Get QuoteDark Inspirational Quotes App

" You can't judge a family's health by the form it's in at a given moment. "

Stephanie Coontz

Related Quotes:

" It no longer makes sense to see singlehood and marriage as two distinct and stable social categories that should be accorded different legal rights and social esteem. "

Stephanie Coontz

" Some people may long for an era when divorce was still hard to come by. The spread of no-fault divorce has reduced the bargaining power of whichever spouse is more interested in continuing the relationship. And the breakup of such marriages has caused pain for many families. "

Stephanie Coontz

" Cooking ought to be, quite literally, child's play. And every child ought to have access to the game. Just don't tell them it's healthy. "

Stephanie Coontz

" Marriage has been in a constant state of evolution since the dawn of the Stone Age. In the process, it has become more flexible - but also more optional. "

Stephanie Coontz

" When I speak on work-family issues to audiences around the country, some of the biggest complaints I hear come from individuals who are described by the census as living in 'non-family households.' They resent the fact that their family responsibilities literally don't 'count,' either for society or for their employers. "

Stephanie Coontz

" As Americans lose the wider face-to-face ties that build social trust, they become more dependent on romantic relationships for intimacy and deep communication and more vulnerable to isolation if a relationship breaks down. "

Stephanie Coontz

" Feminism insists on women's right to make choices - about whether to marry, whether to have children, whether to combine work and family or to focus on one over the other. It also urges men and women to share the joys and burdens of family life and calls on society to place a higher priority on supporting caregiving work. "

Stephanie Coontz

" There's nothing wrong with celebrating the good things in our past. But memories, like witnesses, do not always tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. We need to cross-examine them, recognizing and accepting the inconsistencies and gaps in those that make us proud and happy as well as those that cause us pain. "

Stephanie Coontz

" Too often, tributes to the home-cooked meal assume every family has a schedule that gets everyone home by 5:30 P.M. And too many recipes treat cooking as a solitary pursuit that requires the cook - still most often Mom - to take time away from other family interactions and chores. "

Stephanie Coontz

" One thing standing in the way of further progress for many men is the same obstacle that held women back for so long: overinvestment in their gender identity instead of their individual personhood. "

Stephanie Coontz

" I've had the kind of complex life I write about. I was a single mother for 12 years. I'd been engaged. The wedding fell through. I then discovered I was pregnant and opted to have the child on my own. I was a professor. I was in my mid-30s. I could manage it financially. "

Stephanie Coontz

" Parents who obsess about every detail of child-rearing and orchestrate their children's 'resumes' may run themselves ragged while their own personal identities and adult relationships wither for lack of care. "

Stephanie Coontz

" The origins of modern marital instability lie largely in the triumph of what many people believe to be marriage's traditional role - providing love, intimacy, fidelity, and mutual fulfillment. The truth is that for centuries, marriage was stable precisely because it was not expected to provide such benefits. "

Stephanie Coontz

" The place where we keep our clothes isn't always the only place where we keep our commitments. "

Stephanie Coontz

" In the 1970s, family history wasn't yet thought of a serious field for study. I was terrified of being laughed at by other historians. I called my book 'The Social Origins of Private Life.' It should have been 'As Pompous as You Want to Be.' Every sentence was academic jargon, and if I said X, I qualified it with Y. "

Stephanie Coontz

" Marriage is no longer the main way in which societies regulate sexuality and parenting or organize the division of labor between men and women. "

Stephanie Coontz

" A primary motivation for introducing no-fault divorce was, in fact, to reduce perjury in the legal system. "

Stephanie Coontz

" When you can't change what's bothering you, one typical response is to convince yourself that it doesn't actually bother you. "

Stephanie Coontz

" People feel better when their spouses have good friendships, over and above the effects of their own friendships. "

Stephanie Coontz

" Why do people - gay or straight - need the state's permission to marry? For most of Western history, they didn't, because marriage was a private contract between two families. The parents' agreement to the match, not the approval of church or state, was what confirmed its validity. "

Stephanie Coontz

" Hyper-parenting has many pitfalls. Overprotected and overpraised children may develop an inflated sense of entitlement. "

Stephanie Coontz

" It is ironic that so many politicians claim to defend traditional Christian values of 'faith and family.' In fact, a radical antifamily ideology permeates Christ's teaching, and the early Christian tradition often set faith and family against each other. "

Stephanie Coontz

" It's always seductive to know where one stands in relation to the average. "

Stephanie Coontz

" Because we live so much of our adult lives as singles, it no longer makes sense to assume that marriage is the only way people will organize their obligations and commitments. "

Stephanie Coontz

" For most of America's history, people typically aspired to acquire 'a competency' rather than great riches. A competency meant the ability to comfortably sustain a household without depending on others. 'Competence' also meant being capable and reliable. The American Dream was that people who worked hard and capably could support their families. "

Stephanie Coontz

" Contrary to myth, 'The Feminine Mystique' and feminism did not represent the beginning of the decline of the stay-at-home mother but a turning point that led to much stronger legal rights and 'working conditions' for her. "

Stephanie Coontz

" As a child, I was lucky enough to spend each summer with my grandmother. "

Stephanie Coontz

" Over the ages, some societies have accorded far less value and respect to singles than to married individuals. "

Stephanie Coontz

" Donald Trump has tapped into a deep vein of racism, nativism, and misogyny. "

Stephanie Coontz

" Many alternatives to traditional marriage have emerged. People feel free to shop around, experimenting with several living arrangements in succession. And when people do marry, they have different expectations and goals. "

Stephanie Coontz