"It was an idea we had when Al was in the Senate - to organize and moderate an annual conference that would look at government policy through the lens of the family to help identify ways that the family can be supported and strengthened"
About this Quote
The tell here is the phrase "through the lens of the family": a soft-focus filter that makes politics feel less like power and more like caregiving. Tipper Gore is describing an institutional move, but she sells it as a kind of moral housekeeping. By anchoring the idea in Al Gore's Senate years, she borrows the credibility of elected office while keeping the voice firmly in the safer lane of civic-spouse advocacy. It's influence without the messiness of claiming ambition.
The intent is procedural and strategic: an annual conference, organized and moderated, that can translate sprawling policy fights into something emotionally legible. "Family" becomes the supercategory that can hold child care, education, crime, health, media, even economic insecurity without naming the ideological trade-offs. That vagueness is a feature, not a bug. It invites buy-in from people who disagree about causes but like the implied goal of "strengthening" something supposedly foundational.
The subtext is about power being laundered through consensus language. Who defines "the family"? Which families count? A conference doesn't just "look" at policy; it sets agendas, elevates experts, and produces a respectable narrative that certain interventions are pro-family while others are suspect. In the 1990s context especially, when "family values" was a political shibboleth and culture-war rhetoric was hot, framing policy this way offered Democrats a way to sound protective rather than technocratic. It's a rhetorical bridge between personal virtue and public spending, between private life and state action, designed to make governance feel like support rather than control.
The intent is procedural and strategic: an annual conference, organized and moderated, that can translate sprawling policy fights into something emotionally legible. "Family" becomes the supercategory that can hold child care, education, crime, health, media, even economic insecurity without naming the ideological trade-offs. That vagueness is a feature, not a bug. It invites buy-in from people who disagree about causes but like the implied goal of "strengthening" something supposedly foundational.
The subtext is about power being laundered through consensus language. Who defines "the family"? Which families count? A conference doesn't just "look" at policy; it sets agendas, elevates experts, and produces a respectable narrative that certain interventions are pro-family while others are suspect. In the 1990s context especially, when "family values" was a political shibboleth and culture-war rhetoric was hot, framing policy this way offered Democrats a way to sound protective rather than technocratic. It's a rhetorical bridge between personal virtue and public spending, between private life and state action, designed to make governance feel like support rather than control.
Quote Details
| Topic | Family |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
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