When did parents stop being the boss

I'm in my 30s and none of my friends throughout my adult life have had great relationships with their parents. In my experience the previous generation made a lot of mistakes and passed down a lot of trauma. In trying to be not like them my generation has a tendency to be too soft and really just doesn't know how to parent kids because they weren't parented well. Add to this the fact that smartphones, tablets, the internet weren't around when we were kids, it's a completely new world to navigate

My point is actually that a lot of sweeping statements and judgements are made with no idea of specific circumstances and little grace given.

@Barnbrack

You're making a lot of assumptions and making a lot of statements based on your personal experience.

I do practice gentle parenting, in that I don't shout or rule my kids with an iron fist. What I don't do, is let them get away with bad behaviour and rudeness, or flagrant flouting of accepted social rules because I "can't say no".

Your language is stating that there's two ways - permissive or "hurting and screaming" at children - which isn't fair. This conversation is also not talking about children with special needs. I'm sorry you get looks and feel judged, but this is conversation about parents NOT parenting, while you clearly are, regardless of what a few people that don't know you feel about seeing a split second of your day.

And your parents being abusive and you now having no contact also isn't relevant. I'm genuinely sorry these things are your experience, but they are not the norm.

Overall, I do think that there are some parts of society and some parents that have gone too child centric (eg the people on this thread and others where the idea that a child should give a seat to an adult on a bus is viewed as something outrageous) in a way that is detrimental to society as a whole. And there's definitely an odd disconnect I notice at the moment where on the one hand children are given so much automony to decide what they do, and yet also very little independence. Which worries me.

But I also think people forget how they were really parented. One thing I used to find amusing when my children were little was how often I'd hear people commenting like, "well, when we were little, we certainly weren't allowed to run aroudn a restaurant -we had to sit quietly and colour". But really, the difference wasn't that as toddlers we were more behaved, it was that as toddlers we weren't taken to restaurants. The time we remember - with the colouring in - was when we were older. So there's all this outrage but it's about the wrong thing. (and inf act, I quickly realised it was better for all of us if I didn't take them to restaurants until they got older!)

Ditto with independence or bed times for older children. I remember bedtime being very strict. But then, when I think back properly, I also remember strict bedtime being in the house we lived in until I was a young teen. I do not, in fact, remember strict bedtimes in the house we lived in later. But in my head, "bedtime was a super strict thing in our house" but it took my brother pointing out this dicotomy for me to realise it was... when we were little.

Couldn't disagree more. I want my daughter to respect me, not be afraid of me.

I was afraid of my Mum and I was very well behaved and very miserable throughout my childhood until I left home and went all the way off the rails. It took us years to have a decent relationship and there's still a lot of resentment.

This is ridiculous.. children need discipline and boundaries and this doesn’t have to involve hurting or screaming

I hear what you're saying, and I agree people shouldn't be judging you in that scenario.

The do, and yet so many of us born in the 80s and 90s are no contact with our parents. What does that tell you about parenting then?

Yes, same here. We have never tolerated any type of rude, unpleasant behaviour, we always immediately nipped it in the bud. I'm often horrified at how children and teens speak to their parents, yelling at them, even swearing at them FFS! And the rudeness, sneering and belligerence is off the charts and the parents just suck it up!

In fairness though, we have never sworn at our DDs, or used derogatory language, or belittled them, so it cuts both ways.

I actually believe that the advent of smart phones made it much easier to install good behaviour in children. We never policed our DDs' phone usage, but we made it very clear that the minute their school grades dropped, or there was a disappointing parent's evening, or they didn't willingly do their chores, or they were ever rude/belligerent then their phones would be removed, the taxi service would stop and their allowance would stop.

It's really not hard. Teenagers know which side their bread is buttered and are quick learners. But they need to know you are fully prepared to 100% follow through with sanctions, every single time.

Exactly 💯 this. I've just read an article about how we need to teach our children more grit, as so many don't seem to have it.

I guess maybe a lot of parents perhaps mollycoddle their children too much, but wrapping them in cotton wool is of course counterproductive (as my parents did to me, and im lacking a lot in confidence at times).

Being able to be confident, assertive and independent people come from not being mollycoddled, but as you say, a lot of this generation seems to be the opposite.

I know exactly what you mean but I still get people, particularly older women, tutting, shaking their heads and telling me to control my child who has a disability.

See my previous response.

There have always been good and bad parents, there have always been parents who are neglectful as you describe. But this idea of kids ruling the roost etc comes from people seeing gentle parenting principles and thinking it means never saying no or letting your kids do as they please.

If you see my previous response you'll realise I mean that people making these judgements have no idea what they are seeing half the time. And that kids being let 'run riot' are often kids being upset and not being punished for being upset. Rather than kids not being told no. My youngest is like an absolute model child in day to day life, I have old ladies stop me in the street to commend my parenting but I'm phoning it in. She's just a compliant kid who responds well to gentle parenting techniques and can self regulate at 3 way beyond her years. Whole with my son I'm implementing parenting techniques learnt in actual parenting courses for Neurodivergence, advice from qualified children psychologists and his neurologist and absolutely bashing my brains in and yet because he struggles emotionally I get stares and turns from those same old ladies.

Depends on what it is and the age of the child. Bedtime is kind of flexible for us but when we say it's bedtime it's bedtime. DD is too young for screentime to be a big issue for us, but if she is watching TV on her tablet and we ask her to turn it off and she gets stroppy, we take the tablet away for a few days so she can have a screen reset. Mealtimes...well we expect her to sit at the table and try everything on her plate but if she says she doesn't want it then she doesn't eat it. There's no options- if she was that hungry, she'd eat what she was given.

The going to events one is a bit weird. I can't really see an example of where I'd force my child to attend an event. We wouldn't book an event if it wasn't something she'd enjoy.

The difference with him is that if he's genuinely 'dysregulated' as we call it these days, he wouldnt stop immediately, he'd take a while to calm down and would still be visibly distressed. This child was just a spoilt, manipulative little madam.

I loved the recently trending videos where children were asked to finish sentences such as
Children should be seen and...
I brought you into this world so I can... etc etc
.
None of the children knew the correct endings and some of the responses were like "children should be seen and loved"

Feels like progress to me.

I completely agree with this.

I also believe children thrive best in this relationship. Children need boundaries and they need parents to instill good habits in them, including doing things that aren’t fun to do.

And parenting means stepping up to do the hard work of enforcing things your children need to do. You have to go through that pain barrier with kids when you put in the hard work to enforce a rule.

My kids Father doesn’t do this and frankly they run rings around them. I do enforce expectations and rules. Guess who they prefer spending time with? Me. I care about them enough to spend a lot of time with them, have a lot of fun, but I also lose my shit with them less as I’ve spent time developing a close relationship, but where they know the routine, have the security of knowing I am in charge, and I do the things I do with their best interests at heart. I’m not prioritizing my own, ‘can’t be arsed with this fight’ lethargy. I’m prioritizing them. And they know it.

Or what it has to do with the OP which quite specifically calls out people the OP knows whose children do not have any SEN.

“Felt listened to and heard”.

I think that’s key, in that your child should be listened to and heard - but that doesn’t mean always getting what they want (or think they want at that fleeting moment).

We can hear our children without forgetting that we are still the adults, still the parents, still in charge.

(Love your user name btw!)

I'm sorry I really don't understand what your post has got to do with mine?

Are you saying you've never said no or asked them to do anything they might not want to do?

I disagree, my children are polite, kind, can share, have friends, commended for behaviour at school including my eldest SEN child. However out and about there are days you'd see me huckling this massive boy onto my knee in a shop where he's melted down and I've not seen the signals and I'm comforting what looks like a tantrumming 10 yr old asking for a toy. And I suspect a lot of judgement is going towards parents in similar situations seen in a snapshot of their lives. Because in the 80s a child who could actually like that wouldn't be taken out of would be left in the car or would be terrified to speak due to repeatedly being screamed at or hit. I probably looked like the model child at 7 because I was so anxious I could hardly more than whisper in public.

But why should either one of them give up their seat to an able bodied adult? It's nice to be nice for sure, but teaching children to blindly put others' needs ahead of their own is definitely a cycle I'm trying to break.

Don't be so ridiculous. It's not some sort of binary, 'draconian and abusive'/'let them do exactly what they want at all times, ffs.'

It's part of a parent's duty to equip kids for life by modelling structure and rules because these are part of civilised society. The vast majority of parents manage to do this with love and an acceptance of their kids as 'human beings in their own right'. Of course they are, but they need to be taught and guided.

It's absurd to suggest that discipline equals treating children like robots, screaming and hitting. If you have children do you let them do exactly what they want, when they want? You're doing them no favours if so.

I find this interesting that there's clearly a certain type of parent that thinks that bringing your child up to be polite, friendly, and generally just a well-adjusted person is a bad thing, because you might have to occasionally say "no" or ask them to do something they don't want to do.

You're doing your children no favours by having no boundaries and letting them "rule the roost" so to speak.

And no, it's not about being authoritarian, or hurting or screaming at them. It takes yet again, a particular type of parent who interprets the above as that. It's about knowing that the benefit of age and experience actually counts for something.

I'm not sure when or why this happened, but I agree it's the "I can't say no" and "I can't stop them" types.