The Men Of FOX News Latest Freak Out
First, this happened:
Women are not only more likely to be the primary caregivers in a family. Increasingly, they are primary breadwinners, too.
Four in 10 American households with children under age 18 now include a mother who is either the sole or primary earner for her family, according to a Pew Research Center analysis of Census and polling data released Wednesday. This share, the highest on record, has quadrupled since 1960.
The shift reflects evolving family dynamics.
Then this happened:
Fox News contributor Erick Erickson went one step further, saying nature itself commanded that women be subservient to men.
“I’m so used to liberals telling conservatives that they’re anti-science,” Erickson explained. “But liberals who defend this and say it is not a bad thing are very anti-science. When you look at biology, when you look at the natural world, the roles of a male and a female in society and in other animals, the male typically is the dominant role. The female, it’s not antithesis, or it’s not competing, it’s a complimentary role.”
“We as people in a smart society have lost the ability to have complimentary relationships in nuclear families, and it is tearing us apart,” he continued, adding that “reality showed” it was harmful for women to be the primary source of income in a family.
Notice how Erickson tries to soften the blow. He states that men are typically in the dominant role, but then shies away from using the term subservient for women. But that is what he’s saying. A “complimentary” role cannot, by definition, stand on its own. It needs… well, something to compliment.
Click on the second link and watch the video. Seriously, click on the link! Given their viewpoint their next step should be calling for all female FOX employees who make more than their spouse to be fired… or at least take a pay cut.
Here is what I imagine the conversation at the Erickson house to look like:
LOL!
That’s like claiming conservatives are pro-science because they support “creation science”. It ignores mountains of research on matriarchal societies. Furthermore, arguing that women should be dominated by men because of biology is like arguing that human beings should not be astronauts because of biology. “Man was not designed for space travel!” I mean, that’s a basic fact of biology, but humans have sought to go beyond our natural limitations for millions of years.
Interesting piece.
Two key takeaways IMHO:
1) “In 1960, the share of never-married single mothers was just 4 percent; as of 2011, it had risen to 44 percent”
2) “The median family income for single mothers… is $23,000.”
The results of this study are not good news for women or for the American economy.
For those looking for the real reasons for economic inequality in the US, this article provides a lot of insight.
@xyz: Real question, not snark: Why are the earnings of single-parent households bad news for the economy?
Well, if we assume just one child per single-parent household, the federal poverty line is about 15,510. For two children, 19,530. For three, 23,550.
I don’t know what the average number of children per single family household is. I found some census data that seemed to indicate an average household size of 3.23 for the category “Female Householder”.
If this is true, then the federal poverty line would fall at about 20,454 for these households.
Having a significant and rising number of households just a couple of thousand dollars above the Federal poverty line would seem to be pretty bad news for the economy, I would think.
A “complimentary” role cannot, by definition, stand on its own. It needs… well, something to compliment.
Complementary (transcription error). I’m not sure it makes a difference though in the context.
The most amazing thing about the Erickson BS science is that it never has to call on the “dominant” sex to get serious about being the kind of men and fathers that will take a productive place in a family. Most of the kids from those single mother families didn’t come from a test tube, you know.
True, Puck. I didn’t catch it! Kinda funny, tho!
Cassandra, I’m sure once all the female breadwinners quit their jobs/take a pay cut Erickson will call on his posse of the “dominant” sex to, well… dominate.
@xyz: Aren’t those low wages more the result of an economy with a lot of low-wage jobs than households with lone wage-earners? In other words, I think you have identified a symptom, not a cause.
Maybe. Hard to tell. Although even if your hypothesis is true (lots of low wage jobs) it doesn’t explain why households headed by single mothers proportionally occupy more of these low wage jobs.
This woman said it so well, I had to post it here:
No one has commented yet.
Moss_back • 12 minutes ago
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“Once again, FOX News personalities exhibit their ignorance (no surprise there). Literally hundreds of species: elephants, bonobos, lions, wolves, hyenas, meerkats, bears, pigs – not to mention most insects – are either structured into matriarchal social orders, or exhibit matriarchal-dominant behaviors. In fact, it would seem that, the more intelligent the animal, the more likely it is to develop strong female-dominant social structures. This isn’t a hard-and-fast tendency; higher primates – gorillas, chimpanzees & humans, for example – have trended more toward patriarchies, but it’s common enough to suggest that Dobbs & Co., as usual, don’t have a clue as to what they’re talking about.”
Thanks for posting that, Bill Dunn.
Big cats & bees immediately came to mind when I read those comments. In most “big cat” communities, the male is basically a sperm donor & otherwise virtually useless as far as supporting his offspring. Same w/ bees. The males are drones & the females do all the actual WORK.
I guess right-wingers define “science” differently than the rest of us.
“It doesn’t explain why households headed by single mothers proportionally occupy more of these low wage jobs.”
I’m not sure they do. The US has a higher proportion of low-wage jobs than any other industrialized country — about 25% of all jobs. It may just be that single mothers are less likely to be well-compensated because they need more flexibility to deal with family responsibilities and are willing to trade higher wages for schedule flexibility.
At any rate, I don’t see where low-wage jobs hurt the economy any more if they’re held by single mothers than if they’re held by single, childless males. A low-wage job is a low-wage job, and we’d all be better served if there were no, or fewer, jobs with such low wages.
@geezer- I agree with this- “A low-wage job is a low-wage job, and we’d all be better served if there were no, or fewer, jobs with such low wages.”
However, you are wrong here- “At any rate, I don’t see where low-wage jobs hurt the economy any more if they’re held by single mothers than if they’re held by single, childless males”
A single mother, with children will have a lower AMI than a single childless male. Because of that she and the children would be more eligible for state and federal subsidies, ie, subsidized housing, food stamp program, WIC, medicAid, free school breakfasts and lunches, purchase of care , TANF, etc.
A childless male would have none of these.
I do support and believe in these programs as they are vital to the health education and well- being of our children and our future generation, however they are expensive and have a cost attached.
If Wa****, paid a fair living wage, and the single mothers, (or childless males either) didn’t have to have state and federal subsidies in order to make ends meet , well, we would all be better off
Except Wa******, because it would cut into their corporate profits to not have the tax payer foot the bill for their employee’s well- being. Just another example of American corporate welfare at its best.
I agree with what you say, but xyz was talking about the economy, not about who pays the bills. The economy is simply the sum of all spending. That’s why I was curious about his statement in the first place.
“The US has a higher proportion of low-wage jobs than any other industrialized country — about 25% of all jobs. ”
I a little curious why that is. Without doing any research I’m guessing that part of the reason is that there are more things we no longer do for ourselves. This is not just do the specialization, which is a part of it. Rather because we are more affluent, we tend to outsource more things that we simply don’t want to do ourselves.
My oil gets changed at Jiffy Lube. It’s not because I can’t do it myself, which I can and have in the past. It is because I can afford to go to Jiffy Lube, plus I don’t have to deal with disposing of used motor oil and of course the price point is such that it is the savings in doing it myself is minimal. The same goes for mowing my lawn, mulching my landscape, etc. All of which someone does for me because I would rather spend my time doing other things. These are examples of low-wage jobs, which forever will remain low-wage jobs.
I wonder if it is different in other countries and they tend to do these things themselves resulting in few low-wage jobs?
Should have been “I am a little curious”
Also “do” should have been “due”
edit didn’t work for some reason