Are parents in Cambridge uniquely ineffectual?

[ohrly]

Name change. I apologise for the clickbait title, my observations are based solely on our (primary) school and not all parents here.

We moved here six months ago from a more working-class area. Although that area had its problems, parents generally ensured their kids had basic manners, proper grooming, and weren't violent.

However, at my son's new school, I've noticed a significant lack of manners among many kids. Parents don't seem to enforce them either. The children demand things from their parents and others and are generally rude.

There are a few kids, despite being over seven years old, who frequently hit and push others. Parents respond with mild comments like "Oh no, that's not nice" instead of a more assertive, proportionate reaction like, "Do not hit. If you do that again, we will go home."

Parents also don't seem to enforce boundaries effectively. Instead of saying "5 minutes until we leave the park," they ask, "Are you ready to go now? Okay sweetie, no worries."

Moreover, parents often talk about their kids in a way that suggests the children are in control. They say things like, "Oh, she won't let me..." or "Oh, she doesn't like..." A common issue is kids refusing to let their parents brush their hair, resulting in matted hair.

At parties, no parents watch what's happening, and the kids go quite wild. I've had to stop myself from telling off so many kids.

These observations span a mix of nationalities, but all are middle-class families.
Is this a common occurrence now, or is it specific to Cambridge, this school, or the middle classes? Or am I just going mad?!

I honestly thought I was a super liberal parent until I moved here!

YABU - Stop judging / this isn't a real thing
YANBU - Yes these parents sound dreadful

Ssshhh this is a thread to make insecure people feel better about themselves by judging other people. Don't ruin their fun by pointing out inconsistencies you big meanie

@WindsurfingDreams you do know it is not black and white? And most people are in the middle? I try and keep my house clean and tidy. It is far from perfect. I also try and keep myself and my kids clean and reasonably dressed, not perfect. I also cuddle my kids and play with them.
I live in a place that gets described as yummy mummy territory. I am not middle class. Those women are very well dressed. The latest middle class branded summer dresses, perfectly dyed and styled hair and accessorised. I am wearing cheap but clean t shirts and jeans. I look scruffy in comparison, but I am actually just dressing normally.
Most people try and keep their house reasonable and keep themselves and their children looking reasonable. A cleanish and tidyish home is nicer to live in. Its easier if you can find things easily in your house. And you are less likely to get food poisoning if your kitchen and bathrooms are clean.
I also think families are happier if there is a reasonable amount of control over children so they behave reasonably well. I can't see how it makes any family happy if you have children who scream, fight every decision about what you do next, and who are difficult to take to restaurants or friends houses. We very much operate on the basis of creating a happy family, rather than a happy child at the expense of the family as a whole.

But why would you let your child wobble around on a bike in an area close to the finish of Parkrun? That area is effectively out of bounds for a wobbly bike rider for just half an hour a week.

I don't like brushing my hair. But my hair does feel more comfortable once it is brushed. The same with teeth cleaning. There are lots of ways to make these things easier such as using a very wide toother comb, or even your fingers. If you keep hair brushed reasonably often, children can comb their own hair.

The most feral kids I knew whose parents loved them and were actively trying to parent (as opposed to criminal class druggy parents) were a middle class couple in a large house that had been absolutely wrecked by the kids. They were totally permissive parents. The kids just destroyed everything and did not seem happy children.

Oh I don't disagree. Of course they are. But it's important to acknowledge actual emotional abuse behind a "perfect" veneer on a thread where a lot of people are doing the opposite and implying that a lack of grooming etc is a sign of bad parenting.

I'd be far more wary of an over controlling perfect parent than one who let their children pick what to wear.

And children can behave nicely without anyone needing to be authoritarian, there are plenty of gentle ways to raise well behaved children too. My parents never shouted at me but I behaved well in restaurants because they raised me to see going there as a treat and because they had conversations with us children and made it feel like a special adult experience for all of us.

@WindsurfingDreams Moderation is usually the best way in most areas of life. Usually both extremes are problematic. Of course having kids perfectly dressed who are not allowed to play in case they get dirty is not good. But neither is kids wearing clothes too small, with matted hair and filthy good.
I think different children need different types of parenting. Very gentle parenting is fine for kids who tend to be well behaved anyway. But with some children you do have to be much firmer.

What a mean spirited thread to start op

Cambridge obviously has its fair share of academics, but also plenty of people not involved in any part of the university. To generalise, the kids of academics we've met in state schools have tended to be quite feral and the parents sometimes quite anarchistic in their attitude towards school - often because they feel they know best. And frequently, they do know best, but only about a very narrow subject area, which isn't really that constructive. My DC made friends with the kids they liked, and avoided those they didn't, as any kid would.

But when my kids were at school in Cambridge, we found the whole atmosphere of the city to be quite unmaterialistic. When my DD turned up at school in a skirt we'd bought that weekend at the school jumble sale, the sister of the original owner complimented my DD on the skirt and said how much it suited her.

It’s not about either of those things , it’s about the fear of being judged, about feeling less than, feeling insecure in your own skin so the outer matters more. And that can be judged by your own class or a different one.

1. How do you recognise branded clothing? Surely you have to be brand obsessed yourself to notice?
2. Do you assume that a child wearing scruffy ASDA clothing must be working class?
3. Charity shops don’t sell second hand cheap clothing - it goes to landfill.
4. When you can no longer wear more expensive clothes for smart events, why should you stop using it - why not use it for getting mucky at the playground if you still like it and it’s comfortable?

I agree, wise words. Especially being aware of your advantages but not having that weaponised against them ie you are so lucky so spoilt , which my child isn’t but my mum will do the oh you are lucky like it’s somehow her fault. Can’t explain it very coherently sorry.

Oh dear God, spare me the liberal, faffy parents. Tying themselves in knots to ensure their 'precious little one' never experiences a moment of discomfort or dissatisfaction. Fucking tip toeing around on, ideally, organically home farmed eggshells.

Get a grip. Be the adult and parent that they need you to be. Not the ineffectual parent that you want to be.

@Walkaround are you really saying you can't tell the style of Oliver Bonas or Boden clothing or similar? Because I can and I am not middle class. But I recognise the style. Just as I recognise middle class styles of clothes women wear. They are really not that hard to recognise.
I wear clothes until they wear out. They are not fit for charity shops afterwards. Once they are no longer fit to wear out, they become wear at home clothes, and after that clothes to decorate on or do gardening or painting in. We do this with kids clothes as well.
Charity shops do sell cheap clothes, just not in more middle class areas.

@Hillarious they are still materialistic, just in different ways. They all have big houses, they often have holiday homes, they have fancy tents for camping. They are not living in a terraced house in a working class area and hiring a haven caravan for holidays. They show their materialism in different ways. But they are still very materialistic.

Based on this definition of materialistic, I have to disagree with you, @AvrielFinch "excessively concerned with physical comforts or the acquisition of wealth and material possessions, rather than with spiritual, intellectual, or cultural values"

On the contrary, it’s an interesting subject how, depending on how you’ve been brought up and how they were brought up your values can be polar opposites.

I’m not a particular fan of gentle parenting but I am interested to know what about it attracts such ire here.

The thing I don’t like about it is the belief that children ‘can’t’ control their impulses. I don’t expect my three year old to sit licking his lips in front of a chocolate cake but he can control his impulses in small ways and I expect to see this increase year by year.

Gentle parenting works on the assumption that a child can’t be expected to control themselves and so the adult has to physically force / prevent them doing things they aren’t supposed to do. There comes a time when the adult isn’t able to do this and I think that’s when a lot of the ineffectual parenting that people are complaining about here comes in.

Nonetheless, what is it people think that parents aren’t doing? Because sometimes I’ll be parenting brilliantly but my kids aren’t having any of it.

I recognise this so strongly. I still struggle enormously when I hear (and I quote the DM of a friend of DS) ‘But if you don’t wear make up to work then you’ll be invisible and not valued’. She finds me verging on impossible because I do not conform to her social norms, but doesn’t seem to realise how far away she is from those that I grew up with in Cambridge!

...isn't it the exact opposite of that?
Authoritarian parenting assumes that children will run wild unless a parent tells them what to do and intervenes with commands until the child starts to cop on to the fact that when they hit their sister they get shouted at/otherwise reprimanded. They then stop hitting their sister because they get into trouble if they do.
Gentle parenting is more that children can make choices on their own, so the ethos is more to explain the paradigm in which behaviour exists (if you hit your sister she'll get hurt and be upset) and encourage them to make good choices themselves. Obviously this involves a phase of frequently poor choices followed by further discussion, initially. The idea being that then they will eventually spontaneously choose not to hit their sister even when no adult is around to shout at them for it.

(I actually think what people are seeing in Cambridge is much more commonly 'low demand' parenting - recommended for ND and otherwise overwhelmed children - than 'gentle parenting', though).

Can't comment on Cambridge, but where I live is very working class. You're much more likely to hear kids being told to get their arses in gear it's time to go, rather than simpering that they can have another five minutes!
I'm not going to lie I'd rather that than have a child rule the roost.
I deal with so many parents who tell me their child gets angry and violent when they are told 'no' to something they want.
When we trace it back there has never been any boundaries or house rules in place. Then I usually hear 'well being a parent doesn't come with a manual does it?'
The child has to be rewired, learn that they cant always have their own way and also learn how to respect their parents.
If only ly the parents had dealt with issues at a very early age a lot of misery could have been avoided.

@WindsurfingDreams

Oh I don't disagree. Of course they are. But it's important to acknowledge actual emotional abuse behind a "perfect" veneer on a thread where a lot of people are doing the opposite and implying that a lack of grooming etc is a sign of bad parenting.

I kind of agree but you seem to be positioning this as if all parents who care about tidiness and grooming are hiding abuse behind a “perfect veneer” while the more “free range” style of parenting is automatically kinder and more supportive.

I don’t think it’s as simple as that. There is plenty of abuse and neglect in all families. The squeaky clean variety and the feral variety.

Keeping your children scrubbed clean and shiny all the time isn’t really my thing either but I would stop at seeing it as a red flag for abuse. It’s just different values.

Excessively? No they are not excessively concerned because all their needs are already met such as a nice house in a nice area, private or good state schools, and lovely holidays. So why would they need to be concerned about it?
If you are talking about people that have money and excessively concerned about acquiring more, you are talking about a very small sub set of people.

That doesn't ring true. You're implying that anyone who is content with what they have is materialistic, purely because they are content. My interpretation is that a materialistic person isn't content, and is continually striving for more of what they think they want.

Interesting about those who assume children can not develop impulse control at a young age. There was a famous experiment with young children using marshmallows. Very young children were left alone with a marshmallow after being told they would be given two if they did not eat this marshmallow. It is about delayed gratification. They found the children who waited had better life outcomes as measured against a range of outcomes such as earnings, BMI, non criminal activity, happy marriage, etc.
Children learning impulse control is very important. Constantly distracting them so they never learn this is not helpful.