I feel like what OP is lamenting is kind of like the washing machine thing. When we invented washing machines it was expected to save housewives from having to work as hard, but instead it freed them to do other work. Everyone will always work (or parent) as much as they can, but depending on the environment (and technology) the expectations shift.
I don’t think so. What I’m lamenting is that our society is so far removed from having actual community that people can’t even imagine what life was like back then when parents wouldn’t give any thought to kicking their 9 year old kids out of the house to go run around their cities because the parents knew that everyone in town knew who their kids were and everyone looked after each other, and especially the kids.
That really was normal for most of human history.
Yep. Instead of parenting they used to give their kids cigarettes and whiskey. Beat them whenever they wanted. Marry them off at 13, job well done. The good old days where we didn’t have to parent our kids.
Basically this statistic shows that the word “parenting” was invented at this time. Nothing more. The concept exists since before the dawn of humanity.
Not really, no. The modern concept of a parent is really recent invention. Parents 70 years ago did not have expectations and responsibility that parents have today.
Your great grandparents would absolutely think the job of parenting today is absurd to the point of just being comedy.
Parents 70 years ago did not have expectations and responsibility that parents have today.
Bullshit, and there are people alive today that can call bullshit on your claim, I know a few.
All kids used to be free range.
Ask anyone born circa 1960.
Pretty much everyone of them will have a ‘Stand By Me’ type story about travelling alone as a grade school kid.
Parents used to buy postage and literally mail their kids across the country.
And people didn’t think that was weird.
Kids are allowed to fly without an adult today.
Compared to the conditions in the trains, it wasn’t that bad.
Also, the longest distance was about 700 miles, not really cross country.
In 1913, 700 miles was practically across the country. That was further away than most adults traveled from their birth town in their lives.
Not really. The transcontinental railroad had been around for over fifty years.
Cars were already pretty popular. There were already about 5 million of them out there.
Ocean liners and tourism was available.
The St. Louis Worlds Fair of 1904 got 20 million visitors.
While they might find the methods absurd, they were parents back then and did their version of parenting. They just did not call it that.
Bro…
Things exist even if labels don’t…
“Parenting” exists across most animals, and humans have been doing it since the first human.
They just didn’t say “parenting” in book titles…
On July 14th, 1946, at the dawn of the post-World War II baby boom, Dr. Benjamin Spock published The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care. It would become a foundational work on the topic of parenting, transforming how generations of children were raised.
The book, which has sold more than 50 million copies and been translated into more than 50 languages, stands as one of the best-selling nonfiction works of the 20th century. A culmination of more than 20 years of scholarship—and written over seven years with his wife Jane—the book debuted a revolutionary approach to child-rearing, all delivered in a warm, congenial tone.
https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/July-14/dr-spock-baby-and-child-care-book
But the topic was widely discussed prior to that.
Spock just started using studies to justify parenting styles rather than ancedotal advice.
But obviously the studies had to come before his book.
I honestly don’t believe that Dr. Spock would recognize today’s parenting expectations as anything other than absurdity. Which it is.
No where did he say that children should not be allowed to go to a store by themselves, or that kids should be expected to have a minimum of 16 hours of college credits before they turn 18.
When he was writing, he would not have been able to imagine the way “parenting” would evolve by the end of the century.
No where did he say that children should not be allowed to go to a store by themselves, or that kids should be expected to have a minimum of 16 hours of college credits before they turn 18.
You…
You think that started in the 70s?
When he was writing, he would not have been able to imagine the way “parenting” would evolve by the end of the century.
So…
You also admit that the concept of parenting existed long before you said it did?
Like, what you’re saying is still wrong, but it’s miles closer than your post. I’m not sure if we’re making progress or moving goalposts, but I’m buckled in.
You think that started in the 70s?
Yes. Definitely (though of course the actual specific time when such things started changes based on location, rural areas were slower than suburban).
Consider this: How old were your kids when you allowed them to go to a store by themselves for the first time?
How old were you when you were allowed to go to a store by yourself for the first time?
Ask your grandma how old she was. (Call your grandma anyway, she would love to hear from you.)
The big change you’d see there is walkability…
An 8 year old going to the bodego on their block alone happens everyday still.
My mom grew up over 10 miles from the nearest neighbor with a single mom who didn’t have a driver’s license. How the fuck was she going to the store alone as a kid?
Those are two insanely different scenarios to count as “going to the store alone”.
Like, you think you’re being inclusive with “small towns” but you have no idea that actual rural has more people and is nowhere near the same.
But the main difference is we went from a bunch of small stores around where people live, and to big box stores that you can only really visit via car, which obviously limits people under 16 from being independent.
But going to a store alone is still such a small part of parenting, that this is all completely insignificant
That’s a good point. A significant amount of the freedom that children are lacking comes from how many are run over and killed by cars every year or even the threat of it happening. It’s a legitimate threat to be worried about if you live in suburbia.
Yes, the store thing was just an example. The point is that before the 1970-80s basically ALL kids were “free-range”. In the 80s a PSA would come on tv that asked the parents if they knew where their kids were, and often than answer was ‘no’. (That’s literally the moment when parents started being shamed for not being helicopter parents.)
If you’re going to draw that line, draw it in the 20teens when parents started to get in legal trouble for their kids being unaccompanied.
But again, even just the “free range” nature is a very very small aspect of parenting.
Like, to compare to today’s kids, being let lose on a small town as a preteen is nothing compared to unsupervised Internet access.
In a lot of respects, kids have a shit ton more freedom/privacy than pre-internet kids.
Hell, I remember having to take jr high dating calls from the kitchen phone in front of my whole family.
You’re thinking what was important to you as a kid, is important to kids today.
Let them pick between a cell phone and closed bedroom door or a park with their friends but no phones…
You might be surprised, most people won’t.
We are probably going to disagree on cellphone access being better for the kids.
Is this meant to be a poorly executed April fools joke?
It’s just an uncomfortable fact.
It’s not though.
The centralized concept we now call parenting didn’t exist, but that’s only because prior to around 1920 there were as many forms of “parenting” as there were cultures. The idea that parents never raised their children before the early 20th century is just ridiculous. It still happened, it just wasn’t called parenting.
