0:17

Hello, Faithful Politics listeners and

0:17

viewers.

0:21

If you're joining us via YouTube, it's

0:21

great to be back for another episode of

0:26

Faithful Politics with you.

0:28

I'm Josh Bertram, your Faithful host, and

0:28

I'm joined by our political host, Will.

0:33

It's good to see you, Will. How are you doing?

0:37

Absolutely. So today we're excited.

0:40

We get to interview on our show, Timothy.

0:44

Carney, he's a senior fellow at the

0:44

American Enterprise Institute where he

0:49

works on civil society, family, localism,

0:49

religion in America, economic competition,

0:55

and electoral politics.

0:57

He's concurrently a senior columnist at

0:57

the Washington Examiner and Mr.

1:02

Carney's forthcoming book, Family

1:02

Unfriendly, How Our Culture Made Raising

1:08

Kids Much Harder Than It Needs to Be.

1:10

And we're going to be talking to him. about that and anywhere else that the

1:12

conversation leads us.

1:15

So thank you so much for being on the show

1:15

today, Tim.

1:19

Can I call you Tim? Yes, Tim, thank you.

1:21

Thanks for having me, guys. Absolutely, man, it's such a pleasure to

1:23

have you.

1:25

So if you could just, I gave a short

1:25

little snippet there, but kind of help our

1:30

listeners understand who is Tim Carney and

1:30

why did you become interested in writing

1:36

about families and how our culture is

1:36

unfriendly to them.

1:41

Yeah, so my wife and I, we have six

1:41

children.

1:43

So this is a topic where I actually kind

1:43

of, thank you.

1:47

And praying for my wife as I'm on tour.

1:51

So it's something I know a little bit

1:51

about.

1:54

I'm also a political journalist. You mentioned AEI where I'm a...

1:57

a scholar, a fellow here. So I do lots of research and a couple of

1:59

things have really emerged and become

2:04

clearer in the last few years. One, there's an epidemic of childhood

2:05

anxiety.

2:09

You guys have probably seen about this and

2:09

it's so much at the pediatrician

2:15

organizations, the Biden White House

2:15

declared this epidemic.

2:19

It's definitely much higher than it ever

2:19

was before.

2:22

Parents are stressed. Also, you've probably noticed a birth rate

2:23

is falling and it's low.

2:26

Yes. want 2.7 kids or so and they're getting

2:27

about...

2:34

well, sometimes when it comes time to

2:34

chores I feel like some of my kids are

2:37

about.25. But our birthrate's way down to 1.7 and so

2:41

all of this...

2:44

Some people say, oh, well, the young

2:44

people are selfish, or it's just about

2:48

economics. I don't like either of those explanations.

2:50

And I don't think the data and my

2:50

reporting, uh, would say that those

2:55

explanations are adequate. And so I realized it had to be something

2:56

with our culture.

3:00

That is to say every kid needs two parents

3:00

to raise them ideally, but that's not

3:05

enough families need to be supported by

3:05

culture in all sorts of ways, though.

3:11

Our culture is family unfriendly, whether

3:11

it's, you know, local.

3:15

sports like a rec league where the coaches

3:15

are volunteers being replaced by a

3:20

expensive and intensive travel team or you

3:20

end up in a tournament in Delaware every

3:24

weekend or whether it's dating and mating

3:24

culture where the kids the

3:29

twenty-somethings aren't getting married

3:29

the apps are breaking their brains and our

3:34

culture just isn't into the sacrifice and

3:34

commitment that's marriage and finally our

3:38

values which is that the idea of

3:38

commitment of laying down your

3:45

that those are out the door and we're

3:45

hyper individualistic, we're transactional

3:50

rather than relational. So all of these aspects of our culture I

3:51

think are causing the parental stress, the

3:55

childhood anxiety, and the aversion to

3:55

starting a family.

4:01

That's awesome. I want to ask you a question about

4:02

something that was on the inside cover of

4:06

your book, because I learned a word, and

4:06

it said, Tim Carney, the father of a

4:12

passel of kids himself.

4:15

And I've never heard of the word passel.

4:18

It was like a unit of measurement.

4:20

Like, what is a passel? Well you know how like there's a murder of

4:23

crows?

4:25

There's a passel of carnies. Hahahaha

4:30

I think they were just trying to find the

4:30

marketing folks thought that like a horde

4:35

of kids or a mob would be too scary.

4:41

And sometimes when we show up people are

4:41

kind of intimidated.

4:44

Is this some sort of Irish gang that is

4:44

arriving at our place?

4:49

But no, actually one of the arguments I

4:49

make in the book is that in a lot of

4:53

places... In a lot of situations in my life, just

4:54

showing up with my kids makes other people

5:00

happy. And so you throw, and not because my kids

5:01

are.

5:05

awesome and we're not the von trapp family

5:05

they don't show up and start singing in

5:09

some harmony or whatever they just show up

5:09

and they're kids but like a friday well

5:14

maybe i need to try harder um show up at a

5:14

friday fish fry we're catholics show up at

5:20

a friday fish fry at the parish and

5:20

suddenly people like yes we have a quorum

5:25

you eight people walk in and um and the

5:25

one of the stories i tell in the last

5:31

chapter is of this teacher in

5:35

Five of my kids and then she sends out an

5:35

email being like oh, I won't be here up

5:40

for the last day school So tomorrow's my

5:40

last day, so we couldn't get her a gift.

5:43

There was no way We're not my wife and I

5:43

are not super planner ahead people and so

5:49

we don't have time to go get her a gift

5:49

And so Kate is like what are we gonna do?

5:52

So when the teacher opens a door expecting

5:52

it just to be my littlest one at 730 It's

5:58

all five of them that she taught

5:58

including, you know, the boys who are now

6:01

towering over her and she starts crying

6:01

and my kids

6:05

and it's a big hug and I realized the gift

6:05

I brought her was my kids.

6:09

So people make fun of parents and they're

6:09

like, you think your kids are God's gift

6:13

to the world? And I was saying, you know, I do think

6:14

children are a gift.

6:18

They're a gift to us. So this is my long way of saying a passel

6:19

was a vaguely positive way of saying an

6:24

unruly mob of kids. Ha ha ha.

6:26

Mom. great. You know, I got to say when I was reading

6:27

through your book that I felt that two

6:32

things at one time at one thing, I felt

6:32

just this tension of like, yeah, the

6:41

things you're saying make sense.

6:44

And just thinking about the amount of

6:44

people I know that fit into these

6:48

categories of overworked, stressed, trying

6:48

to figure out how to get their kids.

6:55

on you know into the rat race my kids got

6:55

to be number one they're gonna fail

6:59

college because they got a c and third

6:59

grade math you know what i mean this kind

7:04

of things like just this stress and this

7:04

overwork and then at the same time just

7:11

this longing to like man it would be nice

7:11

to have a simpler

7:17

life. And you know, one of the points that you

7:18

make is talking about the amount of stress

7:22

that's on parents, which I'd love for you

7:22

to go into.

7:24

But I wanted to ask you.

7:27

So my wife sent me an article last night.

7:29

You know, she'll be like, say, hey, you

7:29

should have this person on the podcast.

7:33

She was very interested in your book when

7:33

we received it.

7:36

She and she's like, hey, did you see the

7:36

article about the parents that got

7:43

convicted? for the first time for manslaughter about

7:45

their children's actions, the parents got

7:50

convicted. And of course, I'm not trying to

7:51

oversimplify this, right?

7:54

Because, you know, giving your kid a gun

7:54

and whatever, I don't know all the ins and

8:00

outs of the case and I don't wanna speak

8:00

out of turn.

8:03

But this idea that now parents are like,

8:03

oh wait, now I gotta worry that I'm gonna

8:09

get convicted if my kid does something

8:09

really terrible.

8:14

What, and that kind of just adds, talk to

8:14

us about what's the stress, what's

8:18

happening in our society with this. So there's this quote that I use about

8:20

twice in the book from this woman,

8:24

Stephanie Murray, who says, once having

8:24

children became this

8:30

deliberate choice that you personally

8:30

chose.

8:33

You signed up for this responsibility. You, mom and dad, signed up for this

8:35

responsibility.

8:38

Instead of it, it's not anymore the kind

8:38

of, well, that's sort of what most adults

8:42

do. You get married, you have kids. You can opt out of that course, but that's

8:44

the normal, natural course of doing it.

8:48

Now it's, well, intentional.

8:51

You know, we talk about intentional

8:51

living, but suddenly this is one thing you

8:54

specifically decided to do, like buying a

8:54

boat.

8:57

Well, then you're responsible for it. Totally responsible.

9:00

Obviously parents have the primary

9:00

responsibility for their children.

9:04

There's no doubt about it. Obviously the nuclear family is the most

9:05

important institution in society, I think.

9:10

But that idea that you control your kids'

9:10

outcome, that's part of the logic there,

9:15

which just isn't true. And that's part of what I try to tell

9:16

parents to relax is the good news is you

9:21

don't have to worry that much. So bad news is because you can't actually

9:22

control how your child turns out.

9:27

So that can be a little bit relieving.

9:30

that we need to apologize for bringing our

9:30

children on an airplane.

9:34

You know, you've seen those videos,

9:34

somebody gets a little goodie bag to pass

9:37

everyone around them with like a drink

9:37

ticket and earplugs and you get it they're

9:43

trying to be nice but no children are not

9:43

something we should need to apologize.

9:47

And then if our kid does mess up, whether

9:47

it's mess up in that he gets kicked out of

9:52

school for you know some violation, he you

9:52

know he brought in pot, he doesn't do his

9:58

homework, he talks back to the teacher or something. as dramatic as what you're talking about.

10:02

That idea that, well, we have failed if

10:02

our kid messes up.

10:08

First of all, I mean, I'm a Christian.

10:10

I think that's a deeply unchristian idea I

10:10

think your children are made in the image

10:15

of God and they have infinite value no

10:15

matter what they do and They're better and

10:19

worse ways to raise kids, but the pressure

10:19

that comes Okay, you need to the kids

10:24

should be listening to Mozart in the womb

10:24

You need to make sure that they reach

10:29

these certain milestones by this age You

10:29

should be getting them a tutor You should

10:34

be putting them on a travel team instead

10:34

of just letting them

10:38

little league where they're being coached

10:38

by some volunteer dad or all these things

10:42

that are supposedly bad It it's the cause

10:42

of that childhood anxiety There's no doubt

10:48

in my mind that childhood anxiety is

10:48

caused by a lack of kids Just like riding

10:53

their bike until the streetlight turns on

10:53

There's all sorts of reasons why that's

10:57

disappeared But one of the reasons is this

10:57

parental pressure that every minute you

11:01

need the kid needs to be Getting enriched

11:01

to build up for some measurable success as

11:07

an adult rather than and then being a kid having an expansive

11:09

childhood.

11:12

Yeah, you know, and you just mentioned

11:12

that you're Catholic, you're Christian.

11:17

I'd love maybe for you to kind of unpack,

11:17

like, how sort of your own faith belief,

11:24

and maybe just the broader sort of just,

11:24

you know, community of believers, like how

11:28

their faith really kind of ties into like

11:28

raising a child and before you answer, I,

12:15

you know, I know for me, um,

12:18

Like, so we live in Virginia. My wife's family lives in Indiana,

12:20

Northern Indiana.

12:23

My family lives in California.

12:26

So in Virginia, like it's just the four of

12:26

us.

12:29

Like I've just me and my wife and my, and

12:29

my two young boys.

12:33

Um, and our, our church family is

12:33

basically like our family.

12:36

I mean, like when, when my, my oldest was

12:36

going through a lot of like medical

12:41

issues, he had a brain tumor. Um. wow.

12:45

And it was the church family that really

12:45

helped support us.

12:48

Like Josh, Josh's church, because I go to

12:48

Josh's church.

12:53

And I'd imagine that's probably pretty

12:53

similar across the country.

12:58

So maybe you can kind of elaborate about

12:58

the role of community and faith with

13:03

raising kids. Yes. So we mentioned the birthrate a little bit

13:04

earlier.

13:08

The birthrate for people who go to church,

13:08

synagogue, mosque, whatever, at least

13:13

weekly, is well above two.

13:16

It's about in the middle for people who

13:16

have a religious connection but aren't

13:20

going every week. And then it's lowest for people who don't

13:21

belong.

13:24

And that's not necessarily atheists. That's people who are not attending.

13:29

And. I know there are some pastors out there

13:31

that probably think that it's their

13:35

eloquent homilies on be fruitful and

13:35

multiply that are making the difference,

13:40

but what you're calling the church

13:40

community is really the, that's the big

13:44

question, the big issue here. So we could abstract it a little bit and

13:46

say, families need communities, they need

13:52

support, they need mentors, they need

13:52

older couples, they need a place to meet,

13:56

meet somebody like-minded. They need to have babysitters.

14:01

in Maryland before we moved across the

14:01

river to Northern Virginia or old Paris

14:04

air, there was a list of babysitters that

14:04

it was like the college age or recent

14:09

graduate kids or older high school kids of

14:09

other parishioners and you would call on

14:14

them. And then so all of those things get tied

14:15

together.

14:18

But to be more specific about religion,

14:18

some of the studies I looked at said

14:21

exactly how does religion cause people to

14:21

have more kids.

14:26

And it's just values.

14:29

If there are parents who say Well, our kids are the most important

14:31

thing and we want them.

14:34

I mean not our kids I shouldn't say that

14:34

because kid centric can be a problem Our

14:37

family is the most important thing and we

14:37

want our children to have their own

14:41

families Well, they will make sacrifices

14:41

to do that.

14:45

So if grandma helps watch a firstborn

14:45

She's much more likely to get a second

14:52

grandchild Statistically there are studies

14:52

about that Israel is the center chapter in

14:57

my book have a higher birth rate than all of

15:01

Europe.

15:04

And guess what? In Israel, 70% of mothers get help from

15:04

their own mother in raising their kids.

15:10

It's half that rate in Europe and probably

15:10

in the United States as well.

15:15

That's all tied up with religion.

15:17

It's not necessarily the heart of

15:17

religion, but it's, it's tied up.

15:22

And religious communities do that much

15:22

better than secular communities do.

15:27

And so not to say that a great

15:27

neighborhood or a great public school

15:31

won't, those do release some of the stress

15:31

on parents.

15:34

They do probably result in more babies

15:34

being born, but notably you can't find.

15:40

I comb through the data. What is a measurable, identifiable

15:41

community that has?

15:45

more than two babies. Everyone that I found was a religious

15:46

community.

15:50

Wow, that's amazing. You know, so we, I grew up in a

15:52

Pentecostal tradition and my wife and I

15:58

were both ordained in the Assemblies of

15:58

God.

16:01

She's still ordained. I actually let my credentials lapse and,

16:02

but that's not what the show is about.

16:07

But what we, what we did notice that when

16:07

we would go to like,

16:15

you know, like conferences or something.

16:17

When we would go there, people were so,

16:17

like they loved seeing our kids.

16:23

They wanted to like, you know, hold the

16:23

baby.

16:28

They were...

16:30

just so sweet to our children and we felt,

16:30

oh wow.

16:33

And we had a noticeable, it was

16:33

noticeable, the difference between like,

16:37

hey, you're coming into this community

16:37

that values kids versus most of the rest

16:43

of our experience, like taking into a

16:43

restaurant, people give you like looks

16:48

when your kid's loud, they're upset about

16:48

it, you know?

16:51

And I get it when I go out on a date, the

16:51

last thing I wanna do is hear a kid

16:55

screaming because that's what I had to

16:55

deal with at home.

16:58

But kind of like, The sense I get from reading your book is

17:00

that this has been a shift in American

17:07

culture. Kind of go into some of these, what are

17:09

some of these major shifts?

17:12

You had alluded to them before, but maybe

17:12

even, you can pick out one or two that you

17:17

wanna go into more detail on. What are the big shifts that have happened

17:18

that have made it so that kids, like our

17:24

culture is more unfriendly?

17:27

to families as a whole and to having

17:27

children, what are some of these shifts

17:32

and what do they look like for us to be

17:32

able to recognize them?

17:36

So some of it is just us being more.

17:40

Workists I use the word workism that was a

17:40

sort of almost there's this writer Derek

17:45

Thompson at the Atlantic and he said As

17:45

our society is more secular we get all

17:51

these new atheisms his atheism is like,

17:51

you know a godless religion and that work

17:56

ism is one of those and You know America's

17:56

we've always had a work ethic.

18:00

That's and I believe it's true that doing

18:00

good work is

18:10

Absolutely. But trying to find meaning in our careers

18:11

is...

18:20

I, it's hard for me to talk about this

18:20

because I'm so lucky.

18:23

I get, this is my job, my job and my

18:23

family.

18:26

They really overlap, but ultimately I've

18:26

had bosses who have always said, your

18:29

career is never going to bring you as much

18:29

value, as much reward as your family.

18:34

But that's not an idea that's widely held.

18:36

And so I looked at the countries that try

18:36

to sort of stimulate their birth rate by

18:41

spending a lot of money. A lot of them do it by subsidizing

18:43

childcare and subsidizing parental leave.

18:47

And these are great things for families,

18:47

especially needy families.

18:50

but they don't end up being pro-family as

18:50

much as they end up being pro-work.

18:55

They end up subsidizing work. So that's one thing.

18:58

And then as the number of children gets

18:58

smaller in a society, I think that makes

19:03

people, you'll see two different effects.

19:06

One, people who visit like the sort of

19:06

nominally Catholic countries along the

19:11

Mediterranean, they find all these

19:11

would-be grandmas coming up and just

19:15

wanting to hold every little baby.

19:20

a cafe that nobody brings kids into and

19:20

you're the first person to bring a kid in

19:23

there in a month, suddenly everybody's

19:23

scowling at you.

19:26

And there have been multiple stories

19:26

recently about South Korea, how unwelcome

19:31

children are in most public places because

19:31

they have so few.

19:35

So that's why it's a little spiral down.

19:38

That's why I think we should worry about a

19:38

birth rate at 1.6, 1.7, because then more

19:43

people are going through their days not

19:43

seeing kids.

19:46

So I live in Washington, You know, to the degree Congress still

19:49

does anything, a lot of it is done by

19:54

congressional staffers. These are, you know, 20-somethings, early

19:55

30-somethings.

19:59

Vast majority of them have no children.

20:01

Not only that, the vast majority of them,

20:01

if they, you know, live in D.C., ride the

20:06

metro, walk, Uber, take a scooter, they

20:06

will go Monday through Friday without

20:13

seeing a kid. Now maybe if they go to catch, you know,

20:14

the...

20:18

that also appeals to kids. They'll see kids or they'll see the kids

20:19

going into the movie next door while

20:24

they're, but it's very easy to go seven

20:24

days a week if you're in some of these

20:28

people's lives without seeing children. They're the ones who are making the

20:30

policy.

20:32

They're the one, and if children aren't on

20:32

their mind.

20:35

So a big part of it is just this spiral

20:35

of...

20:39

less kids makes people think about kids

20:39

less.

20:42

And guess what? We need to accommodate children.

20:44

You need to build playgrounds. You need to build sidewalks.

20:47

So one of the, chapter three, it has the

20:47

word fecundity in the title, which I

20:53

realized not everybody knows that, but

20:53

it's having a bunch of kids.

20:58

And I said, if you want fecundity in the

20:58

sheets, you need walkability in the

21:02

streets. You need to let your kids run.

21:07

That's what parents need more of. And so as we accommodate families less, it

21:09

adds to the stress.

21:15

That's pretty mean. I'm going to put that on a t-shirt, I

21:16

think.

21:21

Because it...

21:27

Because then they'll ask me about it, I'll

21:27

point them to your book.

21:31

It's a win-win. But you said something that I thought was

21:33

actually pretty profound, and I hadn't

21:38

really ever thought about it, about these

21:38

subsidies tend to be...

21:44

pro-work, not necessarily like pro-family,

21:44

which I've never really quite considered.

21:51

Cause I remember when, I don't know if it

21:51

was a couple of years ago, you know, AOC,

21:58

Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez, like our favorite

21:58

liberal, like on my side anyways, you

22:02

know, like put out something about her

22:02

staffers can bring their kids to work and

22:07

like, she wants to really sort of support

22:07

the sort of like family thing and...

22:11

At the time, I thought, hey, that's pretty

22:11

awesome.

22:14

You know, like, bring your kid, whatever.

22:17

But to your point, it's like, they're

22:17

still at work.

22:20

Like, how much quality time can you spend

22:20

with your kid?

22:24

Like, at work. So I'm interested in, like, what are some

22:25

things the government can do to, like,

22:30

actually encourage families to just spend

22:30

more time together?

22:34

Well, I'll answer twofold because you

22:34

talked about employers.

22:39

So one thing is just the word

22:39

accommodation I use.

22:44

That has to get used more. Partly because it's at odds with one idea

22:46

of treating everybody absolutely equal.

22:52

Because if you accommodate somebody,

22:52

you're not treating them equal.

22:54

If there's somebody who needs help getting

22:54

upstairs, or you open an elevator for

22:59

somebody that normally wouldn't be open to

22:59

the public, that's an accommodation.

23:03

That's in line with the way AOC uses the

23:03

word equity, right?

23:07

Try to get every, and so families need

23:07

accommodation would be part of it.

23:11

So one is, the number one thing that

23:11

parents want

23:16

disability. If every working mother got to snap her

23:17

fingers, most of them would actually keep

23:22

their job, but they would be home at 3

23:22

o'clock when the school bus drops off, or

23:27

they would be there in line to pick up

23:27

their kids at 3 p.m.

23:30

That's what most American mothers who

23:30

currently work would want.

23:33

And so that sort of accommodation as much

23:33

as possible is going to be the thing.

23:38

A couple other things I talk about is

23:38

helping parents of newborns.

23:46

Sleep so that that's where maternity leave

23:46

is really important paternity leave is

23:50

great, but not for everybody So for me I

23:50

took off two weeks and then my wife wanted

23:54

me out of the house So I thought man if I

23:54

could have used my paternity leave when my

23:59

daughter was like 14 and we could go on a

23:59

canoeing trip for a week So that's sort of

24:05

having that parental leave you can use it

24:05

at any time It's also a way to build

24:08

loyalty with your employees as far as what

24:08

government can do I mentioned sidewalks

24:15

and playgrounds There's an infrastructure of family that

24:16

needs to be built.

24:20

We had a debate when I lived in Maryland

24:20

in my home county about putting more

24:24

sidewalks in certain neighborhoods. And people said, there'd be some trees,

24:26

even some cherry blossom trees that would

24:29

be killed if we put in sidewalks.

24:32

And somebody said, but my kids have to

24:32

literally walk in the road to get to

24:37

school. And one of the homeowners said, well, your

24:37

kids shouldn't be walking to school alone

24:42

anyway. And it's just like, that's the

24:44

infrastructure, the norms all have to be

24:49

put in place to accommodate.

24:53

And daycare subsidies, unfortunately,

24:53

again, they provide a big benefit for a

25:00

lot of families, especially needy ones,

25:00

but they more drive people into work, as I

25:05

said. And then there's questions that we can

25:06

talk about money.

25:10

Child tax credits, child allowances, all

25:10

of that stuff.

25:14

Most of the countries that have spent a

25:14

ton of money, they haven't seen a real

25:17

improvement either in child wellbeing or

25:17

in the birth rate, but just sort of what

25:22

we're doing now, I think is probably about

25:22

right.

25:25

You give parents a $2,000 tax credit for

25:25

each kid.

25:29

It should grow with inflation.

25:31

I would, in a couple other ways, expand it

25:31

a little bit just to provide sort of

25:36

equality for families vis-a-vis other

25:36

people, but just throwing a ton of

25:41

at it often doesn't help if you're not

25:41

changing the culture actively.

25:46

Yeah, that idea of how do you actually

25:46

change the culture is such a big issue.

25:53

Like I've heard things about China and

25:53

it's one child policy and then trying to

25:59

change it and shift it and how difficult

25:59

it is when you've had a generation or

26:04

more. Right. Several generations that are like having

26:05

more than one child is bad, you know, and

26:11

then trying to shift that. How difficult that is.

26:14

Yeah, I wonder if I'm Thinking about the economics of all of

26:16

this, like one of the points that you made

26:22

was that it's expensive, right, to, like

26:22

the economics aren't the whole story, but

26:28

it's expensive to raise children, and part

26:28

of the expense is this pressure.

26:35

that sit in certain pressures that you

26:35

have for your children to succeed.

26:40

Can you kind of describe that and help us

26:40

understand what that means, like the

26:45

economic pressure, like how does it

26:45

contribute, and then how is it not the

26:50

whole story? Um, that's a great question.

26:53

So first of all, if you think of, well, I

26:53

was thinking of this one tweet by a

26:59

journalist friend of mine when right

26:59

before they had their first baby, it was,

27:02

there's this common sort of genre form on

27:02

Twitter where it's like two, a two step

27:07

process. And so step one is research is the cost of

27:08

a night nurse.

27:12

So somebody to come and. you put your kid back to sleep so you can

27:14

actually sleep when you have a newborn.

27:17

Research is the cost of a night nurse.

27:19

Step two research is how to have a

27:19

socialist revolution.

27:23

In other words, this writer could only

27:23

imagine help coming from the market or the

27:28

state. And so if you then expand that of, okay,

27:29

well, I want my kid to be able to play

27:35

baseball, but you don't think of sort of

27:35

the community thing where you volunteer

27:40

and you coach first base and you know,

27:40

it's pretty low cost and you man the snack

27:46

shack and it's fun, but not amazing.

27:49

And instead you're thinking, well,

27:49

baseball is supposed to be about really

27:52

learning to hit and throw. And I'm going to look into the cost of

27:54

travel ball. It's like $800.

28:00

or suddenly this becomes insane. Similarly, if you think you need to get

28:02

your kid a tutor, we got our kid a tutor

28:06

for sort of remedial math and I realized

28:06

everybody else there was not remedial.

28:10

It was let's get ahead of our classmates.

28:13

If you think you need to get them the

28:13

absolute best of everything, which a lot

28:18

of people do, we ran a focus group and

28:18

there were men who said the reason I'm not

28:21

ready is because if I got married now and

28:21

started a family, I'd be able to give them

28:25

the bare minimum, but I don't wanna give

28:25

my kids a bare minimum.

28:27

I wanna give them the best. If what you mean by that is sort of love

28:29

and advice and a great safe environment,

28:36

great. But they mean family vacations that are

28:36

super memorable and the Eiffel Tower and

28:43

yada yada. And so those pressures really add to the

28:44

cost of raising children.

28:50

Now how much does

28:53

economics explain either the anxiety of

28:53

children or the low birth rates.

28:58

The anxiety, a lot of the data shows that

28:58

the wealthier families...

29:05

their kids end up with more anxiety,

29:05

precisely because they're more pressure.

29:08

These sort of high achieving public

29:08

schools that everybody pays $1.4 million

29:14

to live in that school district, and so

29:14

many of the kids will go on to IVs.

29:18

Those have more childhood anxiety than

29:18

working class and poor high schools.

29:22

That was a study that, of all the things I

29:22

saw, that was the most surprising thing.

29:26

More abuse of drugs, not because kids can

29:26

afford it more, but again, because of that

29:32

anxiety. The other thing is wealthier families

29:34

don't really have more children in

29:38

America. Wealthier countries certainly don't have

29:39

more children worldwide.

29:43

Millennials aren't really poorer than Gen

29:43

X or than the boomers.

29:48

If you look at their wealth adjusted for

29:48

inflation at a given age, it's about the

29:52

same. You can't say...

29:56

raising kids has become more unaffordable

29:56

and therefore, that's why people aren't

30:01

having kids, that's why they're more

30:01

stressed because the data just don't point

30:04

to that. With one big exception, in the last three

30:04

years, the price of housing has gone way

30:10

up. That statistically does deter people from

30:11

getting married and starting family.

30:16

But the baby bust started back in 2008.

30:19

We've had fewer babies every year for 15

30:19

years.

30:21

So it definitely predates this housing

30:21

inflation we've had in the last three

30:25

years. Hmm.

30:27

That's really interesting. I'm curious if you've done any studies,

30:28

because I know that you also do electoral

30:35

politics as well. Is there any sort of noticeable trends

30:37

between whether a Democrat or Republican

30:45

or an office and really... Oh, is in office.

30:48

No, I was going to say, though, as far as

30:48

more liberal parents are more stressed out

30:54

and. more liberal parents do have fewer kids.

30:58

I think though, if you, and so Will, you

30:58

might be the test case of this, I think if

31:02

you control for religiosity, that would go

31:02

away.

31:06

I think it's that more conservative

31:06

parents, I mean more religious parents are

31:09

just, for reasons we discussed at the

31:09

beginning, are more likely to have kids,

31:12

and more likely to, less likely to sign up

31:12

to this achievement obsession that causes

31:19

the anxiety. Oh, interesting. Yeah, yeah, because, you know, I was, I

31:21

was wondering, I mean, maybe we are sort

31:26

of a bit of the exception. I mean, my wife and I are both, you know,

31:27

token liberals.

31:31

We knew we wanted to have kids when we

31:31

first got married, and we got married in

31:36

2008. But we were kind of like part of that.

31:41

of that demographic where we're like, I

31:41

don't know, we just, I mean, we weren't

31:45

making a whole lot of money, you know, and

31:45

we're just like, it was just her and I,

31:49

and we wanted to wait a couple years just

31:49

to kind of enjoy married life.

31:53

And then when we finally committed

31:53

ourselves to having kids, it wasn't as

31:58

easy as we thought it was going to be.

32:01

And there was like this whole, like, I

32:01

don't know, like, the situation that was

32:07

brewing, like, we had a foster child

32:07

because we

32:11

and we wanted to find more, a job that

32:11

paid more.

32:16

So then finally, on one day, it's like our

32:16

foster child got placed, so then we

32:23

wouldn't have that responsibility. We got a job offer, and we were living in

32:24

Washington state at the time, we got a job

32:28

offer to move to Virginia that paid more

32:28

money.

32:31

And my wife took a pregnancy test and she

32:31

was pregnant.

32:36

All in one day and we're just like, all

32:36

right, God.

32:39

If that's a sign, I don't know. I'm gonna go with the

32:44

You gotta nail that down, that's a great

32:44

day.

32:47

find it because I remember that I posted a

32:47

picture of the pregnancy test on social

32:52

media and it just kind of went crazy.

32:54

All the grandparents, they all freaked

32:54

out.

32:57

But that's our story.

33:00

But I also know other people that are

33:00

like, I don't want to have kids because

33:03

of, fill in the blank reason, the

33:03

environment, the money, the blah, blah.

33:09

What's your best argument for why

33:09

Americans should have kids?

33:14

So first of all, that kids are good.

33:20

As I was saying earlier, they make people

33:20

happy.

33:23

And it's funny. in sort of think tank world, you're always

33:25

looking for social science data.

33:28

And I was reading this study and it was

33:28

showing how, you know, people are more

33:32

likely to contribute to charity, like

33:32

throwing money in a basket if there, if

33:36

there are kids that they can see. And so not counting parents, other people

33:38

and a charity that has nothing to do with

33:41

kids. And then there were other studies about

33:42

sort of the happiness of, uh, societies

33:46

and correlating with their birthright. And then suddenly I realized, wait, I'm

33:48

trying to prove that like babies make

33:52

people happy. Hahaha! evident.

33:56

Especially the non-parents, the people who

33:56

aren't waking up in the middle of the

33:59

night, they're made happy by it.

34:01

But so, that's one.

34:05

Number two is, well I'll just skip to the

34:05

end because you guys I think will get

34:09

this. When I'm arguing for sidewalks and

34:10

communities and little league instead of

34:16

travel sports, I'm saying these are ways

34:16

to make parenting easier.

34:20

But- If you've done it, you know that raising

34:21

children will be the hardest thing you'll

34:24

ever do. But if you have goals for yourself that

34:25

are high enough, like being a man or a

34:33

woman of virtue, as I would put it,

34:33

becoming a saint, then parenting is

34:38

actually the easiest road. In the book, I call it a cheat code for

34:41

virtue.

34:45

It doesn't guarantee you're going to be

34:45

virtuous, but it makes it easier.

34:48

There are other ways to be a good man or a

34:48

good woman, but they're all harder.

34:53

The Bible says we're supposed to feed the

34:53

hungry and clothe the naked.

34:57

I wake up in the morning and there are

34:57

hungry, naked people in my house.

35:02

They're, they're right there waiting for me. It's just easier to be selfless when you

35:03

have.

35:08

kids that you're responsible for.

35:10

So that is, that's sort of my ultimate

35:10

line, because I speak on this to law

35:14

students and college kids who I know will

35:14

be career oriented.

35:18

And that's the argument I make, that final

35:18

one is the main argument I make to steer

35:22

them towards parenthood. You should want to be something big,

35:23

better than, you know, wealthy and

35:26

successful. You should want to be virtuous.

35:28

And this is actually going to be the

35:28

easiest path to that.

35:32

Yeah, and I'm curious, like, what does the

35:32

data say about, you know, childless

35:39

adults? you know, in their sort of, you know,

35:40

retirement age type thing, because I mean,

35:46

I often think my mom, she's like this

35:46

little old 70s Asian lady that's like

35:53

still super active. She's on a bowling team and all kinds of

35:54

other stuff.

35:57

But like at one point in time, she's going

35:57

to become too old to bowl.

36:01

And like, I feel a certain level of

36:01

responsibility and obligation to like take

36:05

care of my mom, Yep.

36:10

being like 70, 80, 90, whatever, and not

36:10

having kids to just be with me in my

36:17

convalescent home, or when I'm on my

36:17

deathbed.

36:21

So is there any data that shows the

36:21

well-being of adults that don't have kids?

36:26

More than data, there's just stories out

36:26

of Japan, basically.

36:30

This society where the birth rate has been

36:30

super low, where workism became something

36:34

of a religion. And there's just stories of the sadness of

36:36

the elderly, of people dying and not being

36:41

discovered for weeks. I try not to, in Family Unfriendly, I

36:42

don't wanna lean on that.

36:46

I think it was a little too dark to really

36:46

say this is a reason to have kids is to

36:51

avoid this fate. But certainly the fact that there are

36:55

countries that are a generation like Japan

36:55

and South Korea ahead of us in this

37:02

decline or Europe that's half a generation

37:02

ahead of us, those show us kind of what

37:08

the future is and that's one of the ways

37:08

in which it's more sad.

37:13

And so that idea that again children liven

37:13

up and happy up the world that I try to

37:21

make it on the social level but you're

37:21

making the point Will that it definitely

37:24

happens on The individual level but I did talk to

37:26

this woman I was interviewing I ended up

37:32

on a trivia team full of strangers at a

37:32

bar I was working on the book and I took a

37:37

break. I got to the bar. I go on trivia and This one woman I tell

37:38

her I have six kids and she says oh that

37:43

sounds awful and then she's married she

37:43

has a good job she says she doesn't want

37:47

kids and Out of nowhere without anybody

37:47

else saying this

37:52

She says, I hate the argument that you

37:52

need kids have someone to take care of you

37:55

when you're when you're older with all the

37:55

money I saved from not having kids, I'll

38:00

be able to afford a nice clean retirement

38:00

home.

38:04

And she was always obsessed with that

38:04

cleanliness the filth of kids that diapers

38:10

kept using the word litter. And so that's a mindset that actually

38:12

would sort of prefer the

38:19

less human, prefer somebody who you're

38:19

paying to take care of you instead of the

38:24

thought of, I mean, nobody wants to think

38:24

of their kids changing their adult diapers

38:29

when they're 85, but on another level,

38:29

that's, that's the natural way.

38:35

And so I actually think that there is a

38:35

mindset in America that's more

38:38

transactional, that's more

38:38

individualistic, too individualistic, that

38:44

would rather have everything be a

38:44

transaction and arm's length.

38:49

rather than, I changed your diaper 60

38:49

years ago, now you change mine.

38:55

Yeah, you know, I it's interesting.

38:59

What do you think that the like, how does

38:59

technology play a role in all of this?

39:07

Like, what role does even like the sense

39:07

of like, one of the things you talk about

39:17

is the sense of dread that people have

39:17

that

39:20

bringing their kids into this world that

39:20

is so difficult or is heading towards.

39:27

disaster or whatever it is, you know, just

39:27

pick your apocalyptic, you know, doesn't

39:34

matter which side you are. Everyone has an apocalyptic scenario that

39:35

they're thinking about and worried about.

39:43

What role does like technology and this

39:43

idea of how we're advancing and that might

39:50

even be dystopian, what role does that

39:50

play?

39:53

And what are kind of some ways to think

39:53

about that in a healthier way?

39:58

So at the start of the book, I talk about

39:58

the fear that there's the belief that

40:03

there's a skilled kidnapper around every

40:03

corner.

40:06

This one guy tells a story of getting up.

40:09

He takes his kid to Costco. And if you ever gone to Costco, there's

40:11

like pizza that's really affordable right

40:14

outside. So they get the pizza, they sit down and

40:15

then he's like, oh, I forgot the napkins.

40:20

He walks 20 feet over, gets the napkins,

40:20

comes back.

40:23

Oh, I forgot the straws. Walk 20 feet over, get the straws, come

40:24

back.

40:26

Get a tap on the shoulder. That's a no-no.

40:29

I work for Child Protective Services. You shouldn't leave your child like that.

40:33

Think about that. If there was somebody, like in a Liam

40:34

Neeson movie, who's wanted to kidnap your

40:40

child and had a waiting getaway car and

40:40

they were skilled and armed, yes, that

40:44

would be a dangerous situation. So that is the mindset of somebody who is

40:46

constantly terrified.

40:51

And you see this a lot with the constant

40:51

worries about like, oh, your child is

40:54

going to get sex trafficked.

40:56

And they think that these are people,

40:56

girls, who are like grabbed from a

41:00

shopping cart in a mall, which is not the

41:00

way things happen.

41:04

stranger abductions happen, there's 100 of

41:04

them a year, which is absolutely horrible.

41:08

But that means your child, over the course

41:08

of their childhood, has less than a one in

41:12

one million chance of something like that

41:12

happening to them.

41:16

But because if 100 of them in the US

41:16

happen a year, and you follow the news

41:20

constantly, in your mind, like some people use an

41:21

evolutionary psychology explanation, we

41:26

don't think that we can think of 330

41:26

million people as being us, but then when

41:32

we're taking in the social media, we're

41:32

not just watching the local news anymore,

41:35

we're not just talking to the neighbors,

41:35

we're taking the social media, so all

41:38

these horrible things happen and we think

41:38

that they're going to happen to us and

41:43

then where I, towards the end of the book,

41:43

I get into climate change and I quote

41:49

Miley Cyrus water so why would I want to bring kids

41:51

into this planet?

41:55

And so these ideas and then but then I

41:55

quote Ezra Klein, a liberal New York Times

42:00

writer who's very worried about our what

42:00

we're doing to the climate thing.

42:05

Every climate scientist I know has kids.

42:08

And in fact, if you've noticed you,

42:08

there's been this switch where a lot of

42:13

the people who write about climate change,

42:13

they've gone from constantly telling dark

42:18

stories to trying to tell more hopeful

42:18

stories because they realize all they were

42:22

doing was depressing people and making

42:22

them despair.

42:25

And that wasn't the way to get the change

42:25

they want.

42:27

So I think, uh, I mean, this, I guess this

42:27

isn't so much about social media, but just

42:32

the modern media and the ability to get.

42:35

news from all over the country, all over

42:35

the world constantly.

42:38

And then I work as a journalist and I know

42:38

that sort of negative and scaring people

42:43

is easier to get clicks than telling an

42:43

even-handed story.

42:49

So I really think that negative worldview

42:49

is at the heart.

42:52

That's why the last chapter I used the

42:52

phrase, civilizational sadness, a belief

42:57

that we just aren't good. We being humans, we being Americans and

42:59

that sort of thing.

43:02

So actually I will, if I can, I want to

43:02

ask you a question.

43:07

Do you worry about sort of either you and

43:07

your children causing climate change or

43:13

about the world in the future? Do you worry about, you know, the U S and

43:15

our history of systemic racism, all of

43:20

these things, how did they make you more

43:20

dour?

43:23

Do you see other people with your politics

43:23

being more dour?

43:26

Yeah, you know, what's interesting, and

43:26

I'm actually glad you asked that question,

43:31

because our family dynamic is very

43:31

interesting.

43:35

So my wife is white, and our kids don't

43:35

really look anything like me.

43:42

So I don't really worry too much about my

43:42

kids ever being called the N-word in

43:48

school, you know, or whatever.

43:51

So like from a racism standpoint, that's

43:51

not necessarily a big fear for my kids.

43:56

They look pretty white. And from an environmental standpoint, I

43:58

mean, I do worry about climate change and

44:01

I, but it's not a deterrent because like I

44:01

feel that I'm gonna raise my kids in a way

44:08

that should, you know, my anxiety about

44:08

climate change like increases that my kids

44:14

will be the ones that'll figure it out. I mean, like my oldest, I mentioned

44:16

earlier who had a brain tumor.

44:19

I mean, I don't know. how many times I've sat next to him, like

44:21

in a hospital bed, just talked to him

44:24

about, hey, what do you wanna do? Trying to get him to be thinking about the

44:25

future.

44:28

And, you know, and he's got a heart for

44:28

like medical stuff and he's like, yeah,

44:32

maybe I'll be a doctor and I can help

44:32

other kids.

44:34

And I'm like, perfect. Like, like, like that's the hope I have

44:35

for having children.

44:41

You know, I'm not necessarily all that

44:41

doom and gloom cause my kids do bring me

44:44

joy and I think that they will bring joy

44:44

to the world.

44:47

And it just gives me a lot of hope for the

44:47

future.

44:50

So. Um, yeah, appreciate that.

44:53

But, but now, now I want to ask you a

44:53

question just about the Dobbs decision.

44:56

So, so with, you know, with the

44:56

overturning of Roe, um, one would imagine

45:03

that there would be more kids being

45:03

brought into the world, you know, um, you

45:08

know, rightly or wrongly. And I say that somewhat with a grain of

45:10

salt, because I know that the, the

45:13

overturning of Roe was, was a pretty big

45:13

deal, um, especially for folks kind of on,

45:18

on the left side of the political

45:18

spectrum.

45:22

And this kind of ties into the earlier

45:22

point we were making about subsidies from

45:25

the government. Like, in 20 years, you know, these kids

45:27

that are being born, you know, are going

45:35

to be sort of in sort of our society.

45:37

And I really would love to kind of get

45:37

your sort of thoughts, predictions about

45:42

like, what impact you think that may have

45:42

sort of on America as a whole, because I

45:48

don't think that our— economy, our system is necessarily set up

45:50

to raise these kids.

45:57

And there are organizations out there, we

45:57

spoke with Abby Johnson, who, big

46:04

anti-abortion activist. And when we talked to her, she talked

46:06

about some things her organization was

46:09

doing, like helping moms-to-be buy them

46:09

cars, set them up with jobs.

46:15

She just had a lot of infrastructure to

46:15

help.

46:17

moms that were sort of debating whether or

46:17

not to have an abortion.

46:21

But I'd love to kind of get your take on

46:21

like, what effect do you think the dial

46:25

position might have on sort of the family

46:25

unit?

46:28

I mean, that's a big question and a tough

46:28

one.

46:32

So I'll just sort of say my first thoughts

46:32

and reactions.

46:36

So there is definitely data that...

46:40

As I would put it, that the Dobbs decision

46:40

saved lives, that in places like Texas, a

46:44

lot of babies were born who would have

46:44

been aborted otherwise.

46:49

How many it is that, like the statistics

46:49

on that are very, very murky.

46:53

A lot of women cross state lines, et

46:53

cetera.

46:56

So we don't know what the number will be.

46:59

Obviously an overwhelming majority of

46:59

women who seek abortions are not married

47:06

and in most of these cases, the father.

47:09

isn't going to be in the picture. So we're increasing the number of children

47:11

who either are being raised, well, a lot

47:16

of them will be put up for adoption, but

47:16

certainly more children will be being

47:19

raised by their single mother, a lot of

47:19

times a single mother who's a teenager,

47:23

and that is not the best environment to

47:23

grow up in.

47:27

Obviously, all the clearest thing in all

47:27

of social science is that children are

47:33

best off being raised by a pair of married

47:33

parents.

47:36

And so we'll increase the number who are

47:36

raised

47:39

Circumstances will that have negative

47:39

effects theoretically?

47:43

Yes. I mean the what was it Malcolm Gladwell

47:43

tried to argue that abortion reduced the

47:48

crime rate I I'm not convinced that that's

47:48

true.

47:52

I don't I have trouble Thinking about it

47:52

in that way because I have trouble

47:59

thinking pointing to somebody and saying

47:59

you shouldn't have been born and so am I

48:05

dodging your question will a little bit

48:05

yes, but

48:08

It's okay. I tried to wrestle with the real

48:09

implications there, but if we really are,

48:16

try to be utilitarian and consequentialist

48:16

in our discussion of children coming into

48:23

the world, I think that's a dark road.

48:26

I think we could say, okay, well, out of

48:26

the three of us, Tim, Josh, and Will, if

48:30

we had to rank us, who would have been

48:30

better off not being born?

48:33

Who's the most valuable? And that's just, I don't like that way of

48:34

reasoning.

48:39

Yeah, I'm definitely very sympathetic to

48:39

your line of thinking.

48:44

You know, I, and to that point, I'm sure

48:44

that this book is going to have its share

48:52

of critics, if it hasn't already,

48:52

hopefully, right?

48:57

And like, what is, and it's gonna

48:57

challenge some prevailing cultural and

49:03

political narratives that are out there.

49:08

How have critics so far responded to your

49:08

arguments and how do you engage critics?

49:14

How have you done in the past? How do you plan to engage in as, as you

49:15

know, book reviews and all that stuff

49:21

comes out now?

49:23

So I've not yet been blessed with that

49:23

many critics, we'll see.

49:28

But one of the forms... way to think about it, blessed with

49:30

critics.

49:32

I need to think about that one. One of the forms of criticism is that I am

49:33

trying to let parents off the hook by

49:42

talking about the need for social support.

49:46

I think a lot of people and probably

49:46

politically, this would be more folks on

49:49

the right because they value the.

49:54

parental authority and they value the

49:54

nuclear family so much.

49:58

They develop this model, mental model of

49:58

the family where parents have full

50:02

responsibility for kids at all times.

50:06

And because you do see sometimes in

50:06

public, the kid who's acting up, the

50:09

parent isn't even trying to whip them into

50:09

shape.

50:11

And then some people imagine if a kid is

50:11

screaming or acting up, clearly the mom is

50:16

doing something wrong in the moment or in

50:16

general, and I hate that idea, but it's

50:22

very widespread. When I just did an MSNBC hit, some of the

50:24

feedback wasn't a sort of liberal

50:30

attacking me for wanting kids, women to

50:30

have more babies.

50:33

It was somebody saying, I don't agree that

50:33

society, it's society's job to raise

50:37

people's kids. It's just the parents' job.

50:40

So that's going to be one form of

50:40

criticism.

50:42

Obviously, again, the primary

50:42

responsibility is with the parents, but

50:46

parents are not enough to do it. From the left, I think a lot of my

50:49

criticism, my book takes off.

50:54

a lot of the current manifestations of

50:54

feminism.

50:57

And I say actually more stay at home

50:57

parents would be good and I acknowledge

51:01

that a vast majority of those are gonna be

51:01

women.

51:03

So I'm saying America needs more stay at

51:03

home moms.

51:06

I think that's going to upset a lot of

51:06

people who totally reject that.

51:09

There's a lot of people, especially in

51:09

Washington, who think that our economic

51:12

policy needs to reduce to approximately

51:12

zero the number of stay at home moms

51:17

because that would be good for the economy. I say that a lot of modern feminism is

51:19

workism,

51:24

company men and I reject that and so I

51:24

expect I'll get some criticism for those

51:31

arguments. Well, I guess, why stay at home mom

51:33

instead of stay at home dad?

51:38

I mean, I'm very pro stay at home parent,

51:38

personally, especially like in their early

51:47

age before they go to school and whatnot.

51:51

But you know, I mean, like if I'm in my

51:51

and currently my wife does stay home.

51:58

just because of all the medical issues

51:58

with our kids.

52:01

But I would have no issues reversing the

52:01

roles, if the roles were reversed.

52:07

Although I think my wife does a much

52:07

better job than my kids than I do,

52:10

probably. So you can ask my kids if that's true or

52:11

not.

52:16

But I guess, what's the argument for a

52:16

stay-at-home mom versus a stay-at-home

52:19

dad? Simply that that's where the preference

52:20

is.

52:24

So I mean, I could argue from nature that

52:24

when they're newborn, obviously, dad can't

52:29

nurse the baby. And there's a lot of science saying that

52:31

the pregnancy really does form these

52:36

bonds. And if a lot of dads are honest, they'll

52:37

say it wasn't until eight months when.

52:42

my daughter was sitting up and really

52:42

making eye contact that I really bonded

52:46

with them. And so in those first few months, there's

52:47

all sorts of biological reasons.

52:51

And then just culturally, if you just poll

52:51

adults, poll parents, the ones who are

52:58

more inclined towards full-time parenting

52:58

are going to be women.

53:03

So my argument isn't that we just need

53:03

stay at home moms.

53:06

It's we need more stay at home parents. And then one of the retorts is.

53:12

those people are going to be women. And I will say yes and they say so this

53:14

then creates economic inequality between

53:20

men and women. And I say but you're arguing you're saying

53:22

that women are their preferences are

53:26

wrong. So who's being the good feminist here?

53:28

Me saying more women want to stay at home

53:28

let's let them.

53:33

or you saying, no, women, you're doing it

53:33

wrong.

53:35

Be more like the men. So again, I have no objection to stay at

53:36

home dads.

53:39

In fact, one of the things I say in the

53:39

book is that if you had more stay at home

53:42

dads, it would make it easier for other

53:42

people to be stay at home dads.

53:47

Where when I would be with the older kids

53:47

when we had a newborn, and if I went to

53:53

the playground. And I was the only guy there that provided

53:54

some value.

53:58

But at some point it's just like, A, this

53:58

isn't as fun.

54:01

B, you know, it could be borderline

54:01

inappropriate if I'm going to like mommy

54:05

and me yoga classes as a dad.

54:08

And and so to have I said, if my old

54:08

county, Montgomery County, was a pretty

54:14

liberal county in Maryland, I said what

54:14

they should do is have if they want to be

54:19

like gender equity, people have daddy and

54:19

me like woodworking things with the kid.

54:24

during the day. Like really, this gets at another point

54:25

that like really dadding is different than

54:30

moming. So now I'm not saying why there should be

54:31

but that really needs to be celebrated.

54:36

We need a positive model of masculinity

54:36

and it's not gonna be Andrew Tate and it's

54:42

not gonna be well you can be just like mom

54:42

and try to feminize dad but instead I

54:47

always post on Twitter or Instagram when I

54:47

go and I play my kids in basketball

54:52

because I can still barely taller than I am just because I'm more

54:54

wily than he is.

54:58

But then when I play my 9 year old I

54:58

demolish him and I get my other kids to

55:03

film me just absolutely stuffing Sean.

55:06

If I could dunk on him I would dunk on him

55:06

all day but I don't have those ups.

55:11

My wife wouldn't get as much a kick out of

55:11

destroying a 9 year old in basketball as I

55:15

do. So, dadding is its own thing and that's

55:16

another thing we need to...

55:19

only argument I needed. I know, but it's funny.

55:24

It's like if there were more stay-at-home

55:24

dads, I'd imagine you would see an

55:29

increased trend of like childhood

55:29

injuries.

55:34

Because the level of tolerance that I have

55:34

for my kids getting hurt is vastly

55:41

different than my wife's.

55:46

Do it backwards. No, you know, my last question to you is

55:47

just kind of on the topic of just having

55:55

sort of a two-parent household. Do any of the trend statistics that you

55:57

looked at make any...

56:02

differences with like same-sex parents,

56:02

you know.

56:06

Yeah, no, I looked at that a little, not

56:06

deep enough to find that much of a

56:13

difference. All of the data is kids thrive better when

56:14

they have a pair of married parents.

56:20

I haven't seen data that distinguishes

56:20

between same sex and opposite sex parents

56:25

in that regard. Yeah, that's a great question, Will, an

56:28

interesting question.

56:33

I remember, was it, I want to say it was

56:33

Wilcox or something that brought out,

56:39

maybe it was, no, someone from the

56:39

University at Austin that brought out a

56:45

study that talked about how

56:49

same like there's some difference and it

56:49

was seen as negative for children in the

56:54

same-sex household and then they got I

56:54

mean he got like drilled about it and it

57:01

caused a huge controversy so I think

57:01

there's definitely a need for more study

57:06

on that and more kind of data along those

57:06

lines and we'll get that more right since

57:11

that 2015 decision that'll come out more

57:11

and more I think as the

57:18

have more data to help us discern what's

57:18

actually going on there.

57:22

Now whether it will be, whether I'm trying

57:22

to think of how to say this

57:28

without people getting angry at me,

57:28

whether there's gonna be a difference,

57:34

right, that's yet to be seen, I think, but

57:34

I don't know.

57:38

I'm speaking out of a lot of ignorance in

57:38

that regard.

57:44

I did have one question though, this last

57:44

question, and you're welcome to comment on

57:50

anything I just said, but we have a lot of

57:50

people.

57:55

To Will's point, we have a lot of people

57:55

that watch this show that are on different

58:02

walks of life, and they're atheists and

58:02

Christians and Muslims.

58:10

We are both Christians, but we try not to

58:10

make this a distinctly Christian podcast

58:15

necessarily.

58:19

What is the message, the biggest message

58:19

that you want them to hear

58:25

heart from the book, even just from you

58:25

personally, and kind of tied with that,

58:31

what's your biggest concern moving into

58:31

the future in this election season, moving

58:37

beyond what like, yeah, I think I probably

58:37

said it well enough there.

58:43

What's your biggest concern and what's the

58:43

most important thing you want people to

58:47

hear? Um, you hinted at some of the concern,

58:49

which is a real despair and dourness about

58:55

the future. I think that becomes self-fulfilling

58:55

because one of the things it does is it

59:00

reduces optimism and hope.

59:02

It also reduces trust.

59:05

And that's one of the big enemies that I

59:05

run into when I'm talking about this is,

59:09

Oh, well, I don't trust my neighbors. So I can't let my kids run around the

59:10

neighborhood or I don't trust our, our

59:14

local schools anymore. So falling social trust is really my

59:16

biggest concern and that can spiral out of

59:22

control because as people become less

59:22

trusting, they might become less

59:26

trustworthy and that spirals out of

59:26

control.

59:29

So my hope and my message is that.

59:32

When. I talk about the sadness and sometimes we

59:34

think that we're bad.

59:38

And I'm a Catholic. I believe that I'm a sinner.

59:41

I know that I sin. I go to confession. And one of the things we say in confession

59:42

is I resolved to sin no more.

59:46

So far I'm O for about a hundred in

59:46

sinning no more after confession.

59:50

But that resolution is, uh, I think that's

59:50

what you feel when you look at your

59:57

newborn baby, you think, look at this

59:57

innocent child.

1:00:01

I had that innocence, I frittered it away. I want to be a better person going

1:00:03

forward.

1:00:06

And so the hope and the motivation comes

1:00:06

from your own child.

1:00:10

But I think it more broadly comes from a

1:00:10

society where you see the next generation.

1:00:13

These people are going to inherit something. They're going to inherit what we

1:00:15

inherited. So you think of yourself as being in a

1:00:17

continuity rather than being this solo,

1:00:23

one man sailboat sailing through

1:00:23

treacherous waters.

1:00:27

So family gives us that sense of being

1:00:27

part of a continuity.

1:00:31

And I think it will give us the hope. That's so good.

1:00:35

So how can people follow your work and

1:00:35

where can they get the book?

1:00:39

So Family Unfriendly is available anywhere

1:00:39

books are sold.

1:00:42

Go to your local bookstore and talk loudly

1:00:42

about it in front of all the other

1:00:46

customers, how great it is. It's on Amazon, on BarnesAndNoble.com, et

1:00:47

cetera.

1:00:51

I'm on Twitter at TPCarney for Timothy

1:00:51

Patrick Carney.

1:00:55

Check out Wash and AEI.org as well.

1:01:00

Alright great, well once again guys this

1:01:00

has been Timothy Carney and we really

1:01:07

appreciate the conversation that we've had

1:01:07

today.

1:01:09

Tim thank you for being on really

1:01:09

appreciate it.

1:01:15

Absolutely and to our audience thanks so

1:01:15

much for watching and or listening and

1:01:21

until we see you next time keep your

1:01:21

conversations not left or right but up.

1:01:26

Thanks guys, God bless. See ya.