Anti-family

It hasn’t escaped my attention that there is an election going on at the moment. It’s all over the news channels, and ‘yard signs’ have sprung up outside many of the nearby houses, professing allegiance to either McCain-Palin or Obama-Biden. I sometimes wonder how this must affect the neighbourly atmosphere when opposing signs are sported by two houses next to each other. There must be a few rictus smiles while the garbage is being taken out.

I could write bucketloads on the differences between American and British politics, but for now I’ll confine myself to one general observation, which is that the major issues which define one half of the political divide from the other seem to be quite different. In the UK, it tends to be economic and social policy (do you tax and spend on public services, or do you reduce taxation and trust personal wealth to create a higher quality of life?) Here, moral issues like abortion, which in the UK would generally be regarded as an interesting side-issue, seem far more central to the debate, and define the ‘conservative’ and ‘liberal’ agendas.

I occasionally hear liberals accused of being ‘anti-family’. The first time I heard this term, I had to think hard about what it might mean. It strikes me as being essentially meaningless, a bit like being ‘anti-air’ or ‘pro-water’. Families just exist, don’t they? How can you be pro or anti them? Surely one’s relationship with one’s family is an intensely personal matter, something over which one frequently has little control? Some people are no doubt part of a great family, where everyone gets on really well, enjoys spending time together, and supports each other; equally, I’m sure other people, through no fault of their own, don’t get on with their families, or don’t have much of a family, or have dysfunctional families, or have chosen to separate from their families. So what? Aren’t there more important things to consider when choosing the next leader of the free world?