This week’s family-related news included an in-depth look at an industry in China aimed at saving marriages, one’s woman’s story about making a move to her mom’s basement after divorce, the impact of a new immigration policy on parents and children, a survey of family friendly laws adopted by individual states, a profile of a family raising a transgender child, a look of how the scourge of the adult opioid epidemic is devastating our children, a photo essay on interracial marriage 50 years after the “Loving” case, and finally a triumphant love story of soccer teammates. China’s Mistress Dispellers — How the Economic Boom and Deep Gender Inequality Have Created a New Industry Jiayang Fan, The New Yorker, June 26, 2017 A volatile mixture of rapid social change, legal reforms, and traditional attitudes has created something approaching a crisis in Chinese marriage. In the past decade, the divorce rate has doubled. Adultery is the most prevalent cause, accounting for about a third of the cases …Mistress dispellers are only one part of a broader industry that has sprung up to help wives rescue their unions.
Moving Into My Mother’s Basement Helped My Kids — and Helped Save My Life Pari Chang,The Washington Post, June 27, 2017 I had something to prove: I wasn’t a loser who ended up in her parents’ basement. I was the Rocky Balboa of mothers, in training to rise from divorce’s embers. Trump Administration Targets Parents in New Immigration Crackdown Caitlin Dickerson, The New York Times, July 1, 2017 The Trump administration has begun to crack down on illegal immigration, by arresting undocumented parents suspected of having paid to have their children ushered into the country by smugglers. This may endanger children by discouraging parents from claiming custody of their children when they arrive in the United States. Family-Friendly Laws Are Being Passed, but Not by Trump’s Team Claire Cain Miller, The New York Times, July 3, 2017 According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 71 percent of women with children under 18 are in the labor force, and both parents work in 61 percent of married families with children. There is widespread support among voters for policies that help make those two roles possible.
A Transgender Child Faces Growing Up Yasmeen Khan, NPR, July 8, 2017 Q is now on the cusp of middle school, adolescence and facing his changing body. And for a transgender child, this time of life is particularly complex. Q’s parents are divorced but still very much raising him together.
Children of the Opioid Epidemic Are Flooding Foster Homes. America is Turing a Blind Eye Julia Lurie, Mother Jones, July/August 2017 The scourge of addiction to painkillers, heroin, and fentanyl sweeping the country has produced a flood of bewildered children who, having lost their parents to drug use or overdose, are now living with foster families or relatives. Among the 10 so-called Adverse Childhood Experiences, are emotional abuse, physical abuse, separation from parents, and parental substance abuse: kids who undergo traumatic events early in life are more likely to suffer mental and physical repercussions later on, be it substance abuse, depression, heart disease, or cancer.
The Faces of Intermarriage, 50 Years, After Loving v. Virginia Sheryl Gay Stolberg, The New York Times, July 6, 2017 Mixed marriage in 2017 goes far beyond black and white, and might more aptly be called multicultural marriage. One interracial marriage tends to beget another; the children of intermarried couples tend to intermarry.
For Teammates in Love, an Island Oasis Raul Vilchis, The New York Times, July, 6, 2017 Mayor, a striker, and Sierra, a fullback, both 25, are believed to be the first openly gay professional athletes in Mexico’s history, and they are certainly the first players from one of Mexico’s national soccer teams to speak openly about their sexual orientation. But to find acceptance, they have had to move 4,500 miles from home.
To suggest articles for inclusion in the FamilyKind Weekly News Roundup please email us at info@familykind.org.
Comments