A few weeks ago, the New York Times reported that for the first time in our history, “51 percent of [American] women are now living without spouses.”

The sensational headline notwithstanding, in order to reach this conclusion, the Times played fast and loose with the statistics, counting as “women” teenagers as young as 15, as well as including widows and wives of servicemen stationed overseas. Moreover, the language is a bit tricky. The headline does not say 51 percent of women are not married, nor does it say that a majority of women do not want to get married or do not value marriage. 

Indeed, after sifting through the testimonials of single or divorced women that are enjoying their lives sans mate, you discover that, although in smaller numbers than in years previous, the majority of women (as opposed to teenagers) are married. In fact, once you discover that the Census estimates that 90 percent of women will get married, it becomes clear that the Times report of the demise of marriage was greatly exaggerated.   

In a cultural war, this kind of chicanery is to be expected. Cultural progressives have held traditional marriage in their cross hairs for more than 40 years, and this is just another volley fired in the battle for the American cultural soul. They have clearly made little headway in killing marriage. Sadly, they have found success in recasting the institution as an emotional contract between two people -- any two people -- as opposed to the more traditional incubator for the successful growth and acculturation of children. For children, the family is the primary source of moral education. Families shape and mold the character of children and position them to become contributing members of society. Two-parent households are essential because they do this more successfully than do any other family arrangement.

This, however, is information the cultural progressives already know, which is why, after high-fiving their sisters in arms -- “Go ahead, sistergirl. You don’t need no man! Liberate yourself from the oppression of patriarchy!” -- they continue to marry, continue to raise their children within marriage and continue to stay married. As a result, their children are gaining the strong moral and cultural foundations necessary for entry into and success within the middle class. Because their marriages are child centered, their children are going to college and graduate schools in greater numbers, accumulating wealth to a greater degree and passing on the value of child centered marriage to their children. And this is what really irks: Like so much else, the progressive left pushes forth this medicine they prescribe for the rest of us that they do not themselves imbibe.

Even according to the figures reported in the Times, all this single woman bliss is primarily concentrated among black and brown women. Only 30 percent of black women and 49 percent of Hispanic women are living with a spouse, compared with 55 percent of non-Hispanic white women and more than 60 percent of Asian women. Combine that with a 70 percent illegitimacy rate among black women and a 45 percent and rapidly climbing illegitimacy rate among Hispanic women, and one might be inclined to ask those on the cultural left, how’s all this deconstruction working out? Every piece of evidence suggests that it isn’t working out so well.  Communities with low marriage rates and high illegitimacy rates are more often than not hotbeds of poverty, crime and ill-education.

It may be much to the chagrin of cultural elitists but marriage is still the best environment in which to raise children. Were it not, we would see the shining faces of their children with all the rest at the bottom of the well. I read the Times article and recorded it under the heading “Do as we say, not as we do.” And then put it outside with the rest of the garbage.

---

Joseph C. Phillips is the author of “He Talk Like A White Boy."