The Effect of the Information Age on Family Values
The Effect of the Information Age on Family Values
By Dennis M. Parker
The Effect of the Information Age on Family Values
The world might be increasingly reliant on high-tech gadgets and new-media information sources, but, contrary to popular belief, that has only seemed to strengthened traditional family values. What we need to realize is that “traditional family values” is a very hard thing to define, because it means different things depending on different families’ traditions. “The Family” idealized by many of the voices in the family-values wars does not exist -- rather, families assume many shapes and forms, and all family types have strengths as well as vulnerabilities. Americans have still not come to terms with the gap between the way we think our families ought to be and the complex, often messy realities of our lives—or as John Gillis puts it, in his new book A World of Their Own Making, the gap between the families we live with and the symbolic families we "live by." Wikipedia (2006) defines Family values as a political and social concept or term that has been used in various nations across the world to describe a set of moral beliefs in society specifically in response to the perception by social or religious conservatives of declining morality within that nation itself. The term is vague in its precise definition as many different groups have claimed that it means different things. As such, "family values" has been described as a political buzzword or power word. In that, please note that most information contained within this paper is conjecture and personal views.
What do we value? What do we hold dear? What, in the end, are we willing to give our lives for? That is not an idle metaphysical question. Each day we make decisions about work, family, home, office, career, and self that defines who we are and what we cherish. Those who insist that there is a decline in family values fail to realize that the world we live in has
By Dennis M. Parker
The Effect of the Information Age on Family Values
The world might be increasingly reliant on high-tech gadgets and new-media information sources, but, contrary to popular belief, that has only seemed to strengthened traditional family values. What we need to realize is that “traditional family values” is a very hard thing to define, because it means different things depending on different families’ traditions. “The Family” idealized by many of the voices in the family-values wars does not exist -- rather, families assume many shapes and forms, and all family types have strengths as well as vulnerabilities. Americans have still not come to terms with the gap between the way we think our families ought to be and the complex, often messy realities of our lives—or as John Gillis puts it, in his new book A World of Their Own Making, the gap between the families we live with and the symbolic families we "live by." Wikipedia (2006) defines Family values as a political and social concept or term that has been used in various nations across the world to describe a set of moral beliefs in society specifically in response to the perception by social or religious conservatives of declining morality within that nation itself. The term is vague in its precise definition as many different groups have claimed that it means different things. As such, "family values" has been described as a political buzzword or power word. In that, please note that most information contained within this paper is conjecture and personal views.
What do we value? What do we hold dear? What, in the end, are we willing to give our lives for? That is not an idle metaphysical question. Each day we make decisions about work, family, home, office, career, and self that defines who we are and what we cherish. Those who insist that there is a decline in family values fail to realize that the world we live in has
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