Apparently there’s a battle raging, the “good mother” is being vanquished by the “bad mother”, at least in the media. So that the ” good mother” represented by the attachment mom, the helicopter mom, the hovering mom, (check out what all of those have in common?) are becoming bad whereas the “bad mother” the detached, my-kids-are-brats- and-I-can’t-stand-to be-around-them parents are becoming good (or at least trendy and socially sanctified.) The battle was brought to my attention by Katie Allison Granju of Attachment Parenting fame in this article The cult of the Bad Mother (please, when reading this article do NOT click on the link “this story about how many parents each year forget their babies and toddlers in carseats” on page two, I repeat Do NOT click that link, it’s high-lighted so you’ll want to, but don’t, you’ll NEVER EVER get it out of your mind. So Don’t. Okay, still here? good.) And also I was sent this article this past week (thanks Kathleen!) Let the Kid Be by Lisa Belkin (you might remember that she mentioned me in her column this past year here: My Favorite Mommy (and Daddy) Blogs.
First, I wanted to note that on the face of it, judging by the catch phrases alone, this is nothing new. It’s the same ol’ argument that mainstream parenting is the way to raise children, and mothers are the problem. Got to remove the mother from the picture. Think of it, the snide “Oh, she’s an Attachment parent”, the sneering label “helicopter mom”, the term ‘hovering’. the mother is seen as dysfunctional and the child’s relationship to the mother is suspected to be only in the mother’s best interest. Mother is feeding her ego, instead of feeding the baby. The other side is the detached parents, the bad mothers, the ones that admit to spanking, and bemusedly tell us they didn’t want children, and now that they’ve met them, even more. The culture laughs and laughs, it’s funny to see mothers who are so brutally honest. Finally! mothers who are psychologically stable enough to keep their kids at arms length. Sigh. It makes me very sad for the children.
But the truth is that mothers are a lot more nuanced than good or bad, and the labels are more nuanced than we give them credit for too. Attachment parents may be followers of Lenore Skenazy of free-range kids fame and may like to have a beer or two (like me). Helicopter moms might believe in spanking while also using flash cards about multiplication facts and being a teetotaller (like that really bad mother over there, man she’s bad! ;o) I like to find the humor in parenting, but I don’t like to talk smack about my kids. I’m an attachment parent with a twist, a follower of the ideas in the Continuum Concept (my take on it at least), which means that when I first ran across the parenting manifesto of Tom Hodgkinson, I about fell over, it seemed so right to me.
THE MANIFESTO OF THE IDLE PARENT
We reject the idea that parenting requires hard work
We pledge to leave our children alone
We reject the rampant consumerism that invades children from the moment they are born
We read them poetry and fantastic stories without morals
We drink alcohol without guilt
We reject the inner Puritan
We don’t waste money on family days out and holidays
An idle parent is a thrifty parent
An idle parent is a creative parent
We lie in bed for as long as possible
We try not to interfere
We play in the fields and forests
We push them into the garden and shut the door so we can clean the house
We both work as little as possible, particularly when the kids are small
Time is more important than money
Happy mess is better than miserable tidiness
Down with school
We fill the house with music and merriment
We reject health and safety guidelines
We embrace responsibility
There are many paths
More play, less work
And now he’s being touted as one of the heads of the ‘bad parent’ movement, which means he’s really good. And I’m generally considered an advocate of “good mother” ing which means that I’m totally bad. But look closely, the two of us are not so far apart. The trouble is that people are missing the nuances…
Love,
Heather
ps. tom jodgkinson’s book Idle Parenting arrived the day I was sent this article, I JUST finished reading it and love it 98%. I’ll tell you more later this week.
I must know, why shouldn’t I click on the “kids left in carseats” link?
Hi Rebekah,
because it’s too awful, horrifying, graphic, sad. trust me, I may need to see a therapist!
xox,Heather
I love your breakdown of good vs. bad vs. good vs. bad. I’m ‘good’ and ‘bad’ in practically the exact opposite way from what I thought I’d be before I had a baby.
I’m definitely gonna read that book.
[...] today I saw this post by one of my favorite comic writers. The thinking and bubbling in my brain continued. Yes indeed. [...]
Love this! There are so many thing considered “god” and “bad” depending on who is doing the judging.
I believe it all comes out in the wash! You do what’s best for you & your kids & if it works out great then GREAT but if not something may need changing & your way may end up different then someone else’s way. So long as the kids thrive & prosper is all I care about! If they are suffering & those around them are suffering THEN someone needs a good swift kick in the hoo-ha but not if everything’s going well! It’s a little known skill called paying attention, THAT’S the true difference between good & bad parenting, not the style in which it’s accomplished! IMHO bad parents just don’t pay attention to what’s happening & good parents do, regardless of HOW they “parent” (ap, micromanage, feber, spock or freud) Different children need different things sometimes (think in terms of special needs children in a family, you’ll get it faster) One size CAN’T fit all, all the time.
oh & AMEN to the manifesto! I am SOOO there, lol!
Okay. I clicked. Sigh. That WAS awful.
Excellent point! There is no one-size-fits-all good parenting. My personal belief is that if you start with love and a realization of what an amazing gift your child is, listen to your child (and yourself), keep an open mind about what works and what doesn’t, and keep learning, you’ll do okay.
Thank you! This was a really great article. I posted it to my Facebook account. I found it touching.
I came across Hodgkinson’s writing last year and it resonated with me so much I made this scrapbook page with a quote from The Idler.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3398/3610856113_106fddb75c.jpg
p.s. I forgot to say that I’m confused by the good/bad parent thing! LOL
[...] i read phd in parenting’s thoughts, and of course her bad mother, and then i was linked to mama is and after reading that i thought, you know what? this is one of those things i could get sucked [...]
Ohh, I read that kids in carseats article already – I stumbled on it and couldn’t stop reading. * shudder *
I didn’t even realize the whole bad parenting thing was a trend until I read it here, but I see it now. As with all parenting trends, ‘facts’, and advice, I think everything should be taken very very lightly and we should each do what we feel most comfortable doing regardless of what anyone says. You can’t please everyone, especially when it comes to parenting. Do what fits your family, and blow off all the talking heads.
All the information that seems so desperately current and important right now is likely to seem quaint and erroneous to our kids when they have kids.
Bla bla bla does sum it up well. I know a lot of mothers who parent very differently than I do. They do things I wouldn’t think to do, I do things they wouldn’t think to do. For example. I hesitate before admitting to nursing til age three, they lose eye contact when telling me the baby’s bottle-fed. But we understand each other. Some of those mothers I write about trust me with their kids 7 hours a day four days a week… When one of their babies died, I know she felt all the pain I would have felt. And to a degree I did feel it. ALL mothers who knew that mother felt it. Any comparison of parenting styles was bla bla bla. We all love our children.
Reminds me of the Continuum Concept by Jean Liedloff. The part about not being child centered. I get it.
Talk of not being child-centered reminded me of a discussion my aides and I had in my classroom one day. We have two students in wheelchairs. One is far more disabled than the other, and yet the more disabled one is at the same time more “normal”. Her family INCLUDES her, but does not REVOLVE around her. For example, she goes along to sister’s soccer practice as any other little sister would do. She just happens to be in a chair and severly mentally disabled.
The other student is a horrible brat that most people would not want to spend 20 minutes with- everything is about her. And her family reflects that- SHE is in charge of the household, not her mother! This is what happens when a family is totally child-centered- you wind up with spoiled brats! A family is a unit- the family concept itself is the nucleus, and everyone in the family spins around it like electrons. That’s when it works!
I clicked on it.
OMG, I couldnt finish it, My heart fell into the pit of my stomach and I cried.
[...] There was a new mum up there who’s baby was nearly three weeks old. All us other mums were coo-ing and trying to remember when ours were that small. I mentioned that seeing such a little baby was making me awfully broody to which I had agreeing replies. But then one mum, who I’ve always felt a bit unsure about, said “I’m not, I didn’t even want this one!” Nobody knew what to say, I think we were all a bit dumbstruck. So me & friend left at that point. I know this woman obviously loves her son, a gorgeous little four or five month old, but, oh I don’t know. Is this the start of a horrible trend I’ve heard about, where the less attached you are as a parent the better? [...]
eeek, ok read the car seat story, finally found it. Not for the faint at heart, just makes me all the more happy I exclusively Nurse and take public transportation, ok off my soap box! (p.s. the duggars did something similar, they take a head count before & after, lol)
[...] these statements are pretty much pulled verbatim from the article in this post, that I linked to up above them. In that article, the author talks about a specific instance where [...]