The New Normal

A woman I know is a single mother, the mother of two children whom she has spent most of her adult life raising. Her youngest just graduated from high school and she's on her own now, so to speak. She and her live-in boyfriend packed up and left big city living for the rural life. Maybe, some day, if they get settled enough, she might even marry the guy. Who knows?

The mother classifies herself as Christian. When her boyfriend was seriously injured in a freak accident, she called out to God. "Why would God do such a thing?" I, of course, didn't want to say, "Why wouldn't He? You aren't exactly living in sin on His behalf." But the guy has recuperated and she's not concerned any more. She is still concerned about her kids. When her 18-year-old son asked if he could have his girlfriend over to spend the night, she was aghast. "You don't get to do that!" "Why?" he asked. "You do." Her rationale? "This is my house, not yours. When you have your own house, you can decided what to do in it." Her older daughter is working full time and going to school full time to become a nurse. Mom is very careful to warn her repeatedly and publicly not to get involved with relationships with guys. "You've got your schooling to take care of. There's plenty of time after that."

This mother is not the point of this discussion. This mother simply illustrates a large number of parents offering an almost unified moral landscape. "I can do what I want and no one can tell me it's wrong. You know I know it's wrong because I keep telling my kids not to do it, but I'm going to indulge even while I tell them not to."

This parenting message is in contrast to the other side which, while certainly wrong, is at least more consistent. Like the story of the 50-something mother of 5 daughters who was upset that her 14-year-old daughter did not want breast implants. Outrageous! Mom had them. Her four older daughters had them. Why wouldn't the youngest daughter??!! But, no, this rebellious black sheep of the family wants to go to university and travel the world. Big breasts are necessary. Loser. In this scenario, mom has horrible issues ... that she is inflicting on her daughters as a good thing. Wrong, but consistent. "I do it; you should, too."

Indeed, parenting is not the point. What I find fascinating is the double standard that first single mom carried around. It's wrong to have sex out of wedlock ... unless, of course, I'm doing it. Or, it's fine to do it ... unless, of course, it's one of my kids who are. Like the double standard our country carries around on such issues. A president who commits adultery in office (and I mean literally in the office) is okay, but a general who did should resign. Adultery in theory is evil but if you actually do it it's not so bad. We all know that cheating on your spouse is dastardly, but there are websites dedicated to facilitating it and ... hey, look! ... Phoenix (my part of the world) ranked third in married men with mistresses. Reportedly some 31% of married men in Phoenix have a mistress. (And isn't it odd that a married man with a woman on the side has a "mistress", but a married woman with a man on the side has an "affair"? Why is one "evil" but the other just "an affair"?)

And we've nurtured these double standards for a long time. Men have a lot of sex with a lot of partners because that's what men do. They want "easy women", but they surely wouldn't marry one because no one wants to marry an easy woman, you know. So women need to be virginal. That, at least, was the case for some time. Of course, today it ain't necessarily so. Now men are evil for all their philandering and women that do it are feminists, leading the charge for equality.

A lot of time is spent disagreeing over what's right and wrong, it seems. "Oh, sure, you think that this behavior is wrong, but I think it's fine." I suspect it's not really as difficult as that. I suspect it's more of the same issue. We know what's right and wrong, but if I'm doing it, it's okay. We determine morality moment by moment instead of submitting to an actual standard. And we expect that God will surely agree with us on our current moral code, right? Well, He'd better! Or we're going to complain!