What is the typical Irish Family? Britain = Two single mothers, one heavily pregnant.

Lapin

SparkySpitfire wrote: »

But it didn't prove her wrong at all. It just showcased your own cherrypicking skills and you also ignored the fact she said "every other piece of art is a man" not "every famous piece of art is a man".

So no, you didn't prove anything by it.

If 'every other piece of art is a man' then it inevitably follows that every famous piece of art must be a man too.

And all I did was highlight the fact that this is simply not the case by mentioning a few well known examples.
Not much point in listing obscure ones that few people are familiar with.

You accuse me of cherry picking but seem to have the art of nit picking down to a tee yourself.

SparkySpitfire

Lapin wrote: »

If 'every other piece of art is a man' then it inevitably follows that every famous piece of art must be a man too.

And all I did was highlight the fact that this is simply not the case by mentioning a few well known examples.
Not much point in listing obscure ones that few people are familiar with.

You accuse me of cherry picking but seem to have the art of nit picking down to a tee yourself.

There are a few well known examples, quite right. There are also many many many more examples of males in art.

Don't get annoyed at me because your points aren't holding up.

Smidge

Lapin wrote: »

If 'every other piece of art is a man' then it inevitably follows that every famous piece of art must be a man too.

And all I did was highlight the fact that this is simply not the case by mentioning a few well known examples.
Not much point in listing obscure ones that few people are familiar with.

You accuse me of cherry picking but seem to have the art of nit picking down to a tee yourself.

TBF Lapin, I don't get this mentality at all.
Art is art.
The subject is subjective.

But away from the topic at hand we seem to have drifted.
My opinion on "blended/modern" families?

If you can raise a child to be a decent person, it makes no odds what your parental status has been.
I was raised by women with a male presence(grandfather)in the background. Didn't do me a jot of harm.

Einhard

There's a lot of talk here about how one type of family is intrinsically better than another type, but there's precious little evidence to back up views.

I admit that a nuclear family intuitively seems to be the ideal model to aspire to (that's not at all to disparage other forms of family), but the porblem with intuitition is that it's just that- intuitition, a gut feeling, based on personal observations and little else.

It seems to me that if we're to have a proper debate on what family model "works best", then we need some objective, empirical evidence on which to base the debate. In its absence, all we have is personal musings and they're not much use in such a conversation.

Lapin

SparkySpitfire wrote: »

There are a few well known examples, quite right. There are also many many many more examples of males in art.

Civic statues perhaps, but I dispute that this is the case in art in general.
I would say there are far more depictions of women in paintings, photography, music, poetry than there are of men.

SparkySpitfire wrote: »

Don't get annoyed at me because your points aren't holding up.

I'm not annoyed at all. My points are holding up quite well.

You have already conceded that by back tracking and admitting to this much, "There are a few well known examples, quite right."

Smidge

Are you genuinely debating the fact that more art has been made about women Lapin?
To what end?
I don't get your point.
The majority of famous artists have been men.
Will you argue that they were environmentalists is they made paintings of flowers?

Lapin

Smidge wrote: »

But away from the topic at hand we seem to have drifted.
My opinion on "blended/modern" families?

If you can raise a child to be a decent person, it makes no odds what your parental status has been.

Of course.

But as I said at the start of this thread. I think society should aspire to the concept of the traditional family unit.

Thats not to say any others should be scorned or disregarded.

SparkySpitfire

Lapin wrote: »

Civic statues perhaps, but I dispute that this is the case in art in general.
I would say there are far more depictions of women in paintings, photography, music, poetry than there are of men.



I'm not annoyed at all. My points are holding up quite well.

You have already conceded that by back tracking and admitting to this much, "There are a few well known examples, quite right."

I conceded that there are examples, anyone can see that. You're wrong in thinking there's more female examples than male though. More than that, the majority of famous artists over time have been men. I don't even know why you brought this point up in the first place. I feel like I'm talking to the wall...

Einhard

Lapin wrote: »

Of course.

But as I said at the start of this thread. I think society should aspire to the concept of the traditional family unit.

Thats not to say any others should be scorned or disregarded.

But what if it were t be shown that the traditional family unit performs no better than other forms of the same thing? Would you change your perspective then?

Smidge

Lapin wrote: »

Of course.

But as I said at the start of this thread. I think society should aspire to the concept of the traditional family unit.

Thats not to say any others should be scorned or disregarded.

Aspiration to one method over another will always mean that anything after that will be considered "lesser". Thats the bones of it.

Lapin

Einhard wrote: »

But what if it were t be shown that the traditional family unit performs no better than other forms of the same thing? Would you change your perspective then?

It would probably take a couple of generations for such results to manifest themselves. The traditional family has by and large, been the mainstay and basic unit of society for millenia and I don't think it has done us any harm.

To reiterate, I'm not saying children raised by a mother and father automatically grow up to become more rounded individuals than those with single parents or any other form of fragmented family.

I simply think the traditional family unit is the best template for society to base itself on. And I do think its disappointing that in modern life it has come to be accepted that fathers aren't considered by some to be a valuable part of the family anymore.

nokia69

I remember reading an article a while back that pointed out that most of the poor families in the UK were the single parent welfare families, they did poorly in almost all measures, education, crime, teenage mothers ect

its not the best way to raise children, its amazing the number of people who just can't admit this

ideology trumps facts for some people

Einhard

Lapin wrote: »

It would probably take a couple of generations for such results to manifest themselves. The traditional family has by and large, been the mainstay and basic unit of society for millenia and I don't think it has done us any harm.

To reiterate, I'm not saying children raised by a mother and father automatically grow up to become more rounded individuals than those with single parents or any other form of fragmented family.

I simply think the traditional family unit is the best template for society to base itself on. And I do think its disappointing that in modern life it has come to be accepted that fathers aren't considered by some to be a valuable part of the family anymore.

You didn't answer my question. If evidence showed that the nuclear family has the same outcomes for children as less traditional family groups, would you change your position?

I can see where you're coming from, but I'm not at all comfortable making sweeping generalisations which affect others (because such assumptions always do) based on intuition and a feeling in me bones!! :pac:

Paulownia

Presumably these two ladies have private means to allow them to spend their time happily producing children.
Or am I old fashioned too?

Lapin

Einhard wrote: »

You didn't answer my question. If evidence showed that the nuclear family has the same outcomes for children as less traditional family groups, would you change your position?

I thought I answered it clearly. As such evidence would not be available for a couple of generations I'm not going to speculate or try and predict the future, so there is no point in playing with hypothetical situations in the meantime.

Einhard wrote: »

I can see where you're coming from, but I'm not at all comfortable making sweeping generalisations which affect others (because such assumptions always do) based on intuition and a feeling in me bones!! :pac:

What sweeping generalisations?

Annasopra

nokia69 wrote: »

I remember reading an article a while back that pointed out that most of the poor families in the UK were the single parent welfare families, they did poorly in almost all measures, education, crime, teenage mothers ect

its not the best way to raise children, its amazing the number of people who just can't admit this

ideology trumps facts for some people

Link to article?

Annasopra

Paulownia wrote: »

Presumably these two ladies have private means to allow them to spend their time happily producing children.
Or am I old fashioned too?

Show us your bank account before the state allows you to have a child so.

RDM_83 again

bodice ripper wrote: »

If they aren't worse, what is the problem with representing them in sculpture?

I shouldn't bother replying since again your not actually engaging with any of the other points and you'l probably just try and assign me again the views I've made clear I don't hold. I don't judge any of the single parents I know, when I open my facebook I don't get angry when there's loads of pictures of the sweet little hispanic kid a single woman in her 40's I know adopted. But yeah I'm a bigot.

My point is that this is a choice of statue to erect that reveals more than it seems. As does the public art or material culture of any society at the time.

This is not a representation of a lesbian couple, this is not the representation of a lone single mother, this is a representation of technically non-nuclear family (cousins aren't nuclear family) where there is the complete absence of fathers (3 that couldn't have all died) and of the adult male (such as the womens male relatives). Does this make me angry, does it make me think hmmm I wonder where all the guys in this picture thats an interesting choice when absent fathers and lack of male role-models for boy/young men is an issue of which there is growing awareness.

Paulownia

Joeytheparrot wrote: »

Show us your bank account before the state allows you to have a child so.

Perhaps it should be, more appropriately, look at your own bank account before having unprotected sex that mat lead to the birth of someone who deserves a decent chance in life

Annasopra

Paulownia wrote: »

Perhaps it should be, more appropriately, look at your own bank account before having unprotected sex that mat lead to the birth of someone who deserves a decent chance in life

Poverty isnt static at the point of sex.

LorMal

Nodin wrote: »

When you add the mention of the lack of a father figure being "disappointing and wrong", there seems to be a bit more than that.

Ah for crying out loud - should we be celebrating the disappearance of the Father role in so many families today? Is that not 'disappointing'?
Or should we blithely accept that the Fathers role can be limited to the insemination?

Einhard

Lapin wrote: »

I thought I answered it clearly. As such evidence would not be available for a couple of generations I'm not going to speculate or try and predict the future, so there is no point in playing with hypothetical situations in the meantime.

I'm not asking you to speculate. I'm merely asking you would you change your views if the evidence contradicted them. No speculation needed at all.

What sweeping generalisations?

Sweeping generalisations such as children have a better chance in a family consisting of a mother and a father; that society functions better when the nuclear family is the bedrock etc.

These may be factually accurate statements, but nobody here has presented any evidence to support them.

Paulownia

Einhard wrote: »

I'm not asking you to speculate. I'm merely asking you would you change your views if the evidence contradicted them. No speculation needed at all.



Sweeping generalisations such as children have a better chance in a family consisting of a mother and a father; that society functions better when the nuclear family is the bedrock etc.

These may be factually accurate statements, but nobody here has presented any evidence to support them.

Leaving aside the economic considerations of single motherhood it must be harder to fulfill the physical obligations of parenthood alone. As a young parent I was often tired and irritable with my children although I had a spouse to share responsibilities with.

Lapin

Einhard wrote: »

Sweeping generalisations such as children have a better chance in a family consisting of a mother and a father; that society functions better when the nuclear family is the bedrock etc.

These may be factually accurate statements, but nobody here has presented any evidence to support them.

Here

bodice ripper

RDM_83 again wrote: »

I shouldn't bother replying since again your not actually engaging with any of the other points and you'l probably just try and assign me again the views I've made clear I don't hold. I don't judge any of the single parents I know, when I open my facebook I don't get angry when there's loads of pictures of the sweet little hispanic kid a single woman in her 40's I know adopted. But yeah I'm a bigot.

My point is that this is a choice of statue to erect that reveals more than it seems. As does the public art or material culture of any society at the time.

This is not a representation of a lesbian couple, this is not the representation of a lone single mother, this is a representation of technically non-nuclear family (cousins aren't nuclear family) where there is the complete absence of fathers (3 that couldn't have all died) and of the adult male (such as the womens male relatives). Does this make me angry, does it make me think hmmm I wonder where all the guys in this picture thats an interesting choice when absent fathers and lack of male role-models for boy/young men is an issue of which there is growing awareness.

But public art represents all kinds of things, some wonderful, much of it violent, most sadly meaningless of late. Or do you feel there should be tight controls on the content of public sculpture, and if it isn't pushing the right family template, it shouldn't be there?

suicide_circus

LorMal wrote: »

Ah for crying out loud - should we be celebrating the disappearance of the Father role in so many families today? Is that not 'disappointing'?
Or should we blithely accept that the Fathers role can be limited to the insemination?

Listen, the sooner men are removed from society and consigned purely to a few 'The Matrix' style milking facilities where their reproductive juices are harvested, the better. No wars, no crime, no comedy.

Lapin

I reckon if men were removed from society you'd still have war and crime.

Recondite49

Lapin wrote: »

I reckon if men were removed from society you'd still have war and crime.

It's like the Fem'nists who say that if women were in charge there'd be no wars i.e women who seemingly have never heard of Boudicca, Margaret Thatcher, Cleopatra, Queen Elizabeth I etc. ... then complain when no one takes them seriously. :-D

Einhard

Lapin wrote: »

Here

While an interesting study, it doesn't state what you want it to state- namely that traditional, nuclear families perform better on a host of indicators because of the fact that they're traditional and nuclear.

The fact is that single parent families are more likely, for a host of factors, to be lower on the socio-economic scale than other family types*. The study that you put forward doesn't account for this- it merely compares one family type with another.

The only way in which a study could definitively take account of other variables (which all good studies worth their salt do) would be to compare nuclear and non-nuclear families from the same socio-economic groups. Your study doesn't do so, and therefore I'm afraid it can't be used to back up your contention that one family type is intrinsically better than the other.


* I know that some posters will jump on this and claim that it contradicts my argument, and validates Lapin's thesis. However, they would be wrong. We have only witnessed a significant number of single parent families in this country over the past two decades. The mother (or father) in such units would generally have come from the traditional families where both parents were present, so the lower socio-economic status of that family could not be attributed to the head being raised in similar circumstances.

bodice ripper

Recondite49 wrote: »

It's like the Fem'nists who say that if women were in charge there'd be no wars i.e women who seemingly have never heard of Boudicca, Margaret Thatcher, Cleopatra, Queen Elizabeth I etc. ... then complain when no one takes them seriously. :-D

But no one said that. In fact, it was brought up to mock feminists who aren't here saying something that wasn't said in the thread. It's like there's an agenda or something.

Like I said, this crap is just feminists with testicles. Looking for slights.