The Two-Parent Privilege Debunked

[Music] Hey podcast family, welcome to another episode of Motherhood in Black and White. My name is Conji. I'm Tara. And we are popping in to this episode to discuss something that has been in the news for the last few weeks. That has really had Tara and I talking offline and so we said, listen, we should let others into the conversation. Let's not waste this good talk. Let's not let's get behind the microphones and let's bring this conversation to our listening family. And let's talk about this new book and some of the conversation around it. The Two Parent Privilege. Our children from Two Parent Homes where the parents are married. Yes. More stable and more set up for success. Yes. Let's discuss. Let's discuss. And just so we don't get too far down the road and we don't cite this appropriately. We've read articles. I haven't read this but correct. It's a book that came out and it's called The Two Parent Privilege. How Americans stopped getting married and started falling behind. And the author is Melissa Kerney. Yes. And so Miss Kerney has been on the circuit. Right. Promoting her book. There's been a lot of conversations and discussions and parenting forum about bringing this conversation. Like, is it valid? Does she have good points? Does the decline in marriage increase inequality? Does the decline in marriage increase instability with children? And are children from Two Parent households where there's a married couple at the helm? Are they more inherently successful or set up for success? So I know Tara has some big feelings. Huge feelings on this issue. So tell me Tara. Again, we haven't read the book. Right. Been a little busy with life. Correct. Yes. New jobs and teenage children. Yes. And of course traveling to all the concerts. But when you first heard about the book and you were reading some of the articles around it, tell me kind of what you think Tara and how your first reaction was. My first reaction is every article I've read seems to not just be about having two parents in the home, which I could feel a little bit more on board with, but specifically a married couple in the wording of traditional married couple comes up a lot. And I start to question it. I'm like, well, there are a lot of families that have two parents in the home that doesn't look like a traditional married relationship. And there's some she specifically gets into especially like needing a father or you know, yeah, just feels very pointed toward a very specific community that tends to, that people tend to put down and push away. And I don't know that it is very inclusive of all the different types of families that we see in today's world. Right. The traditional two parent family with a traditional marriage traditional values where there are roles that are assigned to a mother and a father. So actually, let's break this down a bit because I think there are two areas that we can kind of talk about. One, it's does it need to be a two parent family with traditional marriage. We'll talk about traditional marriage and why that's not inclusive and why both you and I kind of disagree with that. Let's take a step back though. Let's talk about the two parent privilege. What are your thoughts? Do you think that children from a two parent household, children where there are two parents in the household are naturally set up for success and will be more successful than those who come from either one parent household or no parent house? I think that success comes from a lot of different factors. And so I don't know if I would use the word two parent or two adults in the home leads to more success. I would say that having more adults in the home does create some privilege around more time, more energy, more income, some diverse thoughts, you know, as opposed to just hearing from one person all the time. Right. I do think that there's privilege there. I hate to just immediately attack that to automatic more success. Although I'm sure it does trend that direction just due to some of that privilege. Yeah. That makes sense. Absolutely. And I like the way that you said more adults in the house. Correct. So when I first heard about this book about the two parent privilege, I personally felt attached to it. Right. Because I'm like, that's not me. That was not my upbringing or my childhood. Right. I grew up a child of a single parent. And I will say that I think I can attribute some of my success to the fact that it had different phases of my life. I had more than one adult in the house. Right. I had a stepfathers. And I also had seasons in my life where my mother, who was a single mom, lived with other women who were single mothers. Yes. And so we had that family unit look different because I had two women in the household and they were both raising their families. And so I had the ability and I had that diversity of thought. I had the other parent. And I know that my mom was able to rely on her friends to kind of help out with the economic situation. And I again, I was a child. So not privy to understanding exactly why they combined household. But I do know from conversations that I've had during adulthood that a part of it was it was easier financially in California. You know, they were able to afford rent and be able to afford groceries when they were able to combine households. And for us, it was fun because we were just growing up with our cousins. Right. You know. Yeah. Yeah. I personally am like, I don't see that necessarily not having the traditional or two parent household negatively impacted me. But also it's is that because of who I am. Right. Right. That's the nuance part of it. Yeah. Like because I'm similar. I grew up my parents are divorced in early childhood. And while I had adults in the house, there wasn't a lot of support. Right. So in and out, I had support. But I had ance that like picked me up and took me places and made sure I got to have different experiences. And I had teachers that showed up for me and made sure I was supported and provided some of that background. So again, I don't know. I mean, it's it's hard. There's just new ones to it. And so I don't doubt that there is data that supports something that says these kids all grew up with a single and they're like lower on the line. I'd like to see the line like yeah, even if they're just less successful, but still successful. Like does that, you know what I mean? Like the data, it's tough. There's new ones. Yeah. And there's so many factors that are going to weigh into and contribute to a child success. And again, what are we using to define success? That's a great question. If we look at it and both of us grew up not of two parent households and with support from other adults and places in our lives. Right. What is interesting and where we can kind of weigh into this conversation is both of us have sons that are being raised in two parent homes that are the result of traditional marriage family. And so in this part, when I look at how I'm parenting, there are some things that I see in his upbringing are different. And I would argue maybe a little bit better than what I had. And what that might look like is there is that economic stability that comes from a two parent home. There is the ability for the things that I can teach him that I'm able to teach him. And then also things that his father can teach him that his father can show him. And is that a privilege? Absolutely. But if a child is growing up in a two parent home that doesn't look like that or a two adult home that doesn't look like that, that's not a penalty. Right. So I don't think that we should say privilege versus penalty. It just looks different. Correct. You know what I mean? And I don't want any child or any person that's on this journey to think that there's something that may be less than or different or worse by the way they're doing this journey. Yeah. You know, one of the articles I read about this specifically, she says something, the author says something to that effect like that her intention is not blaming or shaming. It's just to show the data and speak to what is the top of the chain or whatever. It's just such a sensitive subject. It is so hard to not feel like because I know single parents out there that are killing themselves to make sure their kids have everything other kids have. And I feel sensitive to any indication that no matter how hard they go or how hard they try, their kids are always going to be behind. I just can't stand for that. Yeah. And you just said to make sure they have what other kids have. Yeah. I really think that we need to get away from this. And I don't know if it's an Americanized way of viewing the world that success, it is tied to financial success or career success. Right. And it's hard to say that when he's sitting in it, but we live, well, we used to live in this very similar community till you left me. But we never let that go. I'm never, listen, just like Rose and Jack's never go, but she said that. And then like two seconds later, let go. Just to be clear, just to be very clear, we are, we digress. We digress all the time with movie references, shout out to the Titanic. I was going to keep going down the Titanic road, but I'm going to stop. I'm going to come back here. But in the area we live in in North Texas, it is it's somewhat affluent. And what I kind of have to caution myself about is I see these kids that are growing up in economic privilege. And it is a far cry from how I grew up, right? Borderline poverty, kind of like my entire upbringing. But I see what my son is experiencing and the kids around him that have the things. And think that the way to success is by getting the things. And sometimes the parents are giving the children the things instead of giving the children the tools to be resilient adults. Thinking that having an iPhone 15 is going to be a better substitute than having your parent at the football game or having your parent come to the debate tournament. And so I think that we need to do a better job of understanding, familiarly and communally about like, what does it look like to have a successful child? And what does success in adulthood necessarily look like? Well, and you and I have had that conversation before. But I think you and I both buck against the traditional views of success, you know, watching us both in our careers and our journeys trying to be more aligned with our passions opposed to aligned with our bank account. Right. I think we both have made those kind of decisions. And personally with gauge, I have, you know, had to adjust my views of success because I did grow up in that thought process of like, and I think you might agree. I think you may be got it worse than I did. Like success means straight A's college, straight A's in college, a career that alloyered doctor, tax, you know, those kind of things. That's successful. And with gauge, I have to check myself a lot and those old ideas and be like, you know, I'd much rather you were kind and I'd much rather you were happy and I'd much rather you just did your very best at whatever it is that you like to do and whatever that looks like that's successful. So it's a hard thing to unlearn because our generation, you and I came up in a very different way. The two parents are not. It was like, yeah, regardless of your scenario, right. Success means this and you better forget how to get it. Yeah. No, I agree. I agree. And one of the things that I have spent this journey, I will say not just in this podcast, but probably the last five or seven years when I was realizing that I'm near midlife and now I'm kind of turning that corner. It's like, what do I need to be happy? And a few weeks ago, I bought this book because the author had an introduction or forward by Oprah Winfrey. The book was titled, "Build the Life You Want, the Art and Science of Getting Happier." And just like Melissa Kernie in her book, The Two Parents in Privilege, tries to use data. Like this is data informed decisions about why the two parents in Privilege exist and why I'm married. So the book about the art and science of getting happier, it's talking about like what is that we can do to attain happiness. Right, not happiness. Right. Yeah. Like, happiness isn't the goal. Yeah. It's how you can just be happier in the things that you're doing. That's interesting. Yeah. And so I was really dialing in here because I was thinking like, okay, Conj, if we think about what 1985 Conj, you wanted to be. Right. Like what, when we were asking ourselves, when we were playing with our Easy Bake Events, what we wanted to have when we grew up, what we wanted to be, what was going to make us happy when we grew up. If I can reflect on that little girl and like, oh my goodness, so many of the things that I thought I wanted, I achieved, I attained, I checked those boxes, how come it doesn't feel successful to me. And so working through with my therapist, it was like, okay, it's not about checking the boxes and hitting these targets and having these things, which unfortunately I think people are doing so much of. It's about enjoying the part of the journey that you're on and reflecting on every day, like how I can just be a little bit better and happier. And how do we not tie that to financial status? Yeah. Or comparing it to comparison to others. Correct. You know, bringing it back to the book we were discussing originally. I haven't looked at the numbers, but when I look at the data points mentioned in some of the articles, they do seem very tied to financial success, whether or not those children also get married tied to, there's some data around incarceration and trouble with the law, which here or there. And then there's some data around whether they have kids and then college. And I'm like, okay, well, if those are the things we're tying to success, those are the only things, right? And so I do think that this all starts from a place of, we made a decision a really long time ago of what it looks like. And we're still trying to force this two-parent white-pick at fence success story on everybody. Right. Like, that's just not the story. The husband and wife. Yeah. The story. Like the cleavers, yeah. Two and a half kids. Never worked for me. Never. Well, and I think that that's a point that's not touched on in the book or even in a lot of the conversations. So we talk about the two-parent privilege. What we also don't talk about are other privileges that we really need to focus on when we think about how we are raising kids and whether or not that's going to shape their future or shape a success. Because it's not just about the two-parents. It's also about the dimensions of folks identity and how those are reflected or supported in society. We talk the two-parent privilege. We also need to talk about the wealth privilege that is in many ways attributed to the gender privilege. Right. We also talk about ethnic privilege. And again, the privilege of traditional marriage. The fact that those individuals that are in a traditional husband, wife marriage are given more access and are given more support in general in society. Does that necessarily create a privilege? Right. The fact that we as a society are going to allow or permit certain things of and give benefits to people who come from that traditional marriage model. Whereas other people that aren't there, you know, you might have to then live in secrecy or in silence or fighting for those rights and what that does to a human every single day to feel like you were constantly in a struggle for survival because of your identity. And then the people in your household, how it makes them feel. That's part of the thing that gets left out of the data, which is if there is a discrepancy in where these kids fall on some trending line, that it probably has less to do with whether or not they have a mom and a dad married in their home and much more to do with the discrepancies and inequality of people who are not in that traditional family structure and what they're fighting with every day. Right. And it has nothing to do with if they have two parents that are married in the home. And that's everything to do with the economic discrepancies and healthcare discrepancies and property taxes, school district discrepancies, educational resources. Yes, absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that what we need to do and where I hope we land is in a place where we focus on creating policies to address those inequalities that you were just talking about rather than trying to kind of push people into this box by saying, oh, this is the way it worked 50 years ago with the cleaver. So this is the way it needs to work now. Rather than saying, these are things that aren't working. And this is the reality of the world that we live in. What can we do to address these inequalities rather than saying, oh, well, you know, it's better for people that are this way. So more people should do it this way, right? Stop trying to push people into the box. Just let people realize that we are all living in this world where there are inequalities and we need to focus on what we can do to make it so that the children that are in this society can all have equal opportunities to be successful and thrive. Whatever that looks like. Yeah. I was thinking when I was running through my mind as you were laying that out, which is beautiful, it's just like instead of trying to dangle a carrot to get people to where you want them and then helping them, like, let's meet them where they are. And let's support them where they are. It makes us start to make me really angry. Well, we can't have that in heaven. So we don't want to make Tara angry. So what we need to do is think about things that make Tara happier. We're going to think about things that make the happierness in Tara. Yeah. So speaking of happier, one of the things that we were talking about before we started recording this episode. And previously, we've alluded to the fact that we're both Gen X or who's in. We've mentioned. Right. Yes. We have mentioned, you know, like generally our age were kind of 40 somethings. I'm going to be very vulnerable. I'm finding my vulnerable voice here now, Tara. And I'm going to share with everyone that I am at the edge of my 40s. And I'm about to turn 50. Mm-hmm. So as a part of my journey, as I'm moving towards happierness, my bucket list of the things that I want to accomplish before I turn 50. And in addition to some concerts that we're going on together, we are also preparing and planning for a 50th birthday. Girl's trip. Yes, ma'am. So what I would love to hear from our podcast family, you know, reach out to us on social media, share with us some ideas or things that you all think that we can do to celebrate the 50th birthday. But I'm excited because we are planning this and it's going to be so fun. Yes, it is. only thing that could be better and the one thing that I definitely want from my fifth 50th birthday and we'll see if it happens. Isn't in sync reunion concert. - Oh my God, please, please, please. So just to be clear, our birthdays are very close to one another. We're Gemini twins and your birthday isn't a zero this coming year and mine ends in a five. So we're like, right on. We're like feeling it. Like fives and oes, we're doing it big. And in sync, that is the only reason you need. Just do it. - I know. - Just do it and do it in Vegas. I'm already there. Let's go. Like it needs to be in Vegas. You will fly. - I will go wherever I need to go. - Wherever, wherever. - So the limit does not exist. - That's the concert privilege. - That's right, it is a concert privilege. - It's something that we have. But again, we digress all the time. - Yeah. - What I wanted to say is before we wrap up the episode, I hope that we are able to, as a society, have these conversations where we're not leaning into just the data, but we're really taking time to listen to the real world experiences of people. Because what happens often is when we lean into the data, we discount the human condition and the human experience. Families aren't about numbers. Children aren't about statistics. It's about the flexibility of listening and learning and really understanding that there is no one size fits all for a family. It's about making space for every family to exist and to be seen. And unfortunately, sometimes what happens is, when we create conversations or we create conditions, where we elevate one type of family as a model, those that don't look that way. The children that don't come from families that emulate that, they shrink. And I don't ever want that to happen. I want every child, I want every family to be as big and bold as they can possibly be. - I can't say anything besides the outside of that. That's beautiful. I will, before we wrap, I do want to point out that Kaji not only was vulnerable today, but she said as she was discussing with her therapist and I'm so proud. I think that's the first time you've ever said that on the podcast. - And I say it all the time. I'm so so proud. You've grown on me. - You've grown on me. - And this is why we keep you around. - I love it. - Yeah. And again, for me, it's what I need and it helps. - Good. - It really does help. So thank you for that. And again, thank you for just always using your vulnerable voice. I've learned so much from you. - My younger and wiser friend, same say. - Obi-Wan. - Yeah, we'll see about that. But thank you podcast family for tuning in for another episode of Motherhood and Black and White. Tara and I will be back soon with another episode as we continue these conversations. Don't forget to subscribe and follow us on all of the listening platforms and reach out. If you just want to say, hey, you will have our Instagram handles in these show notes. With that being said, we are going to sign off this episode. Be good to yourself. Be good to your families and your friends and take good care of podcast family.