To think if your child ends up violent or criminal, it is partly your fault?

[TheTaupeMoose]

Parenting does matter, sorry.

I just wondered if there is anything else you wanted to call me or describe me as and what it is.

Who are these people who don't judge parents of violent or criminal children?

Parents are judged more than any other demographic based upon their children's behaviour and conduct.
Parents are judged by everyone, and if the child is violent, the judgement is almost always negative, so I'm not sure where you are getting this idea from that parents of children who commit crimes and/or are violent aren't judged.
Who is too afraid to judge them?

Your belief that parents are not judged when their children are criminals and/or violent is not based in reality.

I have to assume you have never had a violent child or a child that has committed crimes, because if you had, you would probably be staggered at how much judgement there is, from so many different quarters.

I am going to keep the details vague for this.

A friend of ours was killed by her son - a violent, horrific and disturbing death. He is now in a secure location etc - won't go into more detail.

Highly complex background of neurodivergence/mental health/institutional failures/mental capacity/medical context. (I have ND background myself - no implications here, I am being very vague on purpose by generalising).

Her other adult child was recently graduated, starting adult life - both from the same supportive, loving family - extended network, community, outdoor life, good school, any other determining factor you would like to call on. Watching him talk in memory of his mum was devastating at her memorial service. Now both this person and their dad have had their family and their lives ripped apart.

I am appalled by even the merest suggestion anything to do with her parenting meant she was the cause of her own death.

I work in this area. You acknowledge the past, how it shapes things now, you work to address it and put healthier things in place, then you think of how you can move forward in a stronger place. The future is the only thing you can change.

I refuse to get stuck in my own traumatic past because I refuse to be a victim. Living in it would only hold me back and blaming stops me taking responsibility for what I can do to move forward in strength.

'Getting stuck in the past' isn't the language of guilty parents. That is usually more like, "It never happened." "It wasn't that bad." "Well, you were a difficult kid." "It was your fault."

Sitting around licking your wounds forever and feeling sorry for yourself will only hold you back and stop you living fully. Don't give them the power. Take it back.

Coming from a stable economic position helps with many things that are simply not available to offenders from more deprived backgrounds. Access to a better defence, more letters of support to put before the judge, a good suit and tie. I believe it makes a vast difference.

That's a tragedy and I don't know what caused it. You have no way of knowing how each child's relationship with the parents was and what role each child played.

How are people on this thread pretending siblings are treated the same? It's impossible.

Agree. Conscious and unconscious bias favour the middle classes. Economic stability is a positive factor in potential outcomes

I would guess he was 'difficult' (impossible) from birth. What are the parents of an ADULT violent paranoid schizophrenic who isn't taking their medication supposed to do. Other than probably hide from them because they're number one on the shit list.

You’re right: parents of children who act out violently or get into criminal behaviour often do face harsh judgement and I’m genuinely sorry if anything I said felt dismissive of that. My point wasn’t that parents are never judged but that in wider public conversations, especially when we’re discussing causes, the parenting element often gets tiptoed around in favour of more “acceptable” explanations like poverty, peer influence, or trauma.

I’m not saying those other factors don’t matter, they absolutely do. But I think we should be able to include parenting as one part of the puzzle without it being treated as taboo or automatically heartless.

And I completely hear you - parenting a child who’s struggling in this way is incredibly hard and often deeply misunderstood. I don’t think judgement is helpful but honest, compassionate conversation might be.

It is impossible and it's impossible to know that your oppositional toddler, tantrummy tween then sulky graffiti writing teenager who drinks cider in the park has something much more serious going on than being a pita.

I was a teacher long enough to see how some of the kids I taught have turned out. In most cases the kids from troubled families where there were no boundaries and the parents made excuses and blamed everyone but themselves have ended up committing crimes. In many cases their parents, siblings and other family members have also been in trouble. In saying that, the three I’ve known to have committed the worst crimes came from caring families and their siblings have turned out fine so far. No mental illness involved in any of these examples.

I'm sorry I don't think you know what trauma work entails. Getting stuck in the past is exactly the language these people use. They also like to say 'leave the past in the past'. You are just playing with words a little bit that don't change the meaning and achieve nothing.

You have once again been dismissive. Why shouldn't abuse survivors feel like victims? It's not a bad thing to validate ones own experience. You can be a victim and still reclaim your voice. The fact that you prefer not to go to the past just tells me you prefer to shut it away, it's not actually part of you and you just avoid. It's not superior to any other way of dealing with the past although I know you'd like to think you are.

This is a discussion forum, FFS, not a policy-creating think tank

What a bizarre way to speak about children.

Well, I can promise you that if your child does something and you were to come and sit down to talk to me about it in any context, I won't be starting from a place of judgement. I will have a blank slate in my mind and just listen, and start to learn about your situation and all the complexities of it. Within every situation are an array of individuals, all with their own complexities. Yes, there may be parent contributing factors (none are perfect or get it all right or never miss anything) but I won't assume it is the driving force.

The ones from troubled backgrounds with poor parental modelling - were their crimes those of chaos? Shoplifting, burglary, drugs, booze rather than sheer sadism?

I hope one day you are ready to see yourself as no longer a victim. Even if you were back then, you don't have to be that for life. It's a great place to be when you've taken back your power.

Really?

Perhaps I'll try a different way.

If your child becomes an adult criminal obviously something has gone wrong.

How are you supposed to know that the following normal scenarios are indicators of a far more serious problem than being age appropriately defiant for some people

A toddler who always says no

A tween who is stormy and tantrummy

A teenager who drinks cider in the park and does graffiti

I am not going to go into particular details about the family's background. I still maintain it is not in anyway "partly her fault" that she died at the hands of a son who they had, for so long, tried to help/get help/treatment/get the right structures and support for as his complex issues and conditions surfaced over the years.

You dont get it: I will always be a victim of my parents' abuse. Someone who got raped will not one day be 'no longer a victim of rape'. It's a weird suggestion. Being a victim doesn't mean everything else you said isn't possible. It's not black and white.

I hope you can give your younger self the compassion it deserves one day. It feels good to acknowledge ones own pain, that something has been unjust and then soothe yourself. It's a skill that serves you well in adulthood. Life is much more livable if you allow pain to exist.

Because you focus on symptoms. Focus on makeing your child feel safe from within, accept them, make them feel seen and heard give them a secure attachment. Then they might try that party drug but perhaps it won't become an escape.

What about all the crime committed by well educated professional people like tax evasion, or insurance fraud, or paying to get their children into schools or lying on applications about where they live, or employing home help below minimum wage, or business expenses that aren't, or letting sub standard housing and breaking housing laws, etc etc. Are these actions a product of their upbringing, or doesn't it matter because that's not real criminal behaviour like stealing cars and breaking into houses is.
I can understand poverty driving crime through desperation and marginalisation and that it could be a consequence of your environment and values installed during your upbringing. But middle class crime is fueled by self interest and greed which is beyond a basic need to survive. Those values are often installed by parents and the social groups and education systems they expose their children to. They just call it something different, usually being ambitious and being successful in life and doing the best for your children, but if you are dishonest on a school application and justify it as doing the best for your child then you are actually the same as a parent who accepts their child stealing to have something in their life.

It doesn't work if they have aspd, you can't tell they have aspd rather than being appropriately boundary testing until it's too late.

And maybe one day you will look back and be able to say, "I was a victim, I'm not anymore." Then you will understand what I am saying and will probably also become a more compassionate and understanding person too. The hardness comes from self-protection, does it not? I learned to protect myself without the walls and being hard on other people.

I'm sorry for what you went through and I hope that you can heal well.

No. That is why how you raise children is really important.