families and society and the needs for social supp quotes
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We urgently need a debate about the best ways of supporting families in modern America, without blinders that prevent us from seei...ng the full extent of dependence and interdependence in American life. As long as we pretend that only poor or abnormal families need outside assistance, we will shortchange poor families, overcompensate rich ones, and fail to come up with effective policies for helping families in the middle.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The ideal of the self-sufficient American family is a myth, dangerous because most families, especially affluent families, do in f...act make use of a range of services to survive. Families needing one or another kind of help are not morally deficient; most families do need assistance at one time or another.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The myth of the self-sufficient individual and of the self-sufficient, protected, and protective family ... tells us that those wh...o need help are ultimately inadequate. And it tells us that for a family to need help--or at least to admit it publicly--is to confess failure. Similarly, to give help, however generously, is to acknowledge the inadequacy of the recipients and indirectly to condemn them, to stigmatize them, and even to weaken what impulse they have toward self-sufficiency.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The myth of self-sufficiency blinds us to the workings of other forces in family life. For families are not now, nor were they eve...r, the self-sufficient building blocks of society, exclusively responsible, praiseworthy, and blamable for their own destiny. They are deeply influenced by broad social and economic forces over which they have little control.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Parents need all the help they can get. The strongest as well as the most fragile family requires a vital network of social suppor...ts.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »