To think gentle parenting has made some kids unbearable to be around?

[KindButFirmFox]

Boundaries aren’t oppression.
Sometimes “gentle” just looks like “ineffective”.

AIBU to think balance has been lost between empathy and discipline?

Ahh Brighton, we call it the muesli belt, home of ineffectual gentle parenting.

I would have stated it was 'a load of tosh' if that was my intent.

Fair enough, apologies that it came across that way

It didn't come across that way, it was written that way. Anyway, it would have been a lot more helpful if you'd actually summarised what it was.

II think I got the gist. It’s effective parenting, adapted for your particular children’s needs?

So in the moment you’d intervene, but also work through with them in a style to which they’re receptive what the issue was and how to avoid it again?

That’s just ‘parenting’, isn’t it?

So, what a normal caring parent would do?

It's interesting how many people on Mumsnet get wound up by the mere idea of gentle parenting. It's like reading one long GB News comment thread, complete with "why can't we hit our children anymore" and everything!

Sarah Ockwell-Smith coined the term gentle parenting, and has expressed her regret over using that term for how misunderstood it's come to be, because the style she describes is authoritative parenting.

Having names for different parenting styles is useful from a psychological / child development research stance because it means that you can compare outcomes and things, but it then becomes popular science and everyone labels their parenting and many label it wrong.

That's why many gentle parenting advocates will say "that isn't gentle parenting, it's permissive / neglectful / ineffectual parenting" - it isn't moving the goalposts or creating new buzzwords; it's protecting the meaning of gentle/authoritative parenting so that these boundaries don't become skewed or blurred. Just because someone says they're gentle parenting, doesn't mean they are.

Sorry that should have been to @Rescuedogblues I think!

@DontGoJasonWaterfalls oh isn't it!
The day after the EU referendum vote, I was with my then, 7 year old, who wasn't doing anything wrong, when a tiny old woman that he was holding the door for, so you know the opposite of brat, said "it's great isn't it we can start hitting them again" nodding towards my 7 year old. This is what some people desired from Brexit clearly. People do think that children should be beaten, worryingly some will have children in their care.

I was reassured that "yeah he could 'ave you in a fisty-cuffs"

But that is what someone thought whilst the child was holding the door of the chemist for them. There's no pleasing some people!

@KeepAwayFromChildren My mother never entertained me and my sister - ever. We were a by-product of the marriage and were never asked to make decisions and had no power or influence whatsoever and the same went for most of my friends.
We had to make our own entertainment with our toys and games and crafts.

That's how I remember my own childhood. After school, we used to hang out with our friends from school. You could read books, watch TV, play with your toys or some such thing while all our parents were at work. I don't remember either my own or my friends' parents spending hours planning what to do with us in the evenings or weekends or indeed our parents talking about feeling like they were our taxi drivers because they constantly had to ferry us around from A to B.

When it came to food, our parents just cooked one meal for the family and you either eat whatever they cooked or just don't eat anything if you don't want to. Even I was already different with my son: if he didn't want something for dinner, I'd find something else for him to eat despite the fact that I wasn't raised that way myself.

I don't think necessarily think that everything was right with the way we were raised but sometimes I just feel like we are going from one extreme to another with nothing in-between so to speak.

I've personally decided to incorporate some 90s parenting myself. My kids are expected to occupy themselves at least for some of time, I don't know if this is nature or nurture to be honest, mine are both quite good at this like I was. I also just cook one meal but once we've finished eating our meal I'll offer toast or fruit so they don't go to bed hungry if they haven't eaten much.

I think a lot of modern parenting can be very martyring which is no good if you can't keep it up.

All the dreadful adults that are around now were, at some point, parented by someone. It's equally easy to judge them and say, well their parents got it wrong.

So not all parents of yesteryear did a better job, and not all parents of today are going to get it right.

Couldn't agree more.

Unfortunately as someone who works in schools to i agree with this. They often end up quite disliked to because they are so used to getting there own way or doing whatever they want they don't realise only mum and dad will put up with this behaviour.

This.

I am firm, no nonsense, consistent boundaries and expectations. I am their parents not their friend. However, I try very hard to listen, consider their opinions, have never ever hit them and don't really punish or reward.

I consider myself a gentle parent but I am very far from a permissive one too.

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I think the thread is being derailed by pedantry about what is gentle/permissive etc.

The op is clearly talking about kids who are never told off/corrected or given firm boundaries for behaviour.

These kids must be a nightmare to teach and I wonder how they maintain friendships if always must have their own way. They struggle in the real world, including now they are reaching the age where they’re in the workplace and an absolute nightmare to manage quite frankly.

I'd argue a massive criticism of the gentle parenting movement is that some people are reading the blogs and genuinely believing that you have to be permissive or never use the word no or have long conversations about feelings constantly. Even if this was never the intention it seems to be the result.

I think that could be more generally called "lazy poor parenting" though.

There are so many people who just cant be bothered to do the leg work any more. They are obsessed with their own phones and encourage and enable obsessive screen isage for their kids. They don't want to deal with the boring and messy stuff so just opt out.

There was a type of parenting in the 1970s that was quite rare and was just called ‘spoiling your children’.

It was indulgent, slack and very unfair on the children who were hard work to be around.

It wasn’t gentle parenting so much as giving in to every demand. Buying the children every toy they wanted. It’s got to have been hard for those kids to adjust as adults.

Your lengthy judgement on my child and parenting was uncalled for.

Omg, you are crazy! 😂 I'm a post-menopausal woman who never really wanted kids. As for your other post about the harm, I can't say I've looked into it, since I was probably never going to have kids. Perhaps you're right.

Well, I have been a child, and like most Seventies/Eighties children, I was smacked occasionally. I can assure you that I do not go around hitting people now! So that's that theory of yours dead in the water. As for having no idea what I'm talking about because I don't have them, I disagree. It's not hard to use your imagination.

I'm British but live in the US.