Is The Parental Role In The Modern Family Changing From a More Disciplinary One To That of A Friend?

Long gone are the days of the perfect family unit, exemplified in shows like “Leave It To Beaver” or “The Cosby Show”, where parents had a defined role as leaders of the household. Society is changing though, and many parents rather than choosing the road of being the disciplinary adult are choosing to rather act as a friend. I want to discuss why I think this is happening , what are some potential positives and negatives to this new structure. I think the paradigm shift that is happening right now is going to be studied in the future by psychologists who want to figure out how two types of differently raised people would act in society.

Why Are Parents Becoming Friends Not Foes ?

The words of of Amy Pohler’s character in Mean Girls exemplifies what we are currently seeing in our culture.

“Can I get you guys anything? Some snacks? A condom? Let me know! Oh, God love ya.”

Why though, has this massive shift happened when only a few decades ago, parents had their place as the disciplinary force within a household. People used to fear getting caught smoking weed or drinking by their parents but now, for many people it’s a light verbal scolding at most. At college I saw it all around me, kids raised in alternative environments where they were not raised by their parents , but rather just lived along with them. In my experience the amount of people who have smoked weed with their parents or got drunk with their parents is unimaginable. My parents were not the most disciplinary and made it clear I could always talk to them , but I would never smoke with them or drink to excess , just out of respect for them, but maybe im the odd one out.

I think perhaps a reason why many of these parents are choosing the friend route may have something to do with divorce and how the family hierarchy seems to break apart after it. It was only really recently that divorce became a common practice in North America, and many times children act out, because they are confused about the situation. More often than not in parental relationships you have a sort of “good cop, bad cop” thing going on between the children and the parents. For example your mother might be more lenient than your father so you go to her to ask for money. However this only works when the two parents are still together, the second they get divorced, the bad cop instantly become the enemy and the good cop becomes their best friend. Rather than keeping the hierarchy continued, things seem to break apart. This is my guess, but it might have a much smaller effect than I believe, because the truth is no one knows why things are moving in this direction.

Benefits

So what are some potential benefits to a friend-like relationship with your parents? I think as a friend you are much more likely to form longer lasting bonds with your parents and become closer to them as people than children in parents from former generations. This provides relationships where the elderly are definitely more accepted in society rather than just being shoved into a home to die. People today who don’t have the type of relationship with their parents as the new generations do, seem to view their parents as a pain in the ass or as a disruption in daily life rather than a gift. Also if a child was going through tough parts in their life, they could talk to their parents without fear of reprisal for doing something bad or stupid. There tends to be less judgment in a friend type relationship. This simple act can be paramount in giving a child a happier life, but most of all making them a more successful part of society. There are probably more benefits I have not thought of, but even the benefits that I have written down put a pretty good argument for choosing a friend relationship with your child.

Cons

With everything there are benefits and cons and the biggest con in my opinion is the possibility of turning your child into a monster. Calling them a monster is a strong and vague claim, but in reality people who act the way these children potentially could is the way a monster would act. Having a friend type relationship with your parents could leave you with no boundaries about how to act in a hierarchy for when you openly enter the real world. Much of early learning in life is about how to discipline ones self and realize that you are not the center of the universe. A child who has their parents approval in whatever they do , whether good or harmful, does not learn boundaries that you are supposed to abide by as a productive member of society. You can’t go around starting fights with people or criticize your boss openly at every turn because you don’t agree with them. You will quickly realize that this is not how the structure of our society works and will be quickly hit with a realization that you are not the most important person in the world. The biggest problem I found when I interacted with people that were close friends with their parents was they had a largely inflated ego and were either borderline or full narcissists. Their parents had been telling them they were god’s gift to the world for so long that they started to not only believe it, but act like it.

Many of these claims I have made are based on my own observations which of course are very limited in the grand scheme of things, but I truly believe this is a parental structure that many are choosing to raise their children. Like I said im not sure whether or not the benefits outweigh the cons in this situation and im sure most individual situations are different, but there definitely is some change going on. Im very curious to hear about your experiences on this subject matter and what your opinion is on it, or even just where you think parenting is going.

-Calaber24p