[Mrs. Don-o]

Contraception. That was the root of the seemingly instantaneous and universal collapse.

At least that's what "The Century of Sex: Playboy's History of the Sexual Revolution, 1900-1999" says about it. I think they're right. And Pope Paul VI predicted the whole flamin' train-wreck 30 years before the publication of this very interesting book.

[dan1123]

Contraception. That was the root of the seemingly instantaneous and universal collapse.

Let me think this through. Before contraception, if unmarried people had sex then they would risk children. Even if abortion was available, it's not a quick fix and you can't do it privately in your own home. So risking children means that there is a fear of/respect for sex. People also therefore respect institutions that restrain sexual desire. It also means that women cannot be expected to not get pregnant. Therefore jobs for women would be restricted to positions that were not essential, because they would have to have maternity leave at minimum, or quit altogether. So men are the primary earners, women (wives) are more or less restricted to the home, not because they can have children, but because they cannot control when they will not.

In comes contraception, and suddenly sex is no longer a fearful/respected act. Religious institutions seen reflexively as protecting children from being born to unwed young mothers are seen as outdated. Women can be hired with the expectation that they will essentially never get pregnant. STD's are largely manageable as far as the workplace is concerned (and AIDS continues to be very rare in the heterosexual population). Divorce gets a lot easier now that women can depend on careers to take them through. Casual sex causes emotional disconnect in marriage to help spur on divorce. Marriage gets diluted and we end up with gay "marriage" and polygamy not looking so bad.

In the end, churches and government have to operate based on the expectation that culture moves on fear of natural consequence rather than any higher moral or legal function. It's sad in many ways, but what do we do now that the genie is out of the bottle and reshaped our culture? Contraception may eventually get banned by law or cultural revolution, but how long can that be expected to stay in place?

I see two possible outcomes:

1. Some horrendous STD would have to sweep through and kill more people than the plague and sex is then respected and feared once again.
2. The cultures that promoted contraception use will see their societies dissolve from lack of families with children and be taken over by forceful theocratic (Muslim?) or autocratic totalitarian societies.