Tiger Woods. It’s the relationship story that won’t die. Part of the public’s fascination with Tiger Wood’s personal drama is voyeurism. For some, this media frenzy is an titillating peak behind the curtain of a rich and celebrated life. But the other reason the public is so polarized about Tiger — the athlete, the role model, or the husband — is because he is a famous (and extreme) example of the “no rules relationship revolution” that everyone is experiencing some form of. Today’s relationship landscape is a place where hook ups have replaced dating and big white weddings walk side-by-side with staggering divorce rates. It’s a place where cougars stalk and divorced men scratch their heads and wonder what went wrong. And every year, 40% of American children are born out of wedlock.
The other day I overheard a conversation between two grade school boys on a school playground. This is word-for-word:
1st Boy: I went to a wedding last weekend!
2nd Boy: Oh yah? I’ve been to THREE weddings. I went to my Mom’s wedding. I went to my Dad’s wedding. And when I was really little, I went to my Mom-and-Dad’s wedding.
How is this child ever going to have a healthy relationship when he grows up or have any appreciation of marital commitment? So, the problem is clear. Families and marriages are falling apart. But who can we blame?
Some of the blame lies with sexually promiscuous men who break their vows, but women are also complicit in this mess. As feminism gave women sexual “freedom” women resigned their responsibility as the executor of our culture’s sexual boundaries. Not so long ago, a women’s sexual transgression would have been costly. It would have been socially, physically, or economically dangerous. But today, thanks to birth control, medical advances, and women’s own economic power, some women can even PROFIT from their sexual freedom. Look no further than some of Tiger’s mistresses to see how to legally profit from sex.
Another blame might be our highly sexualized media. The message blared through suggestive photos and slogans on nearly every TV show, billboard and magazine ad is: sex is good. More sex is better. Healthy, happy, beautiful people are having lots of sex. And there seem to be no attempts to shield children from these sexual messages either. When a national loungerie chains presents a “fashion” show on network television with scantily clad models in prime time, Dorothy, we are clearly not in Kansas anymore. Last Friday, I took my kids to a family street christmas celebration where stores opened their doors for an evening of cheer. There were the expected carolers and free cookies and eggnog, but the local photo studio opted not to have “traditional” Santa and instead provided photo opportunities with a SEXY Santa complete with an open shirt and a six-pack. My little girls were confused as I hustled them away from the store.
The bottom line. We all participate in some way, whether it’s buying products sold through sexy advertising, or endorsing sex without emotional strings. (We are learning through Tiger’s saga, all sex has some kind of emotional string.) And the real victims in this mess are wives with small children. Studies still support the fact that after divorce, a man’s lifestyle goes up, and a woman’s goes down. Women still only make 77 cents on the male dollar, and a chunk of that is lost to expensive childcare costs. We are not equal and we are not free. Women will truly become like good men when they learn to keep it in their pants and act like gentlemen!
I would also toss into the mix the severe fracturing of the religious base. When there was only the Catholics, Muslims and Buddists, it was pretty simple-pick a faith-believe-or die. Now we have millions of variants of Christianity, Muslim faith is fragmented into warring factions. Its hard to have a moral structure when it is collapsing and fractured by internal disagreements.
I still want to see how that 77 cents on the dollar statistic is created. I don’t see any evidence of it in the working world. I never see adds in the paper for firefighters or police officers saying that women are paid less. I never see advertisements to hire male nurses for $0.33 cents an hour more than female nurses. Im sure its generated from someone’s collection of data, but unless we know the assumptions and the basis of the data, its a meaningless number. Even the typical “its from the Government” doesn’t lend credibility to the number.