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The View From The Ground- 9/30/00
Hypocrititis and Family Values
The election season is prime time for the dreaded disease hypocrititis. We have recently seen a flare-up in Minnesota, where conservative Republican Senator Rod Grams is in a uphill fight for re-election against multi-millionaire department store heir and left wing screwball Mark Dayton.
Now, you might think that hypocrititis is a disease suffered by hypocrites, but you would be wrong to think that. It is instead a disease that causes the sufferer to believe that charges of hypocrisy are somehow a substitute for thought or political positions. Although this is a patently ridiculous belief (see my "Straight Talk on Hypocrisy") people, especially liberals, cannot resist the temptation to hurl the charge of hypocrisy.
In the case at hand, Senator Grams’ young adult son is a real mess. He has been in and out of trouble with the law and with drugs for years. His latest escapades have fueled a wave of hypocrititis in which liberal opponents of Grams have scorned his "Family Values" stand by pointing to his deadbeat son. "What a hypocrite", they snidely say, "he says he’s for family values, but he divorced his wife and his son is a criminal. Some family values!"
It is extremely important to understand that people who say things like this are completely addled by the hypocrititis, so it would be mean and unfair to smack them repeatedly about the head and shoulders in an effort to knock some sense into them. They simply are incapable of understanding that whether Rod Grams is a Saint or a Philandering Drunk Child Beater has absolutely no bearing on the importance of Family Values as a political and social issue deserving of discussion. The ideas, the concepts of Family Values need to be discussed and evaluated on their own terms. I understand why hypocrititis sufferers don't like to do this. It would actually require thought. Thinking is hard work. Why do that when it is so much easier to poke fun at imperfect politicians?
The premise of "Family Values" is that the family (generally defined as the traditional nuclear family) plays a critical role in our society in transmitting experience, knowledge and values to generations that follow. This function is not the proper role of the
state, the educational bureaucracy, or Social Services. Things which undermine the independence and primacy of families in playing this role are harmful and undesirable because they disrupt this transmission of cultural values and wreak havoc on social stability. Therefore, if we are to think about what Family Values actually means in the political context, we need to think it through at two levels:
1) We need to understand the degree to which public policy and legislation strengthen or weaken the cohesiveness and strength of families. The classic example of how not to do this is the Welfare State. Thirty Five years ago we created a system which, although ostensibly created in the name of compassion, resulted in an unprecedented breakdown of the family structure through huge stretches of urban America. By blithely replacing fathers with Uncle Sam we created a vicious spiral that has directly led to increased illegitimacy, poverty and crime. Single motherhood is today the best single predictor for poverty. This is compassion? Political and legislative actions, furthermore, need to be evaluated on the basis of what they are likely to do, not what their proponents think, hope or intend that they will do. When in doubt we must be biased in favor of legislation likely to strengthen the family, and opposed that which is likely to weaken it, regardless of intent.
2) We must keep our culture honest. Dan Quayle was ridiculed when he took the producers of Murphy Brown to task for glamorizing single momhood. It turns out he was exactly right. Not only does our popular culture belittle the "traditional "family, it also either ignores or impales those competing moral-cultural influences which provide support for the family (such as religious institutions, republicans, fraternal organizations, Boy Scouts etc.) We must hold the purveyors of our culture accountable for that which they purvey.
One by one, the chickens (or, more appropriately, turkeys) set loose in the '60s are coming home to roost. One by one, the stupid, ridiculous and dangerous notions adopted by a drug addled and naive youth movement and their radical mentors are proving detrimental to our social health. Educational "reform", sexual liberation, the welfare state, feminism, gays rights, affirmative action, in a word: radical liberalism. The effect of these things on our culture has been to, often deliberately, bruise and batter the stability of the American family. Embracing "Family Values" simply means recognizing that that is dangerous and wrong.
None of us, and Senator Rod Grams would be the first to agree, are perfect. It is precisely for that reason that we cannot afford to destroy the most stable and dependable support and correction structure ever created. We must endure in the face of hypocrititis and continue to speak the truth: Family Values does matter, and liberalism is its enemy.