Is one of the causes behind the cultural atmosphere surrounding the Scopes trial, and the concepts about family, “children are the future”?

Question

To start, I noticed that during the peak of the American eugenics movement (1920-1929) that anti-evolutionary bills and eugenical bills were being passed in the same 37 states (well, just about), particularly in the midwest and southern states. I suspect that this also correlates to the treatment of A Civic Biology during the Scopes trial, and it's reprint in 1926, A New Civic Biology, both by George W. Hunter. Wherein, the word evolution was removed and the chapters dealing with heredity were moved to the back sections of the book, as I noticed when I got a hold of these texts. The chapter on Eugenics was left where it was, but during the 4th printing, according to Adam Shapiro, American Book Company's publishers pushed Hunter to remove the language dealing with STD's, and sex itself.

What I think is happening is was a defense of this weird contradiction, like "It's for the family/kids/future." I was told to find No Future: Queer Theory and the Death Drive, I got it in [yesterday now] and have read as much of it as I could in one sitting. This book doesn't seem to be enough though, it introduces me to some interesting concepts of family and children, but it's not solid enough to use as support for my argument.

Are there times in the United States when legislators, the law, and the "Establishment" are particularly protective of children?

Answer 1

This was the case, according to the Neil Howe and the late William Strauss in their book, Generations http://www.amazon.com/Generations-History-Americas-Future-1584/dp/0688119123.

In the 1920s, the elders was the generation that Franklin Delano Roosevelt referred to as having a "Rendezvous With Destiny." Born just after the civil war, they produced what we now call the World War II generation born in the 1900s, 1910s, and early 1920s. At times like these, Idealistic parents are more inclined to believe that their "children are the future." Such children repay their parents by doing "good deeds" as young adults, such as winning wars. But at such times, adults are unusually intolerant about influences that are considered harmful to children. Specifically, that batch of elders passed Prohibition and fought the teaching of evolution in the Scopes trial to protect their children.

According to Strauss and Howe, the Baby Boomers born just after World War II are the modern version of FDR's "Rendezvous" generation (or what they call "Missionaries"). These parents produced the so-called "Millennial children just before the year 2000. Such parents have been particularly protective of these children, especially girls, passing "Megan's Law" and AMBER alerts to protect such them. At the same time, they have allowed their children to adopt values such as multiculturalism and breaking down barriers between sexes, values that are now considered "safe," but would have been considered "dangerous" 100 years ago.