The American colonies had similar laws to England’s — and they were enforced — until the advent of the New Deal, which created the Social Security system, intended to provide 45 percent of a worker’s pre-retirement wages. That would keep mom and dad afloat in the good old days. Civil or criminal cases seeking assistance or reimbursment from adult children all but stopped. But, even more significant to the quiet passing of filial responsibility was the introduction of Medicaid, in 1965, a pillar of the Great Society, which had eligibility requirements that seemed at odds with the existing state laws, even though courts had upheld their constitutionality.
But Medicaid is in big trouble — cutting here, squeezing there — and will be inundated when baby boomers reach old age. The staggering cost of long-term care and the explosion in the number of people who will need it has prompted a second look at filial responsibility laws as a way to deal with the impending crisis. The , a conservative policy group, identified contributions from adult children as one solution to increasing expenditures and insufficient revenues in a 2005 issue brief. A few law journal articles followed, most recently one earlier this year in .
Universal love advocated love without distinction while humanity is a kind of extensive love with the foundation of filial piety, which means people should love their parents first and later spread the love to others....
The author of this essay has been a performer of filial piety. He is also a sincere member and scholar of Chinese culture. When he completed his B.A., he was offered a teaching position in a high school. What has interested him the most was the teaching of Chinese classics, with a required text of Hsiao Ching. In fact, this classical text has been established as a sageous text from the beginning of the Chinese culture. This indicates a great importance of filial piety, the basis of Chinese morality.
Jacobs elucidates the disparity between societal dictates of what the proper roles were for Nineteenth century women and the manner that slavery prevented a woman from fulfilling these roles.
There is a large difference in requiring a parent to take care of a child and a child to take care of a parent. The parent made the decision, in one way or another, to bring the child into the world. The child did not ask to be born and be made a dependent.
I know first hand the folly of “filial responsibility”. My father, with no savings or investments, needed assisted living. I cleaned out my bank account to get him into a safe, “affordable” assisted living home. He passed away unexpectedly of a heart attack. What do I have now? A young child, nothing in the bank, and a pile of bills. What did I ever get from my father? Not much emotionally, not a dime past 16, not a Christmas or birthday card. And now his grandson has to suffer because of his folly. The mis or malfeasance of the parent should not be the responsibility of the child.
Even though, Maggie Gallagher in her essay the benefits of marriage in “Why marriage is good for you,” states that she is trying to promote the return to more traditional view of marriage within the society.
This section is, in fact, a continuation of last section. The main theme of last section is "the position of filial piety in Chinese culture." A simple question comes up to ask: What is the position? The answer given in last section is that "Filial Piety is the leading principle or fundamental basis of Chinese morality." This answer has already touched upon a very important relation between "filial piety" and "Chinese culture." This section will just continue to provide further observation and exploration.
The relation between filial piety and human life is also a substantial topic. Now, for the sake of relevance and for the sake of simplifying selection, we are going to explore how filial piety performs its action in life. The most relevant aspect is its position in family life. Family has been an extremely important substance of Chinese society. Family is naturally prior to society or country. Integration of family is a necessary starting point for attaining a well-controlled country or a peaceful world. As to the relations within a family, the Chinese people emphasize the relation between parents and children, particularly emphasizing children’s love and respect for their parents. So, Chinese family life is, in reality, the life of filial piety. Even up to now, Chinese families are still controlled by the reflective power of the concept of filial piety. In addition to its control of family life, filial piety has also powerfully controlled the social life and many other aspects of Chinese culture. So, filial piety is not only a foundation of morality, but also a fundamental basis of Chinese culture.
Now, let us move from the natural to the cultural. Culturally filial piety is the leading principle or fundamental basis of Chinese morality. Before dealing with filial piety, let us ask a simple question: What is morality? The question itself appears very simple, but the answers can be complicated. In the current Western world, some maintain that the source of morality is reason. Some maintain that it is sympathy, and some insist on the ultimate value of universal love. There are still many other answers. But in Chinese culture, morality consists in value judgments based on human relations. Filial piety just refers to the most immediate and necessary human relation. An individual, as usual, could have many types of human relations. Examples may include relations with friends, cousins, brothers, sisters, uncles and aunts. But none of these relations are more immediate or necessary than the relation of a child to his parents. So, filial piety is the most fundamental relational basis from which other types of moral feelings are developed. Confucius clearly confirmed this point saying: "Filial piety is the foundation of morality." This confirmation is meaningful if the action of filial piety is well-understood in its relation with human life.
I don’t think these types of laws are a good idea. What if you don’t have $14K a month or even $14K period. Who decides how much you have to spend? Are we supposed to put our families in a debt that we may never be able to get out of and sacrifice the potential for our children’s education? This is a recipe for putting more people into the cycle of poverty at least it would ensure that the next generation would also do a little worse than the previous. Back when these filial laws were active people lived to be 50, now it is common to live into the 80s and beyond.
What is Filial Piety? This question appears so general that it could be interpreted in many different ways. Because of many different meanings of the question, there could be many different answers. Now, we have to set a limit on this question. This limit consists in the relevance of filial piety to Chinese culture. So, we can ask specific questions instead of a general one. A specific question which is relevant could be: What is the position of filial piety in Chinese culture? This question could be considered relevant to the major theme of this essay. An immediate answer could be: Filial piety is a kind of natural feeling. But this answer is not yet to the point, since there are many types of natural feeling in human life. So, we have to ask another question specifically: What is the unique quality of filial piety in Chinese culture? A proper answer could be: Filial piety in Chinese culture is an individual’s natural feeling toward his parents. It is composed of natural sensitivity, caring love, sincere concern, and even natural respect. In fact, all these are natural consciousness toward an immediately related person--a parent. These feelings, in Chinese culture, are not products of a Spirit. So, we can also say, that these feelings are humanistic, because they are the product of purely human beings.