What are your thoughts on the two opposing viewpoint editorial articles (the breakdown of the family). Provide thorough explanations to the following questions. (1) Which viewpoint do you most agree

The Breakdown of the Family Causes Teen Violence
Source Database: Opposing Viewpoints Digests: Teen Violence

It would be simplistic to attribute all the violence committed by teenagers to one cause. However, it is clear that the breakdown of the traditional family structure that has occurred in recent decades is a major contributor to this problem. More and more children are being raised in homes that lack the economic and emotional stability that only an intact two-parent family can provide. The consequences of this trend are far-reaching. Experts agree that being raised in a single-parent home increases children's risk for a variety of problems, including poverty, poor educational performance, emotional problems--and violent behavior.
Social scientists have established that children raised in a single-parent family are more likely to commit violent crime. Barbara Dafoe Whitehead, a social historian and the author of a comprehensive article describing the harms of single-parent families, writes: Nationally, more than 70 percent of all juveniles in state reform institutions come from fatherless homes. Boys from single-mother homes are significantly more likely than others to commit crimes and to wind up in the juvenile justice, court, and penitentiary systems.1 In addition, research indicates that neighborhoods with a higher proportion of single-parent households have higher rates of violent crime. This evidence suggests that Americans have underestimated the important role the traditional family structure plays in ensuring the well-being of the nation's children and society at large.
Divorce and Unwed Parenthood
In order to appreciate the impact of the changing family structure on the problem of teenage violence, it is necessary to understand why the number of single-parent families has increased. The answer lies in the changing social values and norms regarding divorce and unwed parenthood. Prior to the 1970s, the belief that a stable, two-parent family was essential for a child's well-being was widely shared. When a marriage turned bad, parents were expected to sacrifice their personal happiness and weather the marital storm for the sake of the children. There was general agreement that it was better for children to have two parents, even if the marriage was less than ideal.
In the mid-1970s, however, the prevailing view of the importance of an intact family began to shift. Parents' happiness began to take precedence over that of their children. Divorce became a socially acceptable alternative to an unhappy marriage. Today, while no one would expect a woman to remain in an abusive marriage (in such a case divorce is in the children's best interest as well as the adults'), too many marriages are dissolved simply because they have become difficult, inconvenient, or constraining. Consequently, 50 percent of marriages in the United States today end in divorce.
The effects of divorce can be traumatic. Children of divorce are put through a chaotic and distressing ordeal as they are forced to accept the dissolution of their family--their source of security, love, and support--and adjust to a new family arrangement. Additionally, their new lives are often unstable, involving shared custody arrangements, stepparents and stepsiblings, and their parents' new romantic partners. All of this instability can undermine a child's sense of security and belonging, which in turn can lead to various problems, including poor school performance, depression, and delinquent behavior.

Along with divorce, unwed pregnancy and childbirth have also become more socially acceptable. Prior to the 1970s, if a young girl or woman became pregnant outside of marriage, she was subjected to censure by the community. If a marriage could not be arranged, her child was branded "illegitimate." Since the 1970s, the stigma associated with unwed motherhood and illegitimacy has been greatly reduced. As a result, the proportion of babies born to unwed mothers increased from 5.3 percent to 30 percent between 1960 and 1996. This number is even higher among African Americans: sixty-eight percent of African American babies are born to unmarried women. African American single-parent families are concentrated in poverty-stricken inner-city neighborhoods, where rates of violent juvenile crime are highest.
Due to society's increasing tolerance of divorce and unwed motherhood, America has seen a dramatic increase in the number of single-parent families, most of which are headed by mothers rather than fathers. The number of American children living in single-parent families rose from 5.8 million to 18 million between 1960 and 1996.
Welfare's Contribution
The rise in single-parent families, especially among minorities in the inner cities, has been encouraged by the ready availability of welfare. Although the welfare reform law signed by President Bill Clinton in 1996 places new limits on these programs, it will take time to undo the damage done by decades of excessively liberal policies.
There is no doubt that welfare has encouraged illegitimacy. Welfare's guarantee of financial security for unwed mothers has eliminated the economic disincentive to bear children outside of marriage. Robert Rector, a policy analyst at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, explains how welfare contributes to illegitimacy in the inner cities: Largely because of welfare, illegitimacy and single parenthood have become the conventional "lifestyle option" for raising children in many low-income
communities.... While young women do not necessarily bear unwanted children in order to reap windfall profits from welfare, they are very much aware of the role welfare will play in supporting them once a child is born. Thus, the availability of welfare plays an important role in influencing a woman's decision to have a child out of wedlock.2
The Absence of Fathers

By encouraging out-of-wedlock births, the welfare system effectively eliminates the father from the family. Indeed, welfare recipients risk losing their benefits if they choose to marry. In a sense, then, welfare has replaced the man as the husband and father of the family. Charles Augustus Ballard, the founder and president of the National Institute for Responsible Fatherhood and Family Development, explains how welfare diminishes the role and presence of fathers in inner-city families: The vast majority of assistance programs ... are aimed at young mothers. At best, fathers are irrelevant; invisible men drifting in and out of their children's lives. At worse, fathers are a presence that can disqualify a mother for government benefits. Fathers ... get the message: They are a problem--an obstacle in the path of a system built to help single mothers cope. I sometimes wonder whether any of us appreciate the radical experiment we are conducting in the inner cities of America. In all of history we have never seen a stable society without fathers. Yet just a society seems to be the aim of our social policy.3 Whether in the inner cities or the suburbs, the lack of a father can have detrimental consequences for a teenager, especially-- but certainly not exclusively--a teenage boy. As William J. Bennett, the former U.S. secretary of education and a well-known commentator on America's social and moral issues, states: Although single women can do a fine job raising children ... it is a lot harder to do it alone.... You cannot raise young boys to become responsible citizens unless there are other good men in their lives--men who will spend
time with them, discipline them and love them.4 The consequences of being without a father can be tragic. While girls without fathers are more likely to become pregnant at an early age, fatherless boys are more apt to join gangs. As Michael Tanner, the director of health and welfare studies for the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank, writes, Boy's growing up in mother only' families naturally seek male influences.

Unfortunately, in many inner city neighborhoods, those male role models do not exist.... Thus, the boy in search of male guidance and companionship may end up in the company of gangs or other undesirable influences.5 And while in the company of these influences, he is apt to succumb to the temptations of drug use and crime--including violent crime. As Ballard states, the absence of fathers is at the root of the youth violence that plagues the inner cities: Look at the social pathologies that plague us today: drug abuse, homicide, gang violence, crime. Now survey the youth who fall prey to any or all of those calamities, and ask them where their father was when their lives took a turn for the worse. Or visit our prisons and ask the men locked up what role their father played in their lives. You'll find too many say, "no role at all."6
It is up to all of us to reverse the process of family disintegration that has left teenagers adrift without the discipline and guidance of fathers and other positive male role models. To protect the nation's young people, as well as our own future, we must commit ourselves to mending split families
and nurturing new unions so that they remain intact.

Footnotes

1. Barbara Dafoe Whitehead, "Dan Quayle Was Right," Atlantic Monthly, April
1993, p. 77.
2. Robert Rector, "Welfare Reform," in Issues '96: The Candidate's Briefing
Book. Washington, DC: Heritage Foundation, 1996.
3. Charles Augustus Ballard, "Prodigal Dad: How We Bring Fathers Home to
Their Children," Policy Review, Winter 1995, p. 66.
4. House Ways and Means Committee, William J. Bennett testifying before
the Subcommittee on Human Resources, January 20, 1995.
5. Senate Judiciary Committee, Michael Tanner testifying before the Subcommittee on Youth Violence, June 7, 1995.
6. Ballard, "Prodigal Dad," p. 66.
 

Source Citation: "The Breakdown of the Family Causes Teen Violence." Teen Violence. Scott Barbour, Ed. Opposing Viewpoints Digests® Series. Greenhaven Press, 1999.

Opposing Viewpoints Resource Center. Thomson Gale. 11 January 2006
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