this post was submitted on 02 Dec 2023
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Obviously the economic aspect is significant here in terms of the constraints on would be parents.
But I often wonder about how much the “modern” culture of parenting and its beliefs in a fairly full time committed always on parenting approach are worth discussing.
One critique I can imagine is that it’s part of the hyper individualism of modern western culture in which everything is pushed onto the solo responsibilities of individuals rather than emphasising the need and value of cooperative and community based approaches to getting things done.
In the case of parenting, from what I’ve seen, a cooperative approach evolves naturally out of necessity, but leverages extended family members rather than communities. In which case it makes sense that anyone without a functioning extended family just can’t reasonably have children.
Another critique is that do children really benefit from constant supervision from their parents or is this something that’s more about parents assuaging some cultural guilt around being good/bad parents?
Not just cultural guilt but fear of consequences. If you're likely to get the authorities called on you for letting your kid go to the park down the street alone, or even play in your own front yard alone, it's not really fair to say parents are choosing to be overly supervising