Family Pride

During the last 50 years or so Americans have learned to welcome welfare. Your parents probably will remember that not too many years ago there was a stigma attached. Something like a loss of respectability. Welfare was a very last resort. It was there for the disabled, handicapped, and chronically ill. It was to be avoided by fit and able and respectable workers. Not any more.

Those born recently don't have any concept of some of the old fashioned virtues. Things like character, integrity, and why it's important to be proud of your independence. We are standing by as families disintegrate.  Maintaining family standards and family reputations have become a tradition of the past. We don't think about these things very often despite media overexposure. Just pay attention to your daily newspaper for example. If it is like mine there is a definite bias toward violence. The first page headlines shout about wars and catastrophes. There are horrible pictures of accidents, murders and dishonest political shenanigans.  All of these things are "negative" and together they absorb most of the space in the paper. (Other than ads.) Television more or less follows the same pattern. We are positively overwhelmed by blood and guts and guns and bombs. Every day without pause we are bombarded with this kind of disturbing negative    news. Consider that children are exposed to a preponderance of this stuff from the day they are born. 

WHAT HAPPENED ?

Turn the page and think about the institution of marriage. Also during the last 50 years religion has been falling out of favor in America. Most children are now born to un-wed parents. There are more divorces than marriages, and more family units contain multiple parents. That is to say, more than one father figure and/or more than one mother. Think about that for a moment. The family unit in almost every married or un-married family in today's population - is broken or in the process of breaking. Most children today have more than one father and one mother, plus more than  one grandfather and one grandmother.  Often there  is animosity between some of the family members. The children are taught that marriage its a serious and sometimes religious ceremony intended to last forever, but in their own broken family they experience a completely different norm.  It is no wonder they are confused. Family standards, values, and traditions are lost to most children of today.

As families fractured and religion became less influential, traditional values started to disappear in the fog. There was no clear path to learn important elements of character;  like honesty, integrity, pride of self, and individual honor.  For a number of years families didn't teach these things,  schools didn't either, and the churches decline didn't help. Today American society is composed of children, teenagers and young adults who simply don't have a moral compass. Delinquency is rampant and the jails are full. There are armed gangs bringing terror to American streets every day in almost every city.

In addition to their victims, these hooligans are victims too. They are also victims because they were never taught traditional and historical values like: The Ten Commandments, the Golden Rule, and the difference between right and wrong.

So now we now have a serious societal problem.  Can it be repaired?