Effects of Divorce Are Exaggerated
Viewpoint
“Sooner or later, we are going to have to let go of the fantasy that we can restore the family of the 1950s,” asserts Arlene Skolnick, a research psychologist at the Institute of Human Development at the University of Ca lifornia at Berkeley, and Stacey Rosencranz, a graduate student at Stanford University. “Since the nineteenth century, the age at marriage, divorce rate, and women’s labor force participation had been rising. In the 1950s, however, the age of marriage declined, the divorce rate leveled off, [and] the proportion of the population married reached a new high…After the 1950s, the long-term historical
In fact, as freelance writer Barbara Ehrenreich points out, “[t]rue, the divorce rate rose after the introduction of no-fault divorce in the late `60s and `70s. But the divorce rate was already rising at a healthy clip before that, so there's no guarantee that the repeal of no-fault laws will reduce the divorce rate now.”
Rather, historical societal trends appear to be at work, including an “irrevocable evolution in women’s expectations for themselves as members of families and as individuals within the larger society,” according to Martha Albertson Fineman, a law professor at Columbia University. Fineman reminds us that “young women in particular have internalized a norm of equality, with its attendant assumptions about career and political participation. They will not be relegated to a life that encompasses only hearth and home, [and thus], we find ourselves in the midst of historical behavioral changes affecting marriage and family.”
One result of these changes is the cultural acceptance of divorce. With that acceptance, some opponents of divorce argue, we are undermining American society, as we know it–with its idealized image of the nuclear family and he althy, happy children.
But according to Fineman, “Our obsession with the idealized nuclear family has meant that our solutions for real problems have not been practical or realistic, but reactionary paeans to distorted images of ‘days gone by. ’” As a culture, we are ignoring real family problems, such as medical care, housing, jobs, and education. “Divorce reform,” Fineman continues, “ignores [these] basic tenet[s] and keeps us inappropriately focused on the failings of spouses.”
As for healthy and happy children, divorce alone doesn’t account for adolescent and teenage problems that critics of divorce cite. Richard Weissbourd, a psychologist and fellow at Harvard University’s School of Government, notes, “It is not divorce per se that does lasting damage to children as much as the way divorce interacts with many circumstances surrounding it. Children are not only affected by how their parents handle divorce…but also by their experien ces in the larger world with friends, with community adults, and with school.”
So while it’s a convenient place to lay blame for society’s ills, divorce has become a scapegoat for much larger problems in our American culture.
Resources
Ehrenreich, Barbara. "The
Harmful Effects of Divorce Have Been Exaggerated." Marriage and
Divorce. Ed. Tamara L. Roleff and Mary E. Williams. San Diego:
Greenhaven Press, 1997.
Fineman, Martha Albertson. "Divorce Laws
Should Not Be Reformed." Marriage and Divorce. Ed. Tamara L. Roleff
and Mary E. Williams. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 1997.
Skolnick,
Arlene, and Stacey Rosencranz. "The Harmful Effects of Single-Parent Families
Are Exaggerated." Single-Parent Families. Ed. Karin L. Swisher. San
Diego: Greenhaven Press, 1997
Weissbourd, Richard. "The Harmful
Effects of Divorce Can Be Mitigated." Marriage and Divorce. Ed.
Tamara L. Roleff and Mary E. Williams. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 1997.