clear for men, starting as boys, so they know who they’re trying to grow into).
“Rebooting fatherhood” sounds like further eroding our sense of what makes men necessary, by shrinking their role and their responsibilities until they’re manageable… and substitutable.
It’s a theme I’ve seen come up in discussions of Melissa Kearney’s strong, thorough book The Two-Parent Privilege: How Americans Stopped Getting Married and Started Falling Behind.
Few of her critics have denied that children raised by married parents have some advantages, but many have indicated that they believe
(a) many of the men who father children would worsen their children’s and (hypothetical) wife’s lives with their presence.
(b) many of the functions of a husband can be unbundled and taken up by a community of friends or, with enough supplemental monetary aid, purchased in the marketplace.
I think (a) has the same issue as Reeves’s retrospective focus. Not everyone should (or can) marry the people they’ve already conceived children with. But if you take Kearney’s findings seriously, that should limit who you enter relationships with as you begin to dating and discerning.
The (b) objection is the one I think can’t possibly stand. Kearney defuses it well here:
I thought about a conversation I recently had with a different economist in a different setting who reacted negatively when I mentioned the importance of family structure to children's outcomes. He bristled, suggesting to me that I sounded "socially conservative," in a way that implied "not academically serious." I countered, "You are always talking about the things you are doing for your kids and how much time their activities take up in your life. Why would you be offended by the suggestion that maybe other kids would also benefit from having the involvement of two parents, and in particular a father, in their lives?"
I think part of what is shaping the pushback to Kearney’s book (and, in a much kinder register, Reeves’s pushback to me) is the idea that it is wrong to point out that some living situations (and sometimes parental choices) are not so good for their kids if you can’t fix the problem.
But this presumes that, first of all, the parents are unaware that their circumstances are less than optimal/actively difficult. And, that it’s impossible to say both, “You’re doing the best you can, based on where you are now” and “but that still can result in harm/bad outcomes.”
About stigma and shame: (1) It may actually be kinder to say, for example, "You're a single mom, we respect you for doing your best, but don't expect miracles, because what you are doing is astonishingly difficult." That way, if it doesn't work out as she had hoped, she doesn't beat herself up quite so much. "Anyone can do it" is not only a lie, it's a cruel lie that puts burdens on people.
(2) I can't shake the feeling that complaints about stigma and shame are not really made in good faith. Plenty of people have no problem shaming me for having too many children. Plenty of people have no problem shaming those who are lazy. I'm not sure they actually do care about stigma and shame as such--what's really going on is that they want to support the idea that the sexual revolution was a good idea. They aren't against stigma and shame in general--they are against stigma and shame *for things they have already decided are acceptable*.
Also, not in response to your questions, but still, and at risk of saying something obvious: A big reason why you can't just unbundle a father's tasks and distribute them to government or market providers is that when they are all done by one person, a person who keeps showing up and feels he has a duty to do so (rather than doing it for remuneration), is that it then becomes a relationship. Children need a relationship to a father--the playing catch, driving you to your activities, etc. etc. are little bits and pieces that go into the relationship, but the important thing is the relationship that they constitute. Also, I'm quite sure it matters that this person is indeed your biological father--but the prior point stands on its own.
Finally, I think the retrospective/prospective things is a very good point. And we do have to care about what happens in the future. No one thinks it bad to tell children to work hard in school, on the grounds that it will shame those who didn't. We just have to tell people--gently and kindly--that it's foolish to have sex with someone if you don't to spend your life with him or her, looking after kids and dealing with the day-to-day. (It's like one of those rules of gun safety: Never ever ever point your gun at something unless you're ok with shooting that thing.)
Thanks for this post and the thought provoking questions at the end.
I teach vocations to high school aged students and, when we start the marriage unit, I usually have my students think of and reflect on their experiences of marriage in their lives (most focus on their parents, but depending on the family situation, I've seen other students talk about grandparents, aunts/uncles, cousins, siblings, parents of friends, etc.). I have them do this to recognize just how different marriages can be based on their own experiences and, instead of stigmitizing what has happened to them in their lives so far, focus on both the positives and the reality that there is not a "perfect" marriage or family. I teach the reality of the Church's teachings on marriage and also try to focus on providing students with opportunities to learn about dating for discernment and the reality that both informal and formal preparation for marriage are necessary. Lastly, one thing I am always sure to be repetitive about is that a marriage is between two people and that they will constantly be learning how to love another person and themselves throughout the entirety of their lives.
For the second question, I think most of my expectations for my wife and I's marriage were buttressed by observing what did and didn't (and indeed, does and doesn't) work for my parents while also learning that they are doing their best each day to love one another. My wife and I also had many serious conversations about marriage (finances, children, etc.) before doing our formal marriage prep with the Catholic Church and I think that helped us go into pre-Cana with more open/realistic eyes. Last but not least, prayer for my wife and son helps fill in the cracks of knowing that I can't control everything and that it's ultimately His will that must be done, not mine.