Are American Parents Doing A Lousy Job?
Are American parents doing a lousy job? That not really a question so much as an accusation. Admittedly, it’s also a slap in the face to millions of parents out there who know far more about the ordeal of raising kids than I do. Fact is, I don’t know a thing about being a parent or raising kids. I pose this question for the sake of discussion.
In my countless travels and many social engagements over the years, I’ve noticed a peculiar tendency that seems unique to American families. In other words, native-born family members appear to interact quite differently when together in public when contrasted with non-American-born parents and their kids. One presumes these similar relationships extend into the home, behind closed doors, as well.
I’m talking about American parents doddering like slaves over their children, allowing the youngsters to be the focal point of all activity and conversation. Indeed, this propensity does appear abnormally American. You don’t see it in other cultures, or at least not as much.
This isn’t the bias of selective memory. It occurs just about everywhere — in restaurants, on airplanes, in doctor’s offices, at grocery stores, at amusement parks — you name it. In general, American-born parents seem to allow their children to run the whole show. Kids must be constantly entertained, amused, cajoled, and pampered. An adult conversation takes a back seat to the whims of six-year-olds.
One doesn’t observe this tendency nearly as often with other ethnic groups — either in similar social situations here in the U.S. with foreign-born parents, or while traveling internationally, or in foreign countries. Their kids quite simply behave much better than ours.
Consider dinner at a family restaurant last night, where a large party was seated at an adjacent table. It filled with parents and their children. There were perhaps 4 or 5 adults and 6 or 7 young children, ranging in ages from perhaps 4 to 10. The kids were loud. They were obnoxious. They were demanding. They ran around the table and annoyed most of those sitting around them. The parents pretty much did nothing, other than feigning some weak threats of discipline. One couldn’t help but notice this was a dreadful experience for all the adults who presumably were out for a nice dinner. They couldn’t engage in normal adult conversation together without being interrupted by one of the kids, or something happening which required attention. It was pathetic.
Tell me this is uncommon. Make the case that the scene I just described doesn’t happen way too frequently, perhaps even with your own friends and family with children present. Say with a straight face that given the choice you wouldn’t prefer the Asian family with kids on the row of your airplane, rather than a family for four from Florida.
Call me what you want. Make the case that I’m a racist. Accuse me of being anti-American. Label me a hater. Tell me I don’t know shit about being a parent. You would certainly be right about that. But one doesn’t see Asian parents and families behaving like that. We don’t witness Latino-born families erupting into a romper room of anarchy and rebellion when they’re out in public. In all my travels to Europe and living there for two years, I rarely saw those kids running the roost.
Obviously, most other cultures behave differently. They raise their kids in a manner that is consistent with a traditional family hierarchy. Children are an essential part of gatherings and are even encouraged to participate in social situations, but their whims aren’t fancied to the point where parents become subjugated to the impulses of adolescents.
Has anyone else noticed this tendency? Are foreign-born parents raising their children more responsible? Are American parents doing a lousy job?
What do you think?
100% true Nolan. We just got back from a vacation in the Caribbean. Lots of tourists from all over the world. The Latino and European kids were well-behaved, quiet, clearly having fun but fully aware of their limits. The American kids were loud and obnoxious, ruining the experience for everyone around them. I think it’s a rather new development too; my brother and I would never be able to get away with that kind of behavior when we were growing up in the 60’s and 70’s.
Not this parent Bubbah.
Not how this cowboy rolls.
Yes, I see it all too often. Feel bad for these kids. Hard life dead ahead when they learn how being an adult starts @ 20ish, not 40.
I could be wrong. Maybe.
Far too many Boomers and Gen Xers want to be “cool” parents, friends rather than role models and authority figures, it’s true. I wouldn’t go so far as to put them in the majority, though.
In a lot of families (including ours, now that I’m engaged to a woman who’s a wonderful and thoroughly involved mom), the kids know their places, that they’re children and not equals. They behave with respect and are treated with respect, but the kind of respect given to a child one is raising rather than that afforded to an adult.
Our kids know that they are loved, they know that there is a stark difference between them and the adults raising them, and they know who’s running the show. They participate in adult conversations and activities frequently, but they know that there’s a line, where said line can be found, and the consequences for crossing it. From time to time, because they’re kids, they screw up and cross it, and when they do, we teach them. That’s our role to a great extent, in my opinion. From my experiences with their friends, things are similar in their homes.
I think that there may be an inherent bias in your anecdotal study of which you’re unaware. We make it a point in our family to eat together at the dinner table in our dining room, and to do so regularly, pretty much every night unless there is a specific reason to do otherwise. From both past experience (with my ex-) and observation, I have to say that lazy and/or “cool” parents don’t make sitting down together to a family meal a priority… with the exception of going out to eat to avoid the inconvenience of cooking, doing dishes, interacting, etc. I suggest that it’s possible that when you go out, you’re statistically more likely to encounter such families than you are to run into families where the parents are involved, responsible, taking their jobs seriously, and where the kids know their places.
(This is not to say that we don’t go out… we do, at least twice per month, usually.)