Tradition: Family and Traditional Nuclear family Essay

Submitted By maymay6565
Words: 1361
Pages: 6

Keeping the Tradition Alive While growing up with no mother, any child will feel as if something is missing. Family time begins to become less important; while the family begins to drift apart, new lives within the family without any one truly realizing it. Whoever said that death and taxes are the only inevitable things in life was over looking an obvious third one: Family (William J Doherty). Family importance helps develop our community, and further generations build upon the roles set by the families today. A family is a group of people or the people you live with, a family is flourishing in a multiplicity of forms: single parent, stepfamily, extended family, and so on; ending up at the bottom traditional family (Press 51). The traditional family of the twentieth century consists of a working father and mother where neither stays home with children (Press 13). Many may still believe in the importance of the traditional family, but circumstances have not allowed them to live in one (Press 14). Today, seventy percent of America’s families are nontraditional. The most common family type is composed of either a two career married couple and their children or a single parent and his/her kids (Press 13). In fact, traditional family has never really existed. While a greater number of traditional families may have existed in the 1950’s, most families were not the romantic versions that appeared on television (Press 13). While traditional family is the family everyone wants, the traditional nuclear family is the choice of millions in America. In hindsight, the 1950’s families seem to have been overwhelmed with problems that went well beyond patriarchy (Press 23). Strong families represent the best path toward self-fulfillment and personal happiness. We should bring again to the cultural fore front the old ideal of parents living together and sharing the responsibility for their children and for each other (Press 24). During the past twenty-five years, the institution of the family has weakened substantially. Americans should recommit themselves to children and strong families; the family change of the past twenty-five years has tended to break up the nucleus of the family unit. Despite the dramatic nature of the recent social transformation of the family, many family experts are still reluctant to refer to the transformation of the family, many family experts are still reluctant to refer to the transformation as family decline (Press 17-20). Individual family members have become more self-sufficient and less bound by the family group, and the group has become less interconnected. The family has grown smaller, less stable, and has a shorter life span; people are therefore family members for a smaller percentage of their life. A great many positive aspects of recent family changes stand out as significant. Women have improved their status and are more likely to have more emotionally rewarding companionships. Everyone agrees that the American family is changing. Children are more likely to be left unattended, divorce rates are raising, and the number of single people in the population is rising. Basic family values have not changed dramatically, but the norms of family behavior have, in fact, changed. Where values are attached to beliefs, norms are attached to and directly guide behavior (Press 21-26). Despite the positive aspects, the negative consequences of family decline are real and profound. The greatest negative effect, in the options of nearly everyone, is on children. Because children represent the future of a society, any negative consequences for them are especially significant. We should be done to counteract or remedy the negative effects of family decline. This has two answers one is that a return to the structure of the traditional nuclear family characteristic of the 1950’s and the second is the development of extensive governmental family characteristic of the 1950’s that does a lot of things together has