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Demographer Says Religious, Cultural Conservatives on the Rise
C-FAM ^ | 03.03.06 | Mark Adams

Posted on 03/03/2006 6:10:19 PM PST by Coleus

Dear Colleague,

What do radical feminists, supporters of euthanasia, and the proponents of special rights for homosexuals have in common? They tend not to have many children. That's good news for those of us fighting for life and family and a new report from Foreign Policy magazine says that adherents to traditional morality are increasing their numbers across the globe.

Spread the Word.  Yours sincerely,

Austin Ruse
President

Action Item: Read the article here.

 

Demographer Says Religious,
Cultural Conservatives on the Rise

 

     "Conservatives will inherit the earth" according to the cover story of the current edition of Foreign Policy magazine which argues that families that adhere to traditional morality are likely to make up a significant portion of future generations because they are producing more children.

     In the "Return of Patriarchy," Phillip Longman argues that the "great difference in fertility rates between secular individualists and religious or cultural conservatives augurs a vast, demographically driven change in modern societies." Looking at polling data from Europe, Longman, a senior fellow at the left-of-center New America Foundation, notes that "how many children different people have, and under what circumstances, correlates strongly with their beliefs on a wide range of political and cultural attitudes."  Those Europeans who "distrust the army," accept "soft drugs, homosexuality, and euthanasia," and "seldom, if ever, attend church . . . are far more likely to live alone, or in childless, cohabitating unions, than those" who hold opposite opinions.

     Some may argue that the children of parents who believe in traditional morality can reject that morality just as the children of 1960s largely rejected the pervasive social norms of the day. Longman says there is a key difference. " . . . during the post-World War II era, nearly all segments of modern societies married and had children. . . . disparity in family size between the religious and the secular was not so large, and childlessness was rare. Today, by contrast, childlessness is common, and even couples who have children typically have just one. Tomorrow's children, therefore, unlike members of the postwar baby boom generation, will be for the most part descendants of a comparatively narrow and culturally conservative segment of society."

     Longman's article is particularly concerned with explaining why patriarchal families have historically been necessary for the survival of society. "No advanced civilization has yet learned how to endure without it," Longman writes. What marks patriarchal societies, according to Longman, are "customs and attitudes that collectively serve to maximize fertility and parental investment in the next generation. Of these, among the most important is the stigmatization of 'illegitimate' children. One measure of the degree to which patriarchy has diminished in advanced societies is the growing acceptance of out-of-wedlock births, which have now become the norm in Scandinavian countries, for example."

     But Longman takes pains to make it clear that patriarchy does not mean misogyny nor should it be associated with "Taliban rebels or Muslim fanatics in Nigeria stoning an adulteress" which he describes as "examples of insecure societies that have degenerated into male tyrannies" that do not "represent the form of patriarchy that has achieved evolutionary advantage in human history."

Copyright 2005 - C-FAM (Catholic Family & Human Rights Institute).
Permission granted for unlimited use. Credit required.

Catholic Family & Human Rights Institute
866 United Nations Plaza, Suite 427
New York, New York 10017
Phone: (212) 754-5948     Fax: (212) 754-9291
E-mail: c-fam@c-fam.org    Website: www.c-fam.org


TOPICS: Culture/Society; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: austinruse; cfam

1 posted on 03/03/2006 6:10:21 PM PST by Coleus
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The Return of Patriarchy
Facing the Facts of Europe's Suicide

2 posted on 03/03/2006 6:11:56 PM PST by Coleus (Roe v. Wade and Endangered Species Act both passed in 1973, Murder Babies/save trees, birds, algae)
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To: Coleus

Good stuff. Thanks for posting it.


3 posted on 03/03/2006 6:41:53 PM PST by perfect stranger
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To: Coleus

As a counter-strategy, feminists, abortion supporters and so called gays will have to control the educational system to overcome their lower birth rates via brainwashing of the young and impressionable.


4 posted on 03/03/2006 8:03:24 PM PST by BlueYonder
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To: BlueYonder

As a conservative, I have 5 kids. That is not much compared to the Islamofascists who have 11 to 15.


"How soon they blow up!~"


5 posted on 03/03/2006 8:08:57 PM PST by Donald Meaker (You don't drive a car looking through the rear view mirror, but you do practice politics that way.)
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To: perfect stranger

I dunno! The mexican illegal immigrants have large families....20 children are common. I once met a lady with 28 living children!


6 posted on 03/03/2006 8:21:11 PM PST by Doctor Don
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To: Coleus

This is irrelevant.

Even with the paltry number of homeschoolers, the general population of school children are firmly in the grasp of the left.

The DON'T NEED TO PRODUCE THEIR OWN OFFSPRING they have already claimed the children of the population in chief. This is why children go home from college with minds full of mush filled with leftism.


7 posted on 03/03/2006 8:28:50 PM PST by longtermmemmory (VOTE!)
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To: BlueYonder

Uh, they already do control the educational system. And you're right--this is the great equalizer. Children are famous for rebelling against the beliefs of their parents.


8 posted on 03/03/2006 8:34:03 PM PST by rbg81
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To: Doctor Don

20 children by one mother is very uncommon in almost every case worldwide. Would you like to be more specific?


9 posted on 03/03/2006 8:48:55 PM PST by perfect stranger
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To: Coleus

yuppers


10 posted on 03/03/2006 10:33:22 PM PST by LiteKeeper (Beware the secularization of America; the Islamization of Eurabia)
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To: Coleus

Democrats and leftists (but I repeat myself) are extremely saddened.


11 posted on 03/07/2006 8:23:04 PM PST by SuziQ
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