Welcome to Breakpoint, a daily look, and an ever-changing culture through the lens of unchanging truth.

For the Colson Center, I'm John Stone Street.

Recently, Stranger Things actress Millie Bobby Brown has faced the ire of critics,

but not for the typical behavior that lands a celebrity in trouble, like drunken behavior or having an unpopular political view. Rather, she got

married and adopted a child, and according to critics, that was irresponsible behavior for someone

so young. See, today, marriage and family have been reimagined in contemporary culture as

capstone achievements to be enjoyed, if at all, after having success, not as cornerstones on which to build a life with another.

Rather than marrying young and having a bunch of kids, people talk today about doing some living before settling down, as if having a spouse and kids is the end of freedom and the end of happiness.

Postponing, even foregoing marriage is the

path to the good life, according to this view. But in fact, study after study attests, the opposite

is true. For example, a 2024 study from the Institute of Family Studies found that 40%

of married mothers aged 18 to 55 describe themselves as very happy, compared with only 25% of single childless women in the same age group.

Since the 1970s, the University of Chicago General Social Survey has asked Americans about their happiness.

Married people were persistently 30 points happier than

unmarried people, whose average scores hovered near zero. And study after study finds that the

best predictor of future financial, medical, and mental success for a child is when the child

is raised by two married biological parents. In other words, in almost every way, our culture is getting this one exactly backwards.

Those thought to be living their best life are often the most miserable.

Those thought to be trapped by responsibilities of marriage and family

are consistently doing the best.

The truth about marriage and family should be told.

The myth should be exposed.

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