Central and southern Africa, small cities not major metropolitan areas. Traditional culture permeates.
It is well known and accepted that the extended family helps out with the ups and downs of life. That is just the way things work at this time - I am just an observer.
Why these observations appear to bother you is difficult to understand.
Who said they bothered me?
The vagueness, one-sidedness, and "feel-good" tenor of your facile statements bothered me.
I re-iterate: Yes, in (e.g.) small town America in the early 20th century, too, the (extended) family would have helped out - but the loose woman would have been branded, generations of children would have been lectured about her wanton behavior, the pastors in the pulpits would have had a field-day, etc.
You conveniently left that part out!
And with multiple baby-daddies?! Cousin Thelma would have been branded the "Whore of Babylon!"
You admit that you are an "outsider," so I would ask you to reconsider your superficial observations before sharing them here. You have probably not witnessed a lot of the "behind-the-scenes" village chatter.
I cannot conceive of traditional rural African societies countenancing such behavior! At a hunter/gatherer level, that might work - but not at any more-advanced societal stage. Any such subsistence-level society would collapse within a few generations. Only wealthy Western nations can afford such madness.
You are merely "reporting your observations as an outsider" without providing any added-value in the form of plausibility-tests or the like.
Q.v. Walter Duranty commenting, "I don't see any mass starvation of the Ukrainians! Looks okay to me!" during the imposed famines of the 1930s.
Try turning on your "bullsh*t-meter."
Regards,
“Central and southern Africa”
Bullseye!
Gotta be in the Southern hemisphere.