Where children really better behaved in the past or do people remember with rose tinted glasses?

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This is inspired by a video online whereby a toddler was having a massive tantrum on a 8 hour flight.
A lot of the comments underneath basically were how terrible a parent the mother was and how in their day the child wouldn't have dared behave like that.
What is the alleged difference? What are we not doing that we did then? Or do people only remember the good parts and forget their children also behaved like that.
I personally as a mother of a toddler found the comments awful. I suspect the mother was not having the time of her life either.

Let's not forget that, for much of history until relatively recently, any children who weren't from the moneyed classes would be working and contributing to the family budget from a very young age.......they didn't have much of a childhood at all.

People grew up very fast. They had to.

bumblingbovine49 no mine was too. I never seemed to get it right. but have to say he is a really nice adult and comes home a lot to visit (so I can't have been too bad)

there is an assumption that all kids of the 60/70's were beaten.
I wasn't. it wasn't the norm even back then,
we were just different from todays kids, cos it was a different time.

One of the key changes I’ve noticed, in addition to hitting a child no longer being acceptable is the idea of a child’s opinion, wants or priorities as being something taken into consideration. Sometimes as equal to that of the adults.

I agree with this from the perspective of being parented in the 70s/80s. As a child, you didn't have any say in family decisions such as holidays, purchases, food, how you'd be spending your time. It was a special treat to be consulted, e.g. on your birthday.

I only have MN to go by, but if it's true that people do consult their children on these types of thing nowadays, it might not be wholly a good thing - not because their opinions aren't valid but because you're putting responsibility on young heads which might be inappropriate.

There was something very relaxing in childhood about the way things just happened and you didn't have to give input - new furniture appeared, or a holiday destination was announced, or dinner turned up on the table - being a 'backseat passenger' in life is quite a precious stage, and people shouldn't make children relinquish it too early.

I think most parents I know would consider children’s opinions to me worth far more than adults, let alone as equal. Do people think that is where it goes wrong? In a family children generally get to choose holidays, days out, meals out, leisure time etc and mostly what is to eat.

I agree and I think it’s making them ill too many choices and adult decisions with adult consequences placed in the hands of children it’s not healthy.

I was born mid 50's and have 2 siblings, one born 50's and the other early 60's. My parents say none of us had tantrums and there is no reason for them to lie.

My siblings both have 2 children. One had children who never had tantrums, the other had 1 child who never did and 1 child that did.

To say all children have tantrums is just rubbish.

My parents were strict and, yes, we did get smacked but rarely. I had respect for my parents but was not scared of them.

We were taught to have respect for all our elders, something that doesn't seem to happen today.

We were taking to the cinema fairly regularly plus did lots of train trips (parents didn't drive) and didn't start showing off any of the times.

We were certainly not "feral" and most times played indoors or in our garden. Our parents played with us, read to us etc. We were not left to our own devices as some posters seem to think. Surely a lot of today's children are more left to their own devices watching tv, playing computer games, using the internet etc?

At my school girls and boys got the cane (I never did) and although I think it is wrong I also think there is far too little discipline today.

I was on a bus in Central London on Boxing Day. Upstairs were quite a few families. One young boy started ringing the bell - they weren't getting off and the bus kept stopping at stops and no one got off. His parents said "oh you shouldn't ring the bell, the driver thinks people want to get off" but that was it. He gradually rang it more and more and then a couple of other children starting whinging that they too wanted to ring the bell. They were both told no but 1 did.

The bell keep ringing drove me mad (I have noise sensitivity) and if I had been the driver I would have thrown them off the bus.

Far too many children now are spoilt selfish brats who never hear the word "no".

If children were raised better back when I was young then why are there so many people my age and older who are criminals, why is there so much violence, why is there corruption etc. and so on? If we were better behaved when we were younger what happened? If parents of yesteryear were such perfect parents, why is it not a better world than it is? If we learn how to be parents from the way we were parented shouldn't we be perfect parents too? It's wearing rose coloured glasses and blowing ones own trumpet and it's a load of gaslighting crap.

RainbowBriteRules As an adult, think how relaxing it is to occasionally have these things taken out of your hands - e.g. if you're staying with friends and they organise all the food, days out, etc. and you just go with the flow.

I think it must actually be quite stressful for today's children if they have to be part of all the family decision-making - when they don't have experience and knowledge to draw on, as an adult would - perhaps that's why they have to let off steam in other ways!

mydogisthebest - didn’t you say something?

I don't think children are necessarily worse behaved. I do think that expectations placed on children are greater. Children access/ experience things that were not that common 20-30 years ago e.g. plane travel and expecting children to sit nicely for 8 hours, or that they will sit quietly for a few hours at a smart restaurant/ pub on a weekly basis when all they want is to eat fish fingers in their pants. I do think children now are way more tired with school/ wraparound care/ structured clubs/ technology and a general more frantic family life. I see chronically sleep deprived children/ teenagers in my work frequently which obviously has a knock on effect on behaviour.

For those who think children today are selfish brats - you would have brought up their parents and taught them what they know.

Maybe take time to reflect on that.

I didn't behave badly as I knew my parents would not accept it. My dc does not behave badly as she knows I won't accept it. A few decades of teaching tells me children behave badly as not only will their parents accept it but they will blame someone else for it. Behaviour is definitely worse, entitled 30 something are raising poorly behaved brats at my school.

But isn't that how life works?
You behave yourself in life for fear of consequences.
You don't misbehave at work or be unruly or you'll be sacked. You behave as you are expected according to the role or the consequences are bad.
In relationships you don't hopefully take the other for granted, use them, call them names, etc for fear of consequences... Being left.
That's how life works.
If they are not even learning these lessons in school and telling off results in parent complaints then exactly when are they going to learn that you behave yourself or else there are consequences.

Totally agree with this.

There is such a lot of polarising happening on this thread

Children now are taught to respect other people. I don’t teach my children to respect their elders but they are taught to respect everyone. Mine certainly do hear no and, for the most part, cope well in public without much fuss.

I do completely agree though that children are given too much choice which is confusing and stressful. Parents need to be comfortable making decisions.

Another aspect worth considering though is that my parents parenting (which was far from perfect) wasn’t picked apart publically and then on social media forums. I genuinely think some parents are terrified to make a wrong move. I think back to my sister reduced to tears by her son having an on the floor tantrum - not because it was upsetting and stressful anyway but because she was worried about what people were saying.

You cannot do wrong for doing right as a parent now because there are myriad ways to judge you.

I think actually it’s a societal shift. the role of mothers/fathers is not really valued. Most of us have to work - leaving nurseries etc to bring up kids.

How many mums netters talk about seeing their kids for an hour before and after work?

Could we please maintain perspective?

I teach secondary children and in the many thousands I have come across in my teaching career I have only come across a handful who are genuinely out of control. A further handful who are so routinely supported by their parents as to be a major challenge (and they are rarely ever the textbook challenging students. They are more often the entitled and demanding who believe a university education andgood grades should be forthcoming without any effort or sacrifice)

Teachers have never ever had much actual overt control. Schools work by good grace and a mutual understanding. If all of them chose to get up and walk out then not a thing could stop them. That has always been the case

I would never have been taken on a plane as a young child.

Allegedly on one particular holiday I was heard screaming 5 miles out at sea by fishermen off the Isles of Scilly.

My poor parents.

One thing that never fails to astound me when i do my initial visits with families is the swearing directed at the parents.
We, as kids and later as adults were never allowed to swear so when i hear a 12 year old telling her mum to ' Fuck right off ' shocks, saddens and barrages me all at the same time. One kid was so upset thst mum wouldn't ( read couldn't afford to) buy her child a new iPad and the amount of anger and lack of respect was truly shocking. This mum is a professional woman who can't cope with children anymore.
Another priblem I see is that kids get the upper hand when the parents disagree about parenting in front of the child. Madness!!! The weaker parent gives in and it's game over for the parent trying to install discipline.
Children don't need to be thrashed to an inch of their lives to be well behaved.
Age appropriate consequences and boundaries need to be in place from the toddler stage. On our family course we teach about ' love and limits which is another way of saying it.

In the old days parents used violence, luckily we don’t go for that anymore
Not true for everyone. I'm in my 50s me and my siblings wasn't hit. My mother in her late 70s wasn't either.
I have talked to my friends about this. Many wasn't smacked either. Some where of course but I wouldn't take it as fact that everyone was ruled by the threat of violence.

I think most children are well behaved in school because there are rules. Parents may not enforce their rules at home or not have any. I do see quite a lot of parents trying to explain why a child shouldn’t do something but often to a child that won’t really understand the concept so the child does the same thing again. I rarely see parents say ‘No’ and mean it. Some Parents seem happy to let their children annoy other diners in restaurants and do unacceptable things whilst they are on their phones, getting drunk or merely ignoring their children. So if they don’t see them much in the week it’s a shame they don’t take much notice of them at the weekend. This is, a minority but they are a noticeable minority.

We were never smacked (as 50s and 60s children) but we did understand when to be quiet and not disturb other people. We played outside all the time and had time indoors playing games if it was raining. No 10 hours of computer games for us. We used our own imagination and could manage our own play. We were never given any say over food, trips out and we never had a holiday. I’m now obsessed with holidays! We had quite a poor childhood but we certainly didn’t cause problems to other people.

HettieBettie - completely agree, parenting is undermined at every level. We are told we aren’t good enough for our children these days and that’s enforced by advertisers, health visitors, family courts, schools .... if the little prince or princess is not happy fingers point squarely at the parents

I wasn’t aware of any of my friends having parents who snacked. Parents read Dr Spock! My uncle smacked my cousin though. So it did happen but certainly not in every house and many middle class people abandoned the concept because they had been hit as children and didn’t want to continue in that style.

Children with behavioural problems were more likely to be sent to special schools in the past.

Now most dcs are mainstreamed meaning the general population is more exposed to behavioural issues.