4 ms·

> Why again the Victorian moral project and supposed "prudery" was in the wrong, in the first place? Because it was a social sledgehammer used to punish people

by tomrod 5y ago

> Why again the Victorian moral project and supposed "prudery" was in the wrong, in the first place? Because it was a social sledgehammer used to punish people's existence (homosexuals, for example) rather than encouraging socially positive behavior (like teaching your kids to read).

dash2 5y ago
It's more complicated than that. Victorian morality was also about (for example) discouraging child prostitution, of which Victorian society had quite a lot. Middle-class moralizers eventually morphed into social reformers when they discovered it was hard to be a good person in tough social conditions. And so on. The good and bad are not very easy to disentangle.
- bashmelek 5y ago
  A related element is that apparently there was a large surplus of women at the time. The imbalance contributed to an increase prostitution and women getting stuck in unhappy marriages.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
rayiner 5y ago
> Because it was a social sledgehammer used to punish people's existence (homosexuals, for example) rather than encouraging socially positive behavior (like teaching your kids to read). But that's not the only thing, right? For example it strongly discouraged out of wedlock childbirth and divorce, which in retrospect seem like pretty good things. Coming from an Islamic society where both are strongly taboo, it's been eye-opening to me to see the social dysfunction in the working class American area my wife's family is from. My mother in law's house is full of random teenagers who are drawn to the fact that she offers a relatively stable household compared to the instability in these kids' home lives. It's great that we got same-sex marriage, but it seems to me like that's the only kind of marriage some folks care about these days. It's not just "prudes" looking at these moral trends with concern. Even center-left Brookings Institution has observed the collapse in marriage rates among the lower class, and how that's exacerbating income inequality: https://www.brookings.edu/research/middle-class-marriage-is-declining-and-likely-deepening-inequality/ https://www.brookings.edu/research/middle-class-marriage-is-... (marriage rates for the top quantile have hardly changed since 1980, at 80%+, but have dropped from 60% to under 40% for the bottom quantile). Studies show that Asian Americans enjoy much higher income mobility than white Americans: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/03/27/upshot/make-your-own-mobility-animation.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/03/27/upshot/make-y.... An Asian American kid born in the bottom 20% of income has a 25% chance of ending up in the top 20% of income as an adult. For a white American kid that number is just 10%. I strongly suspect that an important factor is that Asian Americans continue to have "Victorian values." We don't tolerate divorce and we ostracize people who don't get married. Many Asians come here very poor, but the kids have two parents and the families don’t have to deal with the massive loss of income and upward mobility caused by divorce: https://www.nber.org/digest/jul02/income-declines-after-divorce https://www.nber.org/digest/jul02/income-declines-after-divo... Whenever we talk about "progress" we fixate on improvements for relatively small minorities. While that's not unimportant, it gives us a false sense that progress happens in a single direction. But our progress has resulted not only from breaking down specific possibly obsolete taboos, but breaking down the general framework for enforcing moral norms. That’s been replaced by the elevation of individualism and self determination to a religion. And it appears that this change has had costs. We have lost the ability to use social pressures to keep people from making poor and selfish decisions. The burdens of that progress of that are being borne by kids, especially kids from lower income households.
- watwut 5y ago
  Being married does not raise your income. Rather, higher income makes you more likely to marry. > We don't tolerate divorce and we ostracize people who don't get married. Which also means high levels of domestic violence and simultaneously escalating domestic violence due to inability to leave. Up to and including domestic murders. The fact is, Islamic society does not look like society with better families to me. It seems more like society that likes to pretend that if you are not single, then all is fine, even if you just got chocked by the partner.
  - rayiner 5y ago
    > Being married does not raise your income. Rather, higher income makes you more likely to marry. Being married makes the family more financially stable due to sharing of expenses either having two earners or being able to divide working and taking care of the household. > Which also means high levels of domestic violence and simultaneously escalating domestic violence due to inability to leave. Up to and including domestic murders. The fact is, Islamic society does not look like society with better families to me. Domestic violence is an orthogonal problem that’s common across the developing world, and unfortunately quite common in the developed world. But it doesn’t have much to do with marriage, because of course non-marital relationships can have domestic violence as well. In the US, domestic violence isn’t especially more prevalent in communities that maintain strong taboos on divorce (Asian Americans and Muslim Americans). Meanwhile it’s unfortunately the most common in communities that also have the highest rates of divorce and out of wedlock childbearing.
    - watwut 5y ago
      > Being married makes the family more financially stable due to sharing of expenses either having two earners or being able to divide working and taking care of the household. This does not seem to be supported by real world. In real world, poor people marry less in the first place. And when family income goes down, people divorce more. > Domestic violence is an orthogonal problem that’s common across the developing world, This is not true. The ability to divorce and leave partner makes it lower. The inability to divorce and social pressure to marry makes it higher. It is primary ability to be single when you want/need to that makes it go lower. Whether you will report domestic violence or not also depends on your ability to leave - because if you report it and then stay married, punishment will follow. And afaik, unfortunately, it is mostly common among cops.

by tomrod 5y ago

dash2 5y ago

It's more complicated than that. Victorian morality was also about (for example) discouraging child prostitution, of which Victorian society had quite a lot. Middle-class moralizers eventually morphed into social reformers when they discovered it was hard to be a good person in tough social conditions. And so on. The good and bad are not very easy to disentangle.

bashmelek 5y ago
A related element is that apparently there was a large surplus of women at the time. The imbalance contributed to an increase prostitution and women getting stuck in unhappy marriages.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

rayiner 5y ago

> Because it was a social sledgehammer used to punish people's existence (homosexuals, for example) rather than encouraging socially positive behavior (like teaching your kids to read). But that's not the only thing, right? For example it strongly discouraged out of wedlock childbirth and divorce, which in retrospect seem like pretty good things. Coming from an Islamic society where both are strongly taboo, it's been eye-opening to me to see the social dysfunction in the working class American area my wife's family is from. My mother in law's house is full of random teenagers who are drawn to the fact that she offers a relatively stable household compared to the instability in these kids' home lives. It's great that we got same-sex marriage, but it seems to me like that's the only kind of marriage some folks care about these days. It's not just "prudes" looking at these moral trends with concern. Even center-left Brookings Institution has observed the collapse in marriage rates among the lower class, and how that's exacerbating income inequality: https://www.brookings.edu/research/middle-class-marriage-is-declining-and-likely-deepening-inequality/ https://www.brookings.edu/research/middle-class-marriage-is-... (marriage rates for the top quantile have hardly changed since 1980, at 80%+, but have dropped from 60% to under 40% for the bottom quantile). Studies show that Asian Americans enjoy much higher income mobility than white Americans: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/03/27/upshot/make-your-own-mobility-animation.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/03/27/upshot/make-y.... An Asian American kid born in the bottom 20% of income has a 25% chance of ending up in the top 20% of income as an adult. For a white American kid that number is just 10%. I strongly suspect that an important factor is that Asian Americans continue to have "Victorian values." We don't tolerate divorce and we ostracize people who don't get married. Many Asians come here very poor, but the kids have two parents and the families don’t have to deal with the massive loss of income and upward mobility caused by divorce: https://www.nber.org/digest/jul02/income-declines-after-divorce https://www.nber.org/digest/jul02/income-declines-after-divo... Whenever we talk about "progress" we fixate on improvements for relatively small minorities. While that's not unimportant, it gives us a false sense that progress happens in a single direction. But our progress has resulted not only from breaking down specific possibly obsolete taboos, but breaking down the general framework for enforcing moral norms. That’s been replaced by the elevation of individualism and self determination to a religion. And it appears that this change has had costs. We have lost the ability to use social pressures to keep people from making poor and selfish decisions. The burdens of that progress of that are being borne by kids, especially kids from lower income households.

watwut 5y ago
Being married does not raise your income. Rather, higher income makes you more likely to marry. > We don't tolerate divorce and we ostracize people who don't get married. Which also means high levels of domestic violence and simultaneously escalating domestic violence due to inability to leave. Up to and including domestic murders. The fact is, Islamic society does not look like society with better families to me. It seems more like society that likes to pretend that if you are not single, then all is fine, even if you just got chocked by the partner.
- rayiner 5y ago
  > Being married does not raise your income. Rather, higher income makes you more likely to marry. Being married makes the family more financially stable due to sharing of expenses either having two earners or being able to divide working and taking care of the household. > Which also means high levels of domestic violence and simultaneously escalating domestic violence due to inability to leave. Up to and including domestic murders. The fact is, Islamic society does not look like society with better families to me. Domestic violence is an orthogonal problem that’s common across the developing world, and unfortunately quite common in the developed world. But it doesn’t have much to do with marriage, because of course non-marital relationships can have domestic violence as well. In the US, domestic violence isn’t especially more prevalent in communities that maintain strong taboos on divorce (Asian Americans and Muslim Americans). Meanwhile it’s unfortunately the most common in communities that also have the highest rates of divorce and out of wedlock childbearing.
  - watwut 5y ago
    > Being married makes the family more financially stable due to sharing of expenses either having two earners or being able to divide working and taking care of the household. This does not seem to be supported by real world. In real world, poor people marry less in the first place. And when family income goes down, people divorce more. > Domestic violence is an orthogonal problem that’s common across the developing world, This is not true. The ability to divorce and leave partner makes it lower. The inability to divorce and social pressure to marry makes it higher. It is primary ability to be single when you want/need to that makes it go lower. Whether you will report domestic violence or not also depends on your ability to leave - because if you report it and then stay married, punishment will follow. And afaik, unfortunately, it is mostly common among cops.