> Social technologies like monogamy, marriage, church, community, and even things we think of as "negative", like shame, were developed to combat much of this.

You may want to look at the long history of severe abuse perpetrated by the Church in their pursuit to "combat this".

We've just seen the Irish Laundry report released and it's fucking horrific.

https://www.history.com/news/magdalene-laundry-ireland-asylu...

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/social-affairs/women-on-seco...

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/social-affairs/treatment-of-...

I don't want to minimize those abuses, but we have to be cognizant of the destructive effects of hyper-focusing on negative impacts on a small minority. Our outrage at the mistreatment of the few drives us to tear down institutions and social structures that might be serving critical functions for the many.

20% of kids ages 10-15 in 1900 were working. Many in horrible conditions and many probably died young as a result. That's a lot more than the foster system nowadays. Sending societies marginal people to an early death after extracting some productivity out of them was the historical solution to these problems as I see it.

Looking at the past with rose colored glasses is dangerous.

Plus, violence rates and juvenile deliquency rates at the time were not all that great. These debates always assume that kids now are somehow bad generation, but they actually statistically behave very well.

It can and should be improved, but that does not mean we have to pretend that part was all that better.

Not to mention the large portion of young men from each generation who, from the beginning of human society up until ~1950 in the developed world, were killed in wars.

I've come around to the conclusion that the "cognitive elite" (for want of a better term) underestimate the degree of social support and collective reinforcement normal people need to make good life decisions. They themselves continue to raise their kids in two-person households, etc. See: https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/12/04/education-a.... But they've helped chip away at the culture around monogamy, marriage, churchgoing, etc., because they themselves don't need those things to help them make good decisions.

It's like being overweight. Everyone knows what they should do. Most people can't do it, however, and there isn't much social support for it. In Asian culture, we have all of this social reinforcement about our weight and eating habits. (Though south asians differ quite dramatically from east asians with respect to what they consider fat.) In the U.S., you're left to fend for yourself. Some people go to the gym regularly and eat healthy despite all of the cultural forces working against those good decisions. But most people don't. They just get fat.

Do you have evidence that the foster care system was less fucked up when religious institutions were stronger? Or alternatively could you point to studies comparing religious foster care vs nonreligious foster care?

Genuinely asking, because it never struck me that the foster care system was ever not horrible in America.

Also good to keep in mind that as bad as things are in the US, things are much worse elsewhere. For example the massive orphanages in the old soviet countries where children are confined to little cribs all day, or in India where many orphans roam the streets.

Not religious, but a friend of mine was in an award winning state orphanage in the 1930s. (I haven't heard,but i suppose he is dead now) They would beat kids with a wire chineny brush if they slept with their heads in the pillow, which is how they won those awards for how neat the beds were.

There isn't a good answer to the problem of kids when the parents don't care for them.

UK system after war was heavily reliant on nuns and monks for running orphanages and work schools and such.

It was horrible match and there was huge amount of abuse going on.

> developed to combat much of this.

Or some of these customs, traditions and institutions evolved to combat it through unconscious group selection. The tribes/towns/cities/countries/groups that had superior civic norms (superior defined as those norms which promote harmony, prosperity, in-group cooperation, etc) tended to attract immigrants, be capable of dominating geo-politically, etc, and thus those cultural values become dominant through this process of selection.

Also, while I think that explains things to a certain extent, it's just part of the picture. Culture also come from (i) self-interest, (ii) power asymmetries, and (iii) an unintended by-product of our evolutionary psychology/emotions/personalty traits such as jealousy/disgust sensitivity among others. For example jealousy mediating a desire for taxation (this has been studied by psychologists, it is one of the three common motives), or disgust sensitivity mediating a desire for borders and authoritarian leaders.

Is it this or would these kids simply have been sent off to child labor sweatshops, coal mines or the streets in the past? Early death would mean they'd never see prison. Same with many other social issues that in the past would have simply been solved by letting someone die.

All of those "social technologies" except one have nothing to do with atheism. And the Church does not exactly have a squeaky clean track record when it comes to orphans.

Add to the fact, often the most impoverished countries tend to be more religious. You're not finding a strong correlation to your point.

Poverty and education is a foremost problem.

> Add to the fact, often the most impoverished countries tend to be more religious.

Which way does that correlation run? Maybe impoverished countries are especially in need of the social organization provided by religion because, unlike rich countries, they can't afford to "f--k around?" They can't just spend government funds to deal with the negative social consequences of out-of-wedlock births, divorces, etc.