Racial Myopia in [Family] Law

Abstract

Racial Myopia in [Family] Law presents a critique of Family Law for the One-Hundred-Year Life, an Article that claims that age myopia within family law fails older adults and prevents them from creating legal bonds with other adults outside the traditional marital model. This Response posits that racial myopia is a common yet complex phenomenon in almost every area of law, and it presents most often by centering whiteness as the default standard while failing to account for race and its impact on the law. Race—as well as the scholarship that incorporates race into normative family structure and identity—must be critically considered when proposing new ways of creating family units. This Response calls for active engagement with the racial history surrounding American family structures and the laws utilized to support them in order to achieve the goal of adapting family law to address the needs and interests of all older people.

Keywords: Family law, Critical race theory, Racial myopia, Structural racism, Systemic racism, African Americans, Families, Family structures, Kinship care, Eldercare, Equality, Autonomy, Older people

JEL Classification: K30, K36