The only solution to fatherlessness is fathers. And we have to figure out a way to say so, even in these hypersensitive times. Our culture has gone to such laudable lengths to de-stigmatize single motherhood that we now accidentally denigrate married fatherhood. We work so hard to affirm non-traditional gender roles and family structures that we have forgotten just how valuable they have always been. (Heritage Foundation)
Heritage.Org: Broken families. Gutted communities. Betrayed women. Terrified children. Busy morgues. And overflowing prisons. The evidence is overwhelming. . . . Children who grow up without their fathers—especially in communities where fatherlessness has become the norm — carry the heaviest social, economic and psychological cross social science can measure. Children raised in single-parent homes constitute:
- 63% of teen suicides;
- 90% of runaways and homeless children;
- 85% of behavior disorder patients;
- 71% of high school dropouts;
- 75% of teenagers in substance abuse rehab centers;
- 85% of young prison inmates.
Heritage and its publications continue: “Fatherhood isn’t about being a male. It’s about being a man. Fatherhood harnesses masculinity to the good of society, so the community benefits along with the family, and each individual father as he grows into his vocation. The strength, courage, dependability, honesty, accountability, gentleness, toughness and protectiveness that define real masculinity keeps children safe, wives happy, and trouble at bay. A fish may or may not need a bicycle, but women and children very much need men. . . . . .In every poor community in America, from opioid-riddled Appalachia to violent inner cities, every boy who doesn’t know how to be a man and every girl who doesn’t know she deserves one, is crying out into that empty void in their homes and in their hearts, “Father, father, why have you abandoned me?”
The Nation notes this and other reports explaining Project 2025, the playbook for Trump’s next term and the takeover of our government by the political right wing and Christian Nationalists, both of which comprise a cult determined to dismantle Democracy. Also dismantled would be the FDA, CDC and HHS —still called by the Trump disciple Alex Azar’s name during “Term Trump”,, “Department of Life,”
“. . . .families comprised of a married mother, father, and their children are the foundation of a well-ordered nation and healthy society.” He claims that “all other family forms” apart from “heterosexual, intact marriage…involve higher levels of instability.” . . . .Thus, HHS policies would “prioritize married father engagement” and stress the importance of heterosexual marriage in all of its health, education, and welfare programs, and it would even enable child-abuse prevention funds to be applied to marriage promotion efforts.
The Ace Couple : A lot of these conservatives feel as though the American nuclear family — a mom, a dad, and children — that is their answer to all of the world’s ills. That is their answer to poverty. That is their answer to housing and food insecurity. It is their answer to everything. And that is in large part why our tax code, for instance, heavily incentivizes marriage, because they did it by design. They want to incentivize marriage because they want people to get married. And a lot of that does come from a religious background. A lot of these organizations are very fundamentalist Christian. And so they not only believe, “Well, financially speaking, if everybody was heterosexual and everybody got married and started procreating, then the family unit will look out for itself. The parents will support the kids. When the parents get old, the kids will support the parents. And then the government doesn’t have to have any social programs because the family runs everything and the family has it all figured out and the family will care for itself.” So that’s the modern political financial logic behind that.