Family: New Breed v. the Old

In The Greening of America, Charles Reich offered the giddy prediction that the values of the 1960s counterculture would remake America. Although his thesis was vastly overstated, those values are indeed becoming widespread. In 1974, Pollster Daniel Yankelovich reported that America's noncollege youth were adopting the counterculture values of sexual freedom and self-fulfillment, and were increasingly rejecting patriotism, respect for authority and material success. Last week the results of another Yankelovich poll indicated that this shift in values "seems to be reshaping the nature of the American family and its child-rearing practices."

The study, The American Family Report: Raising Children in a Changing Society, was based on a probability sampling of 1,230 households with one or more children under 13. It found that 43% of the parents belong to the "New Breed." They stress freedom over authority, self-fulfillment over material success, and duty to self over duty to others--including their own children. The study found that New Breed parents are loving but self-oriented, and they take a laissez-faire attitude to their own child rearing. Says Yankelovich: "It's not the permissiveness of the '50s, which was child-centered and concerned with the fragility of the child. Today, the parent says in effect, 'I want to be free, so why shouldn't my children be free?' "

Yankelovich sees "the gradual evolution of a new implied contract between parents and their children." In his view, Traditionalists--the 57% of parents committed to stricter child rearing and older American values--implicitly say to their children, "We will sacrifice for you and be repaid by your success and sense of obligation." The New Breed message: "We will not sacrifice for you, because we have our own lives to lead. But when you are grown, you owe us nothing."

Heavy Strain. Yet the New Breed feels the tug of old values and Traditionalists feel the pull of the new. The study reports that Traditionalists are less willing to make sacrifices for their children than their parents were. Moreover, Traditionalists generally agree with New Breeders (though by a smaller majority) that unhappy parents should not remain married simply for the sake of the children.

One significant finding is that New Breed parents are so uncertain about their new values that they set aside their own beliefs when teaching their children. For example, only 13% of all parents firmly believe that "people in authority know best," but 69% want to teach the principle to their young. Reports the study: "The children of the New Breed are being taught patriotism, the importance of saving, the need for hard work, respect for authority and that having sex outside marriage is morally wrong, all of which their parents no longer believe themselves." Some other findings:

> Single parents (11% of the total) are more insecure about child rearing. Their children seem more unhappy: they get along less well with other boys and girls, and complain more about their parents than other children do.

> Belief in traditional sex roles is eroding, but a slim majority (52%) still feel that boys and girls should be raised differently.

>Most parents (82%) believe that mothers of small children should not work outside the home unless necessary for economic reasons, but three-quarters of their children (aged 6 to 12) see nothing wrong with mothers taking jobs.

> A majority of parents are dubious about the care in day-care centers, and esteem for elementary schools is low. Four out of ten parents do not believe that schools can be counted on to teach reading and writing.

Though nine out of ten parents in the survey say they would choose to have children if they had it to do again, Yankelovich reports that they are generally plagued with doubts and under heavy strain because of changing attitudes. Says he: "It's clear that the new values and the old have not yet found a synthesis."

Anita's Circle

SQUEEZE A FRUIT FOR ANITA BRYANT reads the T shirt worn in many of Manhattan's gay bars. But for homosexuals in Miami, Singer Bryant's crusade against gay rights is no joke. A born-again Baptist and TV promoter for the Florida citrus industry, she has spent most of the past three months organizing a drive to repeal Dade County's new ordinance barring discrimination against homosexuals in housing, employment and public accommodations. As a result of two rulings, that issue is scheduled to be settled June 7 in a public referendum.

On April 15 Miami Circuit Court Judge Sam I. Silver disappointed opponents of gay rights by ruling the ordinance constitutional. Last week the Dade County Commission, by a 5-to-4 vote, rejected a move to repeal the measure despite the budget-conscious argument that repeal is the only way to avert a referendum that would cost taxpayers at least $300,000. Bryant's heavily religious appeal ("God drew a circle and more or less asked me to step into it") has attracted fundamentalists and much of the Miami Catholic community, including family-oriented Cubans and Catholic Archbishop Coleman Carroll. Bryant is fond of quoting Leviticus, which calls homosexuality an abomination. Gays respond that the singer is arbitrary about which biblical injunctions to preach. Her husband, for instance, regularly violates Leviticus' admonition against shaving. Anyway, says Gay Writer Arthur Bell: 'Leviticus is as relevant to the times as Little Women."

The June 7 vote will probably have less to do with biblical quotes than with Bryant's charge that gays are a danger to Miami's youth. Says she: "They do much of their recruiting among children." Her basic fear, she claims, is that religious and private schools will be forced to hire homosexual teachers. At week's end Bryant and her group were hardly clear favorites of the electorate: a poll published in the Miami Herald showed 42% in favor of the gay rights ordinance, 33% opposed, with the rest undecided.

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