Your columnist Mark-Anthony Falzon (April 17) makes sweeping statements about the claimed disappearance of the family unit in Germany and other EU countries. I wonder how many years of experience working, living and socialising with north Europeans, on their home ground, his conclusions are based on.
There are certainly a lot of confusing statements being bandied about, such as that the Maltese family is the strongest in Europe, while the rate of Maltese marriage breakdowns and separations is claimed by some to be close to some of the highest in Europe.
The anti-divorce lobby claims that divorce legislation would destroy the Maltese family.
Maltese marriage breakdowns have been steadily increasing because Maltese society has changed. Previous generations would not have permitted teenagers to return home in the early hours of the morning, or not return at all for a day or two.
About 15 years ago, Philip Carabott (head of the government’s sexual health department) first documented that a significant proportion of University students were sexually experienced, and later repeatedly warned of the possible complications of promiscuity in the young.
Single teenage motherhood used to be an unfortunate scandal rather than a now quasi-normal social status. Cohabitation, whether of the premarital or post-marital-separation variety, has also become commonplace and acceptable. All this social change has occurred without divorce legislation.
In Britain, marriage breakdowns rose when women went out to work to help in the war effort.
The war and the liberating contraceptive pill in the 1960s changed British society. However, if Dr Falzon believes there are no longer any close-knit families in Britain and other north European countries, he doesn’t really know what he’s writing about.
Up to a few decades ago, married Maltese women could not work for the public service (jobs were only for men and single women). Increasing numbers of Maltese married women now work full-time or part-time, increasing the risk of emotional and sexual extramarital liaisons. Not only do many families now need both the father’s and mother’s incomes to enjoy a reasonably decent life, but economists also tell us that more Maltese women need to go out to work to enhance our country’s wealth.
‘Progress’ therefore has changed, and continues to change, Maltese society – and the changes have their pros and cons – you cannot have your cake and eat it.
Another spurious argument I happened to hear recently on the Church’s radio station was someone claiming that divorce generates poverty.
The speaker obviously has little knowledge of economic history, otherwise he would have known that some of the poorest countries in the world have been Catholic and some of the richest have been Protestant.
Protestants had work ethic values and Catholics tended to fret about the wickedness of profit and wealth.
The Catholic countries of southern Europe essentially got out of their long-standing poverty through membership of the European Union.
Editor's note: Should Mr Cilia-Vincenti re-read Dr Falzon's article, he will hopefully realise that the comments about other countries' family values were written in ironic tone.