February 14, 2024
Valentine’s Day Marred By Loneliness Crisis
This Valentine’s Day, the news is awash with stories of loneliness and atomisation among adults across the West. Though clinical attention has focused on this brewing crisis, the remedies are often misplaced. Last year, US Surgeon General Vivek Murthy issued an advisory on this new national problem, which was exacerbated by the Covid lockdowns. Following his appointment to the…
February 14, 2024
Why You Should Get Married
Isn’t marriage a trap, mostly for men? Don’t most married couples end up getting divorced? And aren’t most men happier when they’re single? These are the kind of questions I get from young men whenever I make the case for marriage at speaking events at colleges and high schools across the nation—recently in North Carolina,…
February 13, 2024
The Awfulness of Elite Hypocrisy on Marriage
“Is it morally wrong to have a baby outside of marriage?” “No” is the answer I received from about two-thirds of my sociology-of-family class at the University of Virginia last spring, when I put that question to them in an anonymous online poll. The class of approximately 200 students was diverse geographically, racially, and ethnically. But…
February 9, 2024
Don’t Buy the Soulmate Myth
Taylor Swift’s hit song “Lover” is the perfect anthem for this Valentine’s Day, especially since she is in the midst of a very public romance with her latest boyfriend, Travis Kelce. “There’s a dazzling haze, a mysterious way about you,” she sings to her “magnetic force of a man.” This gets the start of a…
October 27, 2023
What liberals don’t understand about men and marriage
There’s no question the bond between fatherhood and marriage is weaker today than it was 60 years ago. Whereas almost 80% of children were raised in an intact, married home with their father in the early 1960s, today only about 51% have that privilege. In the face of what seems like a fraying father-marriage bond, some left-leaning men’s advocates…
October 2, 2023
Growing Up in Intact Families Matters More Than Ever
Stable, two-parent families have always mattered for kids. But today, we have new evidence that they may matter more than ever. A new study from the Institute for Family Studies (IFS) indicates that an intact family is increasingly tied to the educational, financial, and social welfare of children. Meanwhile, family instability appears to harm kids more than…
September 12, 2023
Who Is Happiest? Married Mothers and Fathers, Per the Latest General Social Survey
Social media and mainstream media are replete with stories suggesting marriage and parenthood are not fulfilling, especially for women. Not surprisingly, many Americans now believe the key to being happy is a good education, work, and freedom from the encumbrances of family life—not getting married and having a family. These cultural developments raise an important question answered by this Institute for Family…
August 12, 2023
Gen Z Shouldn’t Dismiss Marriage So Lightly
A viral TikTok video doesn’t pull any punches in depicting the so-called negatives of marriage and motherhood for young women. The video, that has been racking up millions of views, shows a Generation Z woman seeming to accept a marriage proposal before switching to a series of shorts showing the same woman toiling away in domestic drudgery…
August 2, 2023
The Best Predictor of Happiness in America? Marriage
Americans who are married with children are now leading happier and more prosperous lives, on average, than men and women who are single and childless. Is that statement surprising? In an age that prizes individualism, workism, and a host of other self-centric “isms” above marriage and family, it may well be. But the reality is that nothing currently predicts…
June 11, 2023
Now Political Polarization Comes for Marriage Prospects
Marriage rates in America are falling fast: Many men and women are marrying later, and more and more people are never marrying at all. Marriage is in retreat for a host of reasons, but one overlooked cause is the rising difficulty many young people have finding a partner who meets all of their requirements—emotional, physical, financial, and political. That last…