An Unrelenting Stand for Families

The title of Ben Carson’s new book, The Perilous Fight: Overcoming Our Culture’s War on the American Family, attracted me to it immediately. Twenty years ago, I knew that a war had commenced against my family when my ex-husband filed for divorce. He had the affair, but the family court punished me for standing up for my marriage and family. After I began writing about my experiences, I learned I was not alone. By then, divorce causalities numbered in the tens of millions. No-fault divorce made it impossible to object. The negative consequences to children were horrifying.

Divorce, however, is but one piece of the greater cultural war on the family. Carson claims law and policymakers, economists, and educators have known about it for decades. So why his book now? The war has reached a “crisis” level, Carson says, with the American family “under heavy bombardment and sustained attack.” Our nation’s future hangs in the balance. For example, in a recent study measuring educational proficiency in 60 nations, the U.S. had the steepest decline. Although it spends a whopping $15,000 per capita on education, U.S. children rank 16th in science and 34th in math behind such math giants as Malta, Estonia, and Latvia.

For the first time in history, the marriage rate has dipped below 50%, along with the percentage of children living with their married parents. Population growth is at its lowest in history, at a level that is economically unsustainable as older workers retire. Divorce laws allow families to be torn apart. Bonds between parents and children are eroding. Add to that increases in poverty, pornography, substance abuse, crime, fatherless homes, and more. “America is wallowing in despair and desperation,” Carson writes. At the same time, the nation is broadly polarized, thwarting the unity necessary to address these challenges.

Faith, another vital component of American life, is rapidly dwindling with the percentage of citizens identifying as Christians and churchgoers declining steadily. Carson calls this a loss of “our shared language of right and wrong.” 

As he points out, the traditional family has long been the building block of our society—the means through which our nation has flourished and become a beacon of freedom, economic success, and opportunity. Its child-centric nature has provided the structure through which past generations have matured and thrived. Indeed, a study he references by Brookings and Princeton shows a strong quality of life association between traditional families, on the one hand, and increased wealth, upward mobility, and lower rates of child poverty, on the other, a phenomenon recently coined the “two-parent privilege.” Brad Wilcox’s new book, Get Married, is dedicated to proving this claim. 

The destabilization of the family, however, is causing serious ripple effects throughout communities, states, and the nation at large. Many of these disturbing statistics won’t be news to researchers in the field or of surprise to Americans confronted daily by political bloodsport, hate on social media, or financial and familial crises in their own lives. 

What’s new here is that Carson has assembled the data under one umbrella to demonstrate their interconnected and comprehensive nature to help readers understand the depth and severity of the problem. And the crucial fact that each cog traces back to an assault on the American family itself—from within.

Who’s leading it? According to Carson, the push for globalization is one source, but the greatest threat seems to come from today’s socialists. He refers throughout to a bestselling book published in 1958 by former FBI agent Cleon Skousen entitled The Naked Communist, which lists 45 goals for achieving the downfall of America. These goals align eerily with the destructive changes in our society and the means through which they are being achieved. Carson recounts them in meticulous detail. These means include:

• Use of the educational system to soften curriculum, rewrite history, gain progressive control of teachers unions, and challenge traditional values.
• Employment of the entertainment media to mock traditional families, portray fathers as dolts, and promote pornography and alternate lifestyles.
• Infiltration of corporate media and the press to hide news that doesn’t fit the desired narrative, stoke hatred, and push the falsehood that divorce is healthy and that mothers need careers to be fulfilled. 

Varied means are used to drive wedges between children and parents by overemphasizing the importance of identity, stirring up gender confusion, and advocating for censorship. In past generations, children reared with strong foundations of faith, family, and patriotism grew up to be citizens who weren’t easily pushed around. “Weakened individuals who are easier to bully and control” lack confidence, Carson argues, making them more susceptible to government dependence and meddling in all areas of their life.

Carson’s detractors will inevitably label him a conspiracy theorist and tar and feather him for prior service in the Trump administration. Attacking his evidence and logic will prove a far more difficult task. As he painstakingly connects the dots, enlivening the discussion with real-life stories from the news, the pieces fall effortlessly into place.

In a hallmark of true statesmanship, Carson refuses to write off his critics, whether it’s blended families, polygamists, or feminists. Having grown up without a father, he understands the single mothers working three jobs to support their children. As a man of faith, he acknowledges that scripture “leaves no room for abuse of any kind” in a marriage. He admits that some women are better leaders and that some husbands make “boneheaded decisions.” He applauds the tools of diversity and inclusion when wielded with “common sense.” But he reiterates that traditional families aren’t just his or anyone else’s mere preference—they are simply what work to sustain a healthy society.

Early on, Carson asks two questions that eventually answer themselves: 

Why would so many in our nation support a system that makes it more likely for younger generations to experience poverty and violent crime yet less likely to benefit from emotional stability and social mobility? Why would people be shamed and cancelled for attempting to shine a light on that reality?

Why indeed. Unless what he says is true. At the time of my divorce, I wondered why the family court would malign and threaten to punish me financially if I continued standing up in court. My ex’s lawyers pounded me with litigation paper. I was viciously attacked by online commenters to my articles; feminists shamed me and took up for my cheating ex-husband.

Years later, when I was able to step back from the emotional trauma, I saw clearly that these tactics were designed to shut down exposure of the truth. 

When I read the final two chapters that contain Carson’s passionate call to action, the sinking feeling I’d been having that his book had arrived too late began to lift. Champion your marriage, he says. Strengthen your family bonds, set clear boundaries for your children, have the difficult conversations, and minimize the cultural influences. On a community level, volunteer, mentor, and run for local office. Vote for the people and policies that grow and support families, preserve marriage and traditional families, and protect children. There is so much we can do individually if we heed his first piece of advice—refuse to be discouraged. “It’s never too late to take a stand and fight for the good of your family,” he writes.

He’d said something similar 12 years before when I heard him give the commencement address at my eldest daughter’s college graduation. Toward the end of the speech, he recounted the same story that opens his book about the turning point in the War of 1812. After the heavy bombardment of Ft. McHenry the night before, Francis Scott Key awoke to see soldiers taking turns holding up the American flag, which was still waving amidst the debris. Although America’s future had been in danger, its soldiers had demonstrated “the epitome of persistence, which is what we must believe, and that will lead us to success,” he said.

At the time, Carson had been preparing to retire when he felt pulled into the unfamiliar world of politics and entered the 2016 presidential race. Although he and his brother had been abandoned by their father, he had formed his own stable family. The faith and principles of hard work instilled by his mother, the role models of his uncles, and the support of his teachers had enabled a young black man from inner city Detroit to achieve the American Dream and become one of the world’s most celebrated neurosurgeons. If you’d told him that one day he’d be an advocate for families, “I would have politely questioned your sanity,” he says.

I understand. A few months before my ex-husband left, we’d celebrated our 20^th wedding anniversary and moved into our dream house. Our children were doing well in school, and I’d never been more hopeful about the future. And then it all came crashing down. I spent the next 20 years writing about the perils of divorce and advocating for divorce reform.

Until reading Carson’s book, I’d been on the verge of giving up on my own quest. I’ve watched books exhorting divorce and the demise of families rise to bestseller status. I’ve witnessed cowardly lawmakers refuse to enact divorce reform legislation. I’ve lost count of the stories of suffering men and women I’ve read about or heard on the other end of a telephone line. 

And then I read The Perilous Fight, where near the ending, Mr. Carson argues: “For the sake of families, we should enact legislation to remove or radically reduce incidences of no-fault divorce.” 

Thankfully, his book has given me a much-needed fresh shot of hope. 

Beverly Willett is a retired lawyer, author of Disassembly Required: A Memoir of Midlife Resurrection, and an advocate for divorce reform.

Editor's Note: The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or views of the Institute for Family Studies.