Gentle Parenting : Where do you stand🤔

[Babysleepsorted]

I must say that as a Baby Sleep and Feeding solutions specialist from birth (0-6 months), I came across this mother's take on gentle Parenting and was understandably intrigued by her very strong views on this topic :https://metro.co.uk/2025/06/21/gave-gentle-parenting-a-try-absolutely-hated-23438739/.

How about you?
Would you agree or otherwise....

I stand on the side of ...she wasn't doing gentle parenting, then declared it useless, then goes on to say she did "From that moment, I made a firm decision: In our household, there are rules, boundaries, consequences, respect and good manners. " Which is what Gentle parenting is...

People are fucking stupid..

Yet another person who doesn't understand the difference between gentle parenting and permissive parenting. 🙄

First reply nailed it. I seem to be seeing loads of these kind of articles recently- not sure why I actually bothered clicking, they are so formulaic I could predict exactly what it was going to be saying. You would think that researching the actual definition of the term ‘gentle parenting’ would be a prerequisite to writing an article all about it, but clearly not

Agreed with PP.

I don’t hit, rarely shout, don’t force my kids to do things they are uncomfortable with, listen to their opinions.

But we have rules, boundaries, consequences etc.

The idea that gentle parenting = no rules is idiotic.

So several years ago this woman made a piss poor attempt at gentle parenting for half a day and has now decided it's the source of all childhood ills?

Honestly this is just the same boring argument rehashed. The vast majority of today's parents are doing some form of gentle parenting already. If you have firm boundaries, age-appropriate expectations of your child, speak to them with kindness and respect and don't inflict cruel and arbitrary punishments then congrats! You're gentle parenting. But because it has a terrible wishy washy name, people will chalk any kind of parenting failure up to gentle parenting and smugly claim it doesn't work.

I don't personally see a lot of the gentle parenting stereotypes always presented in this articles in real life - always little middle class darlings being wretched brats and receiving anxious mollycoddling from their mothers (never fathers) in return. I do see a lot of switched off, disengaged parents dragging their eyes up from their phones every ten minutes or so to shout at their kids without actually intervening in their behaviour, plugging them in to iPads to keep them quiet in shops and restaurants, making threats about toys and ice cream and the like. I'd like to see those parents taken to task a bit more than those of us who've just decided we can tell our toddlers no without shouting at or hitting them.

From that moment, I made a firm decision: In our household, there are rules, boundaries, consequences, respect and good manners.

That's gentle parenting.

Some would say that’s authoritative

Because it is authoritative parenting, also known as gentle parenting. Perhaps the author is confusing authoritative with authoritarian?

In all - a poorly-researched, poorly-written article, but it'll be popular with the "back in my day" mumsnetters who think every drug dealer, gang member and ne'er do well they encounter must have been gentle parented.