Foreign Policy Shifts?

[Spekkio]

You kinda did.

You took that statement out of context to interpret something that wasn't there.

The ACA accounts for $1T in federal outlays. Yes, some of that (not all) is to pay for the medicaid expansion.

How do you do that though? I've seen proposals to make divorce harder, limit birth control and other ideas that don't seem to be grounded in reality. Making divorce harder is a double-edged sword, making it harder for spouses in abusive relationships to get out of them. And limiting birth control? Really?

Like I said, a lot of it is messaging. It's okay to want a family. It's okay for leaders to tell men not to abandon their children. In aggregate, we're insanely susceptible to IO campaigns. Look at what happened during COVID-19. Also look what has happened to drug OD deaths since we declared anti-drug campaigns to be a waste of time and money.

Some of it is dramatically improving sex education.

 

[Flash]

You took that statement out of context to interpret something that wasn't there.

The ACA accounts for $1T in federal outlays. Yes, some of that (not all) is to pay for the medicaid expansion.

How do you figure that? All health care spending, including Medicare, Medicaid and the ACA account for a little over $2 trillion of the total US budget of $7.4 trillion. How is the ACA account for over half of that via 'corporate welfare tax credits'?

Like I said, a lot of it is messaging. It's okay to want a family. It's okay for leaders to tell men not to abandon their children. In aggregate, we're insanely susceptible to IO campaigns. Look at what happened during COVID-19. Also look what has happened to drug OD deaths since we declared anti-drug campaigns to be a waste of time and money..

I saw what happened during COVID, the messaging often didn't work very well at all here in the US. You can do all the 'messaging' you want, folks are still going to be assholes and leave their families.

Some of it is dramatically improving sex education.

The teen pregnancy rate has dropped dramatically in the 90's, so I am not sure just how much more sex education is going to help. Interestingly enough, the teen pregnancy rate has dropped around the same time the internet became widely availability. Just sayin'...

 

[sevenhelmet]

I saw what happened during COVID, the messaging often didn't work very well at all here in the US. You can do all the 'messaging' you want, folks are still going to be assholes and leave their families.



The teen pregnancy rate has dropped dramatically in the 90's, so I am not sure just how much more sex education is going to help. Interestingly enough, the teen pregnancy rate has dropped around the same time the internet became widely availability. Just sayin'...

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I think the solution to a lot of this angst lies in fostering healthy young men. Those men will grow up to be good sons, good friends, and good fathers. Stop telling boys masculinity is toxic- show them how it can be positive. A lot of the current political backlash is due to partisan politics treating different identity groups like a zero-sum game. Stop doing that.

We used to have non-political, community level organizations that took care of a lot of this. I think the government's role should be limited to fostering participation in those types of community organizations, not in directly moralizing at us, which inevitably becomes partisan and divisive. The other advantage: it's cheaper and keeps government smaller.

 

[Gatordev]

How do you do that though? I've seen proposals to make divorce harder, limit birth control and other ideas that don't seem to be grounded in reality. Making divorce harder is a double-edged sword, making it harder for spouses in abusive relationships to get out of them. And limiting birth control? Really?

I think you're nit-picking specific ideas that Spekkio isn't necessarily declaring as solutions when instead he's answering the question of why there are individuals who "advocate the nuclear family."

Let's take a step back for a moment and just look at the subject clinically. Specifically there's the social study of feminism vs. conventional nuclear family (provider and care giver relationship) that's an interesting topic to learn more about. As a laymen that started hearing more about this (it's always fun to go down an YT rabbit hole while killing time at work), I'm not sure either side nailed down the realities of living in the 21st century, but discussions about how feminism have created a sense of wanting to be independent resulting in also not being as happy is interesting.

Academics have also looked at the topic of women wanting to be independent (certainly not a bad thing), but then also wanting a relationship that isn't transactional (ie, asking men for their resources). As a result, both men and women (specifically Gen Z) have entered into this recursive environment where women want everything while giving little, men getting frustrated and leaving the relationship, and then women claiming there are no good men, which then puts men off even more. All with the added benefit of social media fueling this toxic cycle.

Meanwhile, both the US and the world's population birth rates are declining at an alarming rate, with governments starting to pay attention at how that will effect their industrial output.

At the end of and as a result of all of this, there is a sub-set of Gen Z and younger Millennials that have subscribed to (re)embracing the concept of the conventional nuclear family, with one provider and one care-giver.

Personally, I'm very curious what will happen as Gen Z starts to age out of relevance when they pass age 49 along with how social media will mature. Unfortunately, I'm guessing the social media component will still be a terrible cancer on society.

 

[Flash]

I think you're nit-picking specific ideas that Spekkio isn't necessarily declaring as solutions when instead he's answering the question of why there are individuals who "advocate the nuclear family."

Let's take a step back for a moment and just look at the subject clinically. Specifically there's the social study of feminism vs. conventional nuclear family (provider and care giver relationship) that's an interesting topic to learn more about. As a laymen that started hearing more about this (it's always fun to go down an YT rabbit hole while killing time at work), I'm not sure either side nailed down the realities of living in the 21st century, but discussions about how feminism have created a sense of wanting to be independent resulting in also not being as happy is interesting.

Academics have also looked at the topic of women wanting to be independent (certainly not a bad thing), but then also wanting a relationship that isn't transactional (ie, asking men for their resources). As a result, both men and women (specifically Gen Z) have entered into this recursive environment where women want everything while giving little, men getting frustrated and leaving the relationship, and then women claiming there are no good men, which then puts men off even more. All with the added benefit of social media fueling this toxic cycle.

Meanwhile, both the US and the world's population birth rates are declining at an alarming rate, with governments starting to pay attention at how that will effect their industrial output.

At the end of and as a result of all of this, there is a sub-set of Gen Z and younger Millennials that have subscribed to (re)embracing the concept of the conventional nuclear family, with one provider and one care-giver.

Personally, I'm very curious what will happen as Gen Z starts to age out of relevance when they pass age 49 along with how social media will mature. Unfortunately, I'm guessing the social media component will still be a terrible cancer on society.

Definitely some ideas in there, but I think you're putting too much an onus on feminism when it is societal evolution as a whole since World War II that has changed things, from birth control to smart phones and yes, feminism.

Women before feminism were much more dependent on men for many things legally, and were much more limited in their careers. No longer having to rely on men for many things, along with the freedom of birth control, has freed women from the societal pressure of having to marry and start a family.

If folks want to do the traditional thing, more power to them. Just don't try and force others to do so, proclaim that it is the 'right' or only way to have a family and disparage others who are in 'non-traditional' families. I am also skeptical of just how many women are actually choosing that path in real life, notably some of the most prominent 'trad-wife' influencers come from substantial means that enable to 'choose' that life and make significant money from doing so. Then there is the reality of the cost of living in much of this country, where single-income families struggle. The fact the government has not instituted more family-friendly measures like subsidizing child care, more universal health care and mandated family doesn't help either.

One thing I have to keep in mind when discussing this kind of thing with my peers is that we are usually be considered upper middle class income-wise, as are most who are likely commenting on this thread.

The reason I am reflexively wary of politicians discussing this subject is how often times they use it as a bludgeon to disparage those from 'non-traditional' families, feminism, single mothers, working women or even their religious practices among a myriad of other things. Even women's right to vote has resurfaced for some bizarre reason. All while they not only break the very 'rules' they proclaim to champion but flaunt themselves doing so with pride.

If anything from the last 10 years of domestic politics has shown me it is the crass opportunism and sheer hypocrisy of the politically active evangelicals who will debase themselves just to achieve political power, all while violating many of the same tenants of faith they so loudly proclaim to follow. These are often the same folks often leading the charge on this subject along with their politician allies. No wonder a lot of folks don't want to buy what they're selling.

 

[Spekkio]

I saw what happened during COVID, the messaging often didn't work very well at all here in the US. You can do all the 'messaging' you want, folks are still going to be assholes and leave their families.

The metric isn't 0, the metric is reducing it to an acceptable level from a public policy perspective.

The teen pregnancy rate has dropped dramatically in the 90's, so I am not sure just how much more sex education is going to help. Interestingly enough, the teen pregnancy rate has dropped around the same time the internet became widely availability. Just sayin'...

Teen pregnancy is a metric, but not a good one if people demonstrate the same irresponsible behavior (meaning, not using contraception out of wedlock) after age 20.

Children born to unmarried parents peaked in 2010 at 50%. It still hovers at 40-45%. Only 44% of millenials are married, and that's based on the incorrect definition where the youngest are 30 and not 22. And as @Gatordev aptly summarized, it absolutely is a national security / survival concern that we are only having 1.6 children per household when we need to be having 2.1 (and ideally 2.5).

Women before feminism were much more dependent on men for many things legally, and were much more limited in their careers. No longer having to rely on men for many things, along with the freedom of birth control, has freed women from the societal pressure of having to marry and start a family.

Both men and women should have 'societal pressure to marry and start a family.' It's a core function of life, and necessary to continue the survival humanity. That's the point - that feminism has demonized this.

There is a happy medium between saying women should have equal rights and opportunities, like being able to open a bank account and compete for any job open to men without regard to gender, and completely rejecting gender roles. Women relied on men to provide income for the household... but men relied on women to manage that household (including the budget oftentimes) and provide nurturing support for them and their children. Say that out loud in a feminist 'space' and that will get you tarred and feathered.

Meanwhile, very few women are tolerant of stay at home dads and the vast majority do not date / marry lower income earners.

The paradox about 'feminism' is the complete rejection of being a woman instead of empowering it. That is making a lot of young men 'nope' out of long-term relationships.

If folks want to do the traditional thing, more power to them. Just don't try and force others to do so, proclaim that it is the 'right' or only way to have a family and disparage others who are in 'non-traditional' families.

Children born to married parents have significantly better academic and professional outcomes, on average. There is also a wide chasm between 'encourage' and 'force.'

One thing I have to keep in mind when discussing this kind of thing with my peers is that we are usually be considered upper middle class income-wise, as are most who are likely commenting on this thread.

And, anecdotally, a lot of officer wives stop working after a couple of PCS's / giving birth because officers make enough to support the household on a single income. Statistically, mil officers have a lower divorce rate than the general population.

And I have seen my spouse many times encounter that 'ew, you don't work' face from other women when we had 3 toddlers running around and had to have the 'look, she made a decision based on what she felt was best for the family' talk with my mom to get her stop the pointed questions about 'so when are you going back to work?' 5 minutes after walking in the door.

If anything from the last 10 years of domestic politics has shown me it is the crass opportunism and sheer hypocrisy of the politically active evangelicals ...

Um, okay... I don't think Mike Huckabee is commenting in this thread, so simmer down now.

 

[number9]

What is the correlation between states that teach (primarily) abstinence and abstinence-only, and the states with the highest rates of teen pregnancy?

I have two kids. They are great most of the time. It is eye-wateringly expensive all of the time.

 

[taxi1]

it absolutely is a national security / survival concern that we are only having 1.6 children per household when we need to be having 2.1 (and ideally 2.5).

That is the planetary conundrum. What sort of society based on steady state (through immigration) or declining population will emerge?

South Korea is going to find out for the rest of us. Minimal immigration and a total fertility rate of 0.75 (in 2024), the lowest in the world. That is insanely low.

I don't see the USA keeping its growth without immigration, and there aren't enough Afrikaners to ensure the immigrants are of the right color. So the million dollar question, when we get around to it, is how to assimilate.

 

[Spekkio]

That is the planetary conundrum. What sort of society based on steady state (through immigration) or declining population will emerge?

South Korea is going to find out for the rest of us. Minimal immigration and a total fertility rate of 0.75 (in 2024), the lowest in the world. That is insanely low.

All the more reason to try to lead the problem.

I don't see the USA keeping its growth without immigration, and there aren't enough Afrikaners to ensure the immigrants are of the right color. So the million dollar question, when we get around to it, is how to assimilate.

While I don't dispute the undertones of racism in a large portion of the strict immigration enforcement camp, you do introduce significant societal problems when you mix large percentages of widely disparate cultures. Western Europe is finding this out with Muslim immigration. We can roll our eyes at demonizing a group of Catholic immigrants with mostly western European culture and slightly more brown skin, but large-scale immigration from Africa / Middle East is a whole other ball game.

 

[taxi1]

While I don't dispute the undertones of racism in a large portion of the strict immigration enforcement camp, you do introduce significant societal problems when you mix large percentages of widely disparate cultures. Western Europe is finding this out with Muslim immigration. We can roll our eyes at demonizing a group of Catholic immigrants with mostly western European culture and slightly more brown skin, but large-scale immigration from Africa / Middle East is a whole other ball game.

The strategy of keeping them out points to population collapse, unfortunately. That's where the bodies are.

Maybe there is no good answer. Maybe we need to right scapegoat. Aliens from Alpha Centauri?

The Scapegoat Mechanism: To stop mob violence from destroying society, humans historically unite by projecting their anxieties onto a single "scapegoat".

 

[number9]

If you want population growth, you need to prioritize it. Make it clear that there are individual gains from it, societal gains from it, and then incentivize it. People respond to incentives...

 

[CommodoreMid]

The metric isn't 0, the metric is reducing it to an acceptable level from a public policy perspective.

Teen pregnancy is a metric, but not a good one if people demonstrate the same irresponsible behavior (meaning, not using contraception out of wedlock) after age 20.

Children born to unmarried parents peaked in 2010 at 50%. It still hovers at 40-45%. Only 44% of millenials are married, and that's based on the incorrect definition where the youngest are 30 and not 22. And as @Gatordev aptly summarized, it absolutely is a national security / survival concern that we are only having 1.6 children per household when we need to be having 2.1 (and ideally 2.5).


Both men and women should have 'societal pressure to marry and start a family.' It's a core function of life, and necessary to continue the survival humanity. That's the point - that feminism has demonized this.

There is a happy medium between saying women should have equal rights and opportunities, like being able to open a bank account and compete for any job open to men without regard to gender, and completely rejecting gender roles. Women relied on men to provide income for the household... but men relied on women to manage that household (including the budget oftentimes) and provide nurturing support for them and their children. Say that out loud in a feminist 'space' and that will get you tarred and feathered.

Meanwhile, very few women are tolerant of stay at home dads and the vast majority do not date / marry lower income earners.

The paradox about 'feminism' is the complete rejection of being a woman instead of empowering it. That is making a lot of young men 'nope' out of long-term relationships.


Children born to married parents have significantly better academic and professional outcomes, on average. There is also a wide chasm between 'encourage' and 'force.'


And, anecdotally, a lot of officer wives stop working after a couple of PCS's / giving birth because officers make enough to support the household on a single income. Statistically, mil officers have a lower divorce rate than the general population.

And I have seen my spouse many times encounter that 'ew, you don't work' face from other women when we had 3 toddlers running around and had to have the 'look, she made a decision based on what she felt was best for the family' talk with my mom to get her stop the pointed questions about 'so when are you going back to work?' 5 minutes after walking in the door.


Um, okay... I don't think Mike Huckabee is commenting in this thread, so simmer down now.

Don’t feel like breaking your post up, but 2 points. First, now that more women are working along with their husbands for dual income, there hasn’t been a proportional increase in how much men are contributing to the household in terms of child care, cooking, cleaning, etc. Second, on the dual mil piece, multiple PCSes in a short period of time, in many cases to areas without a great job market, doesn’t lend itself well to spousal employment. I’ve had friends get out of the military because their spouses had potential to make so much more than they were as an officer and the PCSing was destroying that opportunity.

 

[sevenhelmet]

If you want population growth, you need to prioritize it. Make it clear that there are individual gains from it, societal gains from it, and then incentivize it. People respond to incentives...

This isn't a popular position, but I maintain the Earth is already overpopulated. Just because the planet "can" support billions more doesn't mean that it should do so indefinitely. The only reason we got this far was due to mechanized farming and petroleum, which powers the former and provides a range of products to fertilize and treat crops. That won't last forever.

Whether I'm right about all that or not, we need an economic model that doesn't rely on population growth. In that sense, AI may end up being necessary even as we rage against it taking opportunities away from humans. I think that's the tension we're now finding ourselves in.

 

[Spekkio]

First, now that more women are working along with their husbands for dual income, there hasn’t been a proportional increase in how much men are contributing to the household in terms of child care, cooking, cleaning, etc.

This is often cited, but it's based on perception surveys conducted by female psychologists with an axe to grind.

I'd be interested if someone did an actual study where they logged household chores accomplished independent of time spent. I will use my anecdote as why: I, as a man, am able to empty the dishwasher in a fraction of the time because I can do things like grab 6-8 plates, stack them all up in my hand, and put them into a cabinet - something that takes my wife 3-4 passes. I also am way more likely to simply put dishes in the dishwasher and wait until it's full whereas my wife voluntarily does dishes by hand. So she spends way more time doing dishes than I do despite accomplishing similar, if not less, work output. Ditto for the fact that I can mop the entire house top to bottom in 10-15 minutes when it takes her 20-30. Ditto for cooking, where I'm significantly faster at doing prep work like chopping veggies (most line cooks are men). When we fold laundry together, I'm typically getting through 2/3 - 3/4 the basket (thanks, OCS!)

So she feels like she 'does more' because she spends more time doing the same tasks.

The second layer of this is that women often don't count the things men typically contribute to the household as 'household chores.' Mowing the lawn, painting the shed, fixing the loose door hinge, patching the hole in the wall, etc. for some reason don't count in any of these surveys. There is rarely a weekend where I'm not doing something around the house to either fix or improve something. Equality in relationship roles is all fine and dandy until "your SON flushed his TOY down the toilet!"

Third layer is that I can buy for a dollar that women partake in childcare more often, but they also work fewer hours per week - 36 hours for women vs 40 hours for men.

I guarantee this is way more common than the current research methodology of 'do you feel like you do [more / less / equal] of [cherry picked list of chores] than your husband?' would lead you to believe.

 

[taxi1]

grab 6-8 plates, stack them all up in my hand, and put them into a cabinet

I hope as a man that you juggle those things. For the kids

Asking Gemini...

"Are there actual studies where they logged household chores done by men and women in the household when both work?"

Yes, numerous major studies and time-use logs confirm that women perform more household chores than men, even when both partners are employed full-time. [1, 2]
Prominent research detailing this division includes:

• The American Time Use Survey (ATUS): Conducted by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, this ongoing survey is the gold standard for tracking how people divide their day. The Gender Equity Policy Institute analyzed these logs to find that working women spend roughly 12.6 hours per week on core chores (cooking, cleaning), compared to just 5.7 hours for working men