Helicopter Parenting: A Scourge of the 21st Century

[williepete]

I see most of my peers wanting to be friends with their children.

My neighbor is 78 and raised 3 boys who all grew up to be fine men. She's a tough old hag. We love her. She often gets disgusted with young mothers and is known to say, "You're not their friend! You're their parents."

Parents are survival instructors. Failure to teach survival skills never ends well.

 

[williepete]

There was a few times though...……

When I think back to my 20's, I shudder. I really shouldn't be here.

 

[SweetSue92]

Absolutely about being friends with your kids. They're not supposed to be your friends.

I'll go even further than that. It is very, very bad for the KIDS when your entire life centers around them. I think it used to be that children were a wonderful and important ADDITION to your life, not the very center of them. Not anymore. For too many American families, the child is the very center of the parents' existence, and if they're not, then the parents think they're doing it wrong.

Oh, they're doing it wrong, all right. This is very bad for the kids, in so many ways. But for just one thing, it puts a LOT of pressure on the kids. They're just trying to live their life. They shouldn't have to fulfill yours, too.

I see most of my peers wanting to be friends with their children. Then when it comes to make the hard decisions, and provide necessary discipline, set boundaries, and guidance they CAN'T DO IT. They are AFRAID their kids will be upset with them, and ostracize them. It makes them crazy, and it makes me disappointed to see parents live in fear of their children.

From what I've seen, you're right. Keep doing what you're doing, and you will reap rewards.

We've probably heard it said: If you are not friends with your kids when you're raising them, you get to be friends with them when they're adults. And I think this is mostly right, with my own. They're 21 and 19 and honestly--we aren't really raising them anymore. Sure, giving them guidance and advice. But we treat them like the young adults they are.

But whoa Nelly, there was no democracy in our house when they were children. Nope. We were the mom and dad and they were not, case closed! We loved them and treated them kindly but they were not the adults. You know, we raised them like people did before it all got nuts.

 

[SweetSue92]

I see most of my peers wanting to be friends with their children.

My neighbor is 78 and raised 3 boys who all grew up to be fine men. She's a tough old hag. We love her. She often gets disgusted with young mothers and is known to say, "You're not their friend! You're their parents."

Parents are survival instructors. Failure to teach survival skills never ends well.

Exactly. No, I wish to goodness parents knew this. It's to the point we have to teach parents this--or we should. Raising children is above all an act of emancipation.

I teach at the elementary level and we have children carried in by their parents--on their parents' hip. Like a 2 year old. And not just kindergarteners either.

Let that sink in....if you dare.

 

[SweetSue92]

There was a few times though...……

When I think back to my 20's, I shudder. I really shouldn't be here.

Let's just make a pinky pact not to tell our kids any of the stuff we did in our teens and early 20s. My darn kids are too savvy though and have talked to their grandparents....darn those grandmas and grandpas anyway!!!

 

[mudwhistle]

I assume you're all familiar with helicopter parenting: over-protective, over-involved parenting which began in the 80s and really took off in the 90s. I feel like I've been given a front row seat for the debacle. I began teaching in 1993, just when the phenomenon was beginning to catch on. By the time I got my teaching feet underneath me, helicopter parents were in full force. But none of my teaching colleagues had been raised by helicopter parents. We suspected what we were seeing wasn't....good, to say the least.

Well.

Now we know. Now we have this generation of teens and young adults riddled with anxiety and depression, unable to function without strict perimeters. College deans have to include parents on college orientation (!) and teach parents how to 'break away' (!) and there are words for doing things ("adulting") that we just expected to do when we were in our 20s. Why?

We robbed kids of struggle, in short. We decided if we could shelter, protect, and take the challenge away from them, that was better. We decided that the infinitesimal chance of them being abducted if they rode their bike across town at age 12 was not worth it. So we drove them around, activity to activity, until they were 16. Extrapolate that to every activity and throw in a good deal of judgment and a bunch of other stuff, and you have a toxic stew of child-rearing.

There's a lot more to say, but I'll leave it to the board to weigh in. There is a TON of information on this, but here are just a few links to get you started:

The Effects of ‘Helicopter Parenting’

I was gonna start a thread on this subject.

This is a major influence on helicopter parents :

Missing white woman syndrome - Wikipedia

Missing white woman syndrome

Missing white woman syndrome is a phenomenon noted by social scientists[1][2][3] and media commentators of the extensive media coverage, especially in television,[4] of missing person cases involving young, white, upper-middle-class women or girls. Instances have been cited in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and South Africa.[5] The phenomenon is defined as the media's undue focus on upper-middle-class white women who disappear, with the disproportionate degree of coverage they receive being compared to cases of missing men, or women of color and of lower social classes.[6][7] Although the term was coined to describe disproportionate coverage of missing person cases, it is sometimes used to describe the disparity in news coverage of other violent crimes.

PBS news anchor Gwen Ifill is said to be the originator of the phrase.[7] Charlton McIlwain, a professor at New York University, defines the syndrome as white women perpetually occupying a privileged role as violent crime victims in news media reporting, and concludes that missing white woman syndrome functions as a type of racial hierarchy in the cultural imagery of the West.[8] Professor Eduardo Bonilla-Silva categorizes the racial component of missing white woman syndrome as a form of racial grammar, through which white supremacy is normalized by implicit or even invisible standards.[1]

Missing white woman syndrome has led to a number of right-wing tough on crime measures that were named for white women who disappeared and were subsequently found harmed.[9][10] Moody, Dorris and Blackwell (2008)[11] concluded that in addition to race and class, factors such as supposed attractiveness, body size and youthfulness function as unfair criteria in the determination of newsworthiness in coverage of missing women. Also noteworthy was that news coverage of missing black women was more likely to focus on the victim’s baggage, such as abusive boyfriends or a troubled past, while coverage of white women tends to focus on their roles as mothers or daughters.[12]


United StatesEdit

With regard to missing children, statistical research which compares national media reports with FBI data shows that there is marked under-representation of African American children in media reports relative to non-African American children. A subsequent study found that girls from minority groups were the most under-represented in these missing-children news reports by a very large margin.[13]

Zach Sommers, a sociologist at Northwestern University, noted that while there is a sizable body of research that shows that white people are more likely than people of color to appear in news coverage as victims of violent crime there is relatively little when it comes to missing persons cases.[1] In 2013, Sommers cross-referenced the missing persons coverage of four national and local media outlets against the FBI's missing persons database. Sommers found black people received disproportionately less coverage than whites and men received disproportionately less coverage than women; Sommers could not directly assess the number of missing white women in the FBI files due to how the data was structured but concluded that there was circumstantial—although not statistically conclusive—evidence that white women received disproportionate coverage.[14][1]​

 

[BlackSand]

I assume you're all familiar with helicopter parenting: over-protective, over-involved parenting which began in the 80s and really took off in the 90s. I feel like I've been given a front row seat for the debacle. I began teaching in 1993, just when the phenomenon was beginning to catch on. By the time I got my teaching feet underneath me, helicopter parents were in full force. But none of my teaching colleagues had been raised by helicopter parents. We suspected what we were seeing wasn't....good, to say the least.

Well.

Now we know. Now we have this generation of teens and young adults riddled with anxiety and depression, unable to function without strict perimeters. College deans have to include parents on college orientation (!) and teach parents how to 'break away' (!) and there are words for doing things ("adulting") that we just expected to do when we were in our 20s. Why?

We robbed kids of struggle, in short. We decided if we could shelter, protect, and take the challenge away from them, that was better. We decided that the infinitesimal chance of them being abducted if they rode their bike across town at age 12 was not worth it. So we drove them around, activity to activity, until they were 16. Extrapolate that to every activity and throw in a good deal of judgment and a bunch of other stuff, and you have a toxic stew of child-rearing.

There's a lot more to say, but I'll leave it to the board to weigh in. There is a TON of information on this, but here are just a few links to get you started:

The Effects of ‘Helicopter Parenting’

There are more contributors to the problem ... And I am not going to bash them singularly (just as a honorable mention).


Video Games …
Video games now consume a lot of children’s free time.
They are tailored atmospheres of engagement that now involve a broad social setting.

Internet …
In the past, children had to negotiate personal relationships in more productive manners.
If one child wanted to do one thing and another child wanted to do something else, they had to find common ground on their own.
Nowadays … A child can go online and find a million other children that agree with them or are interested in the same things they are.
There is no longer as much of a need to negotiate cooperation to meet less than favorable standards.

Fast food and immediate gratification …
We live in a world where problems are more easily “fixed”.
You feel hungry, drive up to a box and order, food comes out a window in a bag.


All of these things lead to a society that is no longer balanced or requires an adjustment of input to satisfy a different output.

.​

 

[SweetSue92]

I assume you're all familiar with helicopter parenting: over-protective, over-involved parenting which began in the 80s and really took off in the 90s. I feel like I've been given a front row seat for the debacle. I began teaching in 1993, just when the phenomenon was beginning to catch on. By the time I got my teaching feet underneath me, helicopter parents were in full force. But none of my teaching colleagues had been raised by helicopter parents. We suspected what we were seeing wasn't....good, to say the least.

Well.

Now we know. Now we have this generation of teens and young adults riddled with anxiety and depression, unable to function without strict perimeters. College deans have to include parents on college orientation (!) and teach parents how to 'break away' (!) and there are words for doing things ("adulting") that we just expected to do when we were in our 20s. Why?

We robbed kids of struggle, in short. We decided if we could shelter, protect, and take the challenge away from them, that was better. We decided that the infinitesimal chance of them being abducted if they rode their bike across town at age 12 was not worth it. So we drove them around, activity to activity, until they were 16. Extrapolate that to every activity and throw in a good deal of judgment and a bunch of other stuff, and you have a toxic stew of child-rearing.

There's a lot more to say, but I'll leave it to the board to weigh in. There is a TON of information on this, but here are just a few links to get you started:

The Effects of ‘Helicopter Parenting’

I was gonna start a thread on this subject.

This is a major influence on helicopter parents :

Missing white woman syndrome - Wikipedia

Missing white woman syndrome

Missing white woman syndrome is a phenomenon noted by social scientists[1][2][3] and media commentators of the extensive media coverage, especially in television,[4] of missing person cases involving young, white, upper-middle-class women or girls. Instances have been cited in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and South Africa.[5] The phenomenon is defined as the media's undue focus on upper-middle-class white women who disappear, with the disproportionate degree of coverage they receive being compared to cases of missing men, or women of color and of lower social classes.[6][7] Although the term was coined to describe disproportionate coverage of missing person cases, it is sometimes used to describe the disparity in news coverage of other violent crimes.

PBS news anchor Gwen Ifill is said to be the originator of the phrase.[7] Charlton McIlwain, a professor at New York University, defines the syndrome as white women perpetually occupying a privileged role as violent crime victims in news media reporting, and concludes that missing white woman syndrome functions as a type of racial hierarchy in the cultural imagery of the West.[8] Professor Eduardo Bonilla-Silva categorizes the racial component of missing white woman syndrome as a form of racial grammar, through which white supremacy is normalized by implicit or even invisible standards.[1]

Missing white woman syndrome has led to a number of right-wing tough on crime measures that were named for white women who disappeared and were subsequently found harmed.[9][10] Moody, Dorris and Blackwell (2008)[11] concluded that in addition to race and class, factors such as supposed attractiveness, body size and youthfulness function as unfair criteria in the determination of newsworthiness in coverage of missing women. Also noteworthy was that news coverage of missing black women was more likely to focus on the victim’s baggage, such as abusive boyfriends or a troubled past, while coverage of white women tends to focus on their roles as mothers or daughters.[12]


United StatesEdit

With regard to missing children, statistical research which compares national media reports with FBI data shows that there is marked under-representation of African American children in media reports relative to non-African American children. A subsequent study found that girls from minority groups were the most under-represented in these missing-children news reports by a very large margin.[13]

Zach Sommers, a sociologist at Northwestern University, noted that while there is a sizable body of research that shows that white people are more likely than people of color to appear in news coverage as victims of violent crime there is relatively little when it comes to missing persons cases.[1] In 2013, Sommers cross-referenced the missing persons coverage of four national and local media outlets against the FBI's missing persons database. Sommers found black people received disproportionately less coverage than whites and men received disproportionately less coverage than women; Sommers could not directly assess the number of missing white women in the FBI files due to how the data was structured but concluded that there was circumstantial—although not statistically conclusive—evidence that white women received disproportionate coverage.[14][1]​

I think the "missing children" and "stranger danger" epidemic certainly is a contributor to helicopter parenting--and I can see the point in this information. It seems valid to me. However, "stranger danger" is not the only factor that goes into helicopter parenting. There's also the self-esteem movement, parents having fewer children, and other factors I suppose.

Still, as I said, this is interesting (and sad) information, and certainly one part of the puzzle. Thanks for sharing it.

 

[SweetSue92]

I assume you're all familiar with helicopter parenting: over-protective, over-involved parenting which began in the 80s and really took off in the 90s. I feel like I've been given a front row seat for the debacle. I began teaching in 1993, just when the phenomenon was beginning to catch on. By the time I got my teaching feet underneath me, helicopter parents were in full force. But none of my teaching colleagues had been raised by helicopter parents. We suspected what we were seeing wasn't....good, to say the least.

Well.

Now we know. Now we have this generation of teens and young adults riddled with anxiety and depression, unable to function without strict perimeters. College deans have to include parents on college orientation (!) and teach parents how to 'break away' (!) and there are words for doing things ("adulting") that we just expected to do when we were in our 20s. Why?

We robbed kids of struggle, in short. We decided if we could shelter, protect, and take the challenge away from them, that was better. We decided that the infinitesimal chance of them being abducted if they rode their bike across town at age 12 was not worth it. So we drove them around, activity to activity, until they were 16. Extrapolate that to every activity and throw in a good deal of judgment and a bunch of other stuff, and you have a toxic stew of child-rearing.

There's a lot more to say, but I'll leave it to the board to weigh in. There is a TON of information on this, but here are just a few links to get you started:

The Effects of ‘Helicopter Parenting’

There are more contributors to the problem ... And I am not going to bash them singularly (just as a honorable mention).


Video Games …
Video games now consume a lot of children’s free time.
They are tailored atmospheres of engagement that now involve a broad social setting.

Internet …
In the past, children had to negotiate personal relationships in more productive manners.
If one child wanted to do one thing and another child wanted to do something else, they had to find common ground on their own.
Nowadays … A child can go online and find a million other children that agree with them or are interested in the same things they are.
There is no longer as much of a need to negotiate cooperation to meet less than favorable standards.

Fast food and immediate gratification …
We live in a world where problems are more easily “fixed”.
You feel hungry, drive up to a box and order, food comes out a window in a bag.


All of these things lead to a society that is no longer balanced or requires an adjustment of input to satisfy a different output.

.​

Ooooooohhhhh yes.

If you wanted to start a thread on tech and children's brains....oh my. There is SO much to say. Honestly, I thank God that I raised my children in their formative years before it was available (but just). I understand the temptation, boy do I. But any teacher of young children can tell you--it is changing children in ways we are only beginning to understand.

And I'm not just saying we want kids to "sit down and shut up" either. The changes aren't just that we can't deal with them, really. As you say. They have extremely short attention spans; very poor locomotor control; they can't negotiate with friends and on and on.

I think in just a few years we'll know. Neuroscientists will be warning parents same way they warn about car seats.

 

[koshergrl]

I get twenty-somethings in my class regularly. Most are hard working. They know their job depends on passing. But some make me shake my head and wonder how they got dressed by themselves.

Two weeks ago, I had a 25-year-old in my class. In my world, that's a grown man. His whining got old fast. It was the first and I hope last time in my life a grown man looked me in the eye and said, "You need to do this for me". And he meant it.

His parents did him a huge disservice. These are the little snowflakes who grew up with participation trophies who are now becoming enamored with socialism. With no memory of the Cold War or understanding of 20th century history, they don't understand the murderous, bloodthirsty, tyrannical nature of "free stuff". Or maybe since they grew up having everything done for them and everything provided for them, they're willing to trade in their parents for an all-controlling and providing state.

They are taught in school that to be good people, they must embrace globalism and not question government control of every aspect of their lives..and the lives of others. At the same time, history is kept from them, and they are not taught to read.

Voila, the mentally ill poop *protesters* who show up with weapons to clobber people who rally to promote freedom of speech.

 

[williepete]

They have extremely short attention spans; very poor locomotor control; they can't negotiate with friends and on and on.

Would you expand on that a bit?

 

[BlackSand]

Ooooooohhhhh yes.

If you wanted to start a thread on tech and children's brains....oh my. There is SO much to say. Honestly, I thank God that I raised my children in their formative years before it was available (but just). I understand the temptation, boy do I. But any teacher of young children can tell you--it is changing children in ways we are only beginning to understand.

And I'm not just saying we want kids to "sit down and shut up" either. The changes aren't just that we can't deal with them, really. As you say. They have extremely short attention spans; very poor locomotor control; they can't negotiate with friends and on and on.

I think in just a few years we'll know. Neuroscientists will be warning parents same way they warn about car seats.

I am certainly not a Luddite … And I didn’t mean to stray too far from the topic.
I just think that helicopter parents are a variable that added to other variables become more of a problem.

I could have included the “perpetual excuse” … It’s always someone else’s fault.
The common desire to find fault or blame in the actions of someone else, policy or system failure.
This is compounded with helicopter parents and their desire to adjust the teacher over the child.

That is further compounded by policy that chases the “outliers” in variables.
The more we attempt to include less than favorable conditions to eliminate feelings of exclusion …
The more we anchor our destiny to mediocrity.

If we attempt to include the lowest common denominator into an equation …
The more we limit the possible outcome.

We are no longer encouraging children to explore the rewards of excellence …
We are telling them to explore and that every rock they drag home is excellent.

.​

 

[SweetSue92]

I get twenty-somethings in my class regularly. Most are hard working. They know their job depends on passing. But some make me shake my head and wonder how they got dressed by themselves.

Two weeks ago, I had a 25-year-old in my class. In my world, that's a grown man. His whining got old fast. It was the first and I hope last time in my life a grown man looked me in the eye and said, "You need to do this for me". And he meant it.

His parents did him a huge disservice. These are the little snowflakes who grew up with participation trophies who are now becoming enamored with socialism. With no memory of the Cold War or understanding of 20th century history, they don't understand the murderous, bloodthirsty, tyrannical nature of "free stuff". Or maybe since they grew up having everything done for them and everything provided for them, they're willing to trade in their parents for an all-controlling and providing state.

They are taught in school that to be good people, they must embrace globalism and not question government control of every aspect of their lives..and the lives of others. At the same time, history is kept from them, and they are not taught to read.

Voila, the mentally ill poop *protesters* who show up with weapons to clobber people who rally to promote freedom of speech.

Depends on where you are.

 

[SweetSue92]

They have extremely short attention spans; very poor locomotor control; they can't negotiate with friends and on and on.

Would you expand on that a bit?

Certainly. I'm no expert mind you, just what I've seen and what we think it might be from. Kids who spend too much time on technology, especially the kind that is "instant gratification" like iPads and smartphones...we think they're both doing something like short-circuiting and rerouting their normal brain development. What I would say is--the input coming in is fast but shallow, if that makes sense. They're getting lots of information but it's not making a huge impact in their entire system; its artificial in a way. It's not stimulating them socially, kinesthetically, etc.

It seems to us that kids' brains get used to that super fast input and they need it to feel stimulated. Like how if you take drugs and your brain gets used to that unnatural influx of chemicals...pretty soon you don't feel normal without it. So kids come back to school--this is especially noticeable in the fall--and they seem to be withdrawing from it while at the same time trying to adjust with how to deal without that constant instant stimulation, which is stressful. So the teacher is trying to model or briefly explain something, the child is totally checked because the brain has been physiologically changed and on top of that, the child is anxious because he or she knows that he should attend but can't. And this is just the beginning of the year. And how does anxiety come out in children? Misbehavior.

And this does not address what parental addiction to smartphones has done to kids--which is a whole 'nother topic.

 

[williepete]

Thanks. Fascinating. (Morbidly fascinating )