A few months ago, I published a zine called The Authoritarian Parent is Mother Culture. The zine was well received and quite a few people commented on how much it resonated, which obviously always feels great to know the thing I put out into the world are meaningful. But I wanted to come back and take a few some time to better explore the intention behind the zine, because I think it was widely misunderstood.
(click to read or buy here)
The motivation for this zine came from a question I had asked myself: where the heck did authoritarian parenting come from and why do so many parents default to this approach? The answer followed pretty quickly: because it emulates our culture. Our culture rewards and punishes, just like authoritarian parenting does. Our culture teaches us to mask our feelings, just like authoritarian parenting does. Our culture tries to change us through these rewards and punishments, just like authoritarian parenting does. The parallels became pretty clear once I started to unpack it.
When I shared the zine on social media and with friends, I received a lot of comments that suggested that the piece that resonated the most was the recognition about how authoritarian parenting does all these things to children, but few people commented on the congruence between authoritarian parenting and our culture which had been the “a-ha moment” for me.
I think this happened for two reasons. 1) I used the term mother culture which was unfamiliar. 2) The understanding the authoritarian parenting behaves in this way is not a new concept for anyone familiar with the gentle parenting approach, but it is new for most people.
I borrowed the term mother culture from the book Ishmael by Daniel Quinn. In the book, the term is used to describe the western colonial capitalist culture in North America, but also uses the term “mother” in reference to how this culture tries to guide us or even coddle us by using certain approaches or messaging that encourages the self-fulfilling nature of the culture itself. Like a mother trying to help guide a child along the right path to adulthood, mother culture tries to guide us in a direction where we continue her own goals and ideals, perpetuating the culture.
In contrast, I had more than one discussion about mother culture as the culture of motherhood and how that ties into authoritarian parenting: another great discussion, but not the point that I was trying to make at all.
To the second misconception, there are always folks out there that don’t believe that gentle parenting can be affective. Sometimes it boggles my mind that rewards and punishments - authority and control are still the dominant approach to parenting. The notion that children are real, whole people as soon as they are born is one that continues to resonate with folks, especially the neuro-divergent community, but it’s definitely not the popular paradigm in both academic research as well as popular opinion. Most parents see their job as one that is responsible for shaping children into adults, for turning their children into adults, as if their children won’t grow into adults regardless. The message “for your own good” comes to mind as a prominent phrase used by most parents these days.
I had one comment on Instagram that suggested the author of the zine must not be a parent (assuming that because any parent would know that authoritarian parenting is the only effective way to parent) as if I was making this all up with no experience of living with children.
It’s easy to forget in our little self-directed education community bubble that we are still the minority - that most families out there are still using a style of parenting that we see as harmful and damaging. Many parents in our small community are working diligently do undo the damage caused by either the school system or authoritarian parenting, and we forget that this isn’t happening outside the bubble.
I hope that both these two misconceptions become less unknown and that we can transition to a culture that views both authoritarian parenting and western colonial capitalism as ass backwards and wrong. I can dream of a world where the gentle parenting approach is reflected as the dominant culture that surrounds us, where people are treated as whole and real for who they are, where we’re not driven by reward and punishment as we navigate through life, and that we can take off our masks and find our true potential by following the path that feels real and whole and good rather than profitable.
Ah wouldn’t that be the dream 😍😆 I often forget we’re in the minority too.. then I meet someone out in the world and I’m catapulted back to reality. I do hope things are changing though, slowly.