the reason we have been fighting teen pregnancy is because as a society we decided not to support young parents, and because teen pregnancy happens out of wedlock with the fathers usually disappearing. i believe historically this comes from the fact that mothers used to stay at home, so as soon as you had a child you would not go to school anymore.
we could decide otherwise and create structures where young people, still in highschool or studying, are at the same time able to live together and have children.
> because teen pregnancy happens out of wedlock with the fathers usually disappearing
Usually disappeared. Once DNA tests were invented, it became straighforward to go after them. Underrated breakthrough to support children and single mothers.
In the US, there is ~$115 billion worth of child support debt outstanding. Even with DNA testing, we’re not going after the folks who aren’t supporting their offspring, mostly because they are low income and have nothing to take to satisfy these debts.
> Yet, 2020–2022 data in the KIDS COUNT® Data Center reveal that just 23% of U.S. female-headed families reported receiving any amount of child support during the previous year (down from 26% in 2018–2020). Female-headed families refer to unmarried women living with one or more of their own children under age 18, which may include stepchildren and adopted children.
> One in three kids — nearly 24 million kids total — lives with a single parent, mostly single moms. In fact, according to 2022 Census Bureau data, of the 10.9 million one-parent families with children under age 18, 80% were headed by a mother. This makes women the more frequent custodial parent and the majority of those who need child support.
While fertility rates are down, roughly 40% of annual pregnancies in the US are unintended (per the Guttmacher Institute). There is still much work to do to drive down the rate of unwanted pregnancies.
yes, but what would be the point? they are still in school too, have no work and no income, so they are not going to pay child support either. the girl is better off without such a guy.
my point is to support couples who actually want to be together to build a family. getting pregnant from a guy you messed around with is not a family. the goal is to prevent unwanted pregnancies by making it easier to have wanted ones in a supportive environment. hunting down a guy who didn't mean to get you pregnant after it happens unintentionally doesn't accomplish that.
In some tribal societies, everyone fucks everyone, whatever children are born are born, and since nobody knows who the father is they all care for all of them collectively.
Is it possible this is actually a better model than the nuclear family?
Even if it is, there's never any guarantee that something which works at the scale of a tribe can be transplanted to a nation of millions.
To a limited extent, the school system itself is how we collectively care for the next generation. How far can it be pushed in the direction you ask about?
one idea is multi family homes. the idea is that instead if each family having having all their own space for themselves, you have a lot of shared spaces. consider that you need to be private, that's your bedroom and a bathroom. but you can share the kitchen, the living room, a play room, a reading room, a tv room. you don't have to share everything. there is a lot of flexibility in how you arrange the space, but the overall idea is that you have multiple families together, and because you share some things you also get to know each other better and kids can run around and feel at home everywhere. if you need a babysitter because you want to go out, you can simply check in with one of the other families if they are at home, and ask if it is ok if you go out.
the two main benefits are that parents get to know each other better, just like they would in a village, instead of being anonymous like we are most of the time, barely knowing who our neighbors are. and the sharing of resources. my dad loved books and music. i basically grew up in a library. it was nice when i had to make a school report that required some research, but it would not have hurt if those books would have been shared with a lot more people. ok, we have public libraries too, but you get the idea. by sharing resources you are able to get a lot more things that you would not be able to get if you lived alone.
Yes I wonder why. Teen pregnancy sounds so amazing and inconsequential for individuals and societies alike that teens should just be inoculated as a rite of passage or something...
compared to the alternative, it definitely is. The problems with it are mostly artificial ones our society created. If you were God and redesigned human society from scratch, why wouldn't you have them procreate in their most healthy, fertile, and horny years?
Because teenagers are not known for having the best judgement? Because parenting comes with commitments and obligations that, early in life, conflict with other things that are seen as desirable for a well functioning society (education, equality, opportunities)? Having more experience in life generally makes you a better/better-prepared parent?
Don't read me wrong, I'm not stating that the current economic/social pressure is good at producing healthy/happy parents/families, it just doesn't seem good either to turn teenagers into parents. The "sweet spot" probably lies in between, and what you say is very much an appeal to extremes.
we could decide otherwise and create structures where young people, still in highschool or studying, are at the same time able to live together and have children.