Try Emile from Rousseau. In general, what you are describing is the difference between the sciences of pedagogy an psychology. In one sentence, (since the enlightenment) pedagogy tries to find the optimal conditions for humans to develop their true self, while psychology usually observes a misguided development and tries to find a treatment. Psychology therefore has to have some model of what constitutes normality to compare against. These specific studies and treatments are easy to write about as a scientific journalist or parenting literature author. It's telling that practically none of the parenting books I've skimmed through are based on pedagogy.

(that's no dismissal of psychology at all, but you have to use the right tool for the job).

As one of many, many parents, my observation has been that there is so much contradictory parenting advice because there is so much variation in the kids, in terms of behaviors, personalities, the order in which they bootstrap their motor vs verbal skills, body awareness, etc., etc. As a result, consuming parenting advice is like going down a checklist of things to try, and the kid won’t respond to most of it.

The author here wasn’t talking about authority, she’s saying that the goal of parenting is ultimately to raise another human being. You can try to be the best parent you can be, but in the end, it’s not about you.

That's a big pile of self-contradiction. Both survival skills and religious rules are specific qualities.

[citation needed]

I suspect this only even approaches reality if by “intention” you mean “clumsily projected attitude”.

> The idea that there exist professional parents who explictly know what they are doing (with footnotes and sources) is a major conceit in our present culture.

The idea that parenting isn't a field which can be, and is, productively studied and that there aren't people who can provide useful guidance based on greater knowledge of that study and skill at observing and applying that knowledge is, itself, a major conceit in our present culture.

This unfortunately is not a given and that's the crux of the discussion.

If every parent were able to achieve complete knowledge and wisdom about all things parenting before they had kids we wouldn't be talking of any of this.

That is true. But the reverse is not. NOT having kids pretty much guarantees you have mostly romanticized notions about how things should be, and vastly underestimate the issues that parents have to face on a daily basis. Non-parents also seem to universally think that all kids are the same and merely talking to them is enough discipline. It will be enough for a small minority of kids, and nowhere near enough for most. Left to their own devices (if you pardon the pun) most kids will totally veg out and they will be unprepared to face the challenges of adulthood. The goal of a good parent is to make sure it doesn’t happen, even if the kid hates everything you do to make sure of it. Good parents don’t play “friends” with their kids. They’re more of a mix between a close confidant and a demanding manager who is totally prepared to make their kids lives unpleasant if it helps them in the long run.

You will be very quickly disabused of your romanticized notions when you have a child of your own. Until then you should probably refrain from giving parenting advice.

A parent you make insecure by gaslamping the hell out of them, suggesting there's something wrong with their child if it doesn't conform to xyz is going to spend a lot of money on solutions to problems that don't exist.

We made tons of these mistakes the first time around. For the rest, we just bought diapers, formula and toys and let nature take its course. They turned out fine.

Baby books are the Fox News of childrearing-- lots of bold opinions and advice, most of it dubious/inapplicable.

This is not true and is extremely unrealistic thinking.

Also: some traits of your children's personality form very young, regardless of your style of parenting. Your influence is strong of course, but some things are just due to the way your kid is wired. You can set an example, and be firm about bad behavior, but some shit is going to happen anyway, tantrums included, depending on the personality of your children.

That doesn't mean I don't believe my kids are going out to experience(and develop their own) moral codes. What it means is that as long as they are in my house, they will abide by my rules, as they will have to when they will abide by their landlord's rules. This is coming from a former kid who went over to his friend's houses to play FPS games, downloaded porn then erased the internet history, and visited anarchy websites teaching me how to build bombs and the like. I know what children are liable to do outside my range of vision.

The problem I have with your perspective is that it can be taken to any end and doesn't teach children that different people have their own values, or that parents have a duty to their children's wellbeing. It takes moral relativism to such an extreme that, given the possibility that your premises are true, I'd have to question whether parents are even necessary.

The reason that I would instill my values in my children is so they can enter a world where not everyone sees my moral codex as valid, thus they are given something to think about when they come to an age where they're forced to wonder whether I as a parent am being reasonable. They can choose to rebel, which they almost certainly will, and they can also choose to respect at least some of my values. In my experience, the kids who grew up in households whose parents let their kids do whatever they wanted turned out to be dependent little shitheads. I know of only one exception, and in that case the dad was such a negligent jerk that the kid had to raise himself; he turned out pretty well in the end, but that's not without the psychological drama of having shitty parenting and other mistakes he made because he had no moral guidance.

Sorry, but I'd rather be an actual dad and play some role in how a child gets raised. Allowing children, especially under the age of 12, to do whatever they want, is absurd.

> your perfect moral codex

I never made such a claim.

William Sears, who has written numerous books, has eight kids of his own, and is/was a practicing paediatrician:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Sears_(physician)

> But the advice you get is always variations of the same. Try to be patient, try to be reasonable. If you need to make threats, have it escalate slowly. Follow through on consequences.

You may wish to look at the books/advice that a larger pool of parents have found to be useful:

* https://old.reddit.com/r/Parenting/wiki/recommended_reading

No, it doesn’t actually, as any kind of even approximately universal effect, force any of that, and even a casual look around at society would demonstrate that pretty clearly. It may or may not have motivated that in you – but plenty of people who would describe themselves as having those traits in their own relationships / parenting objectively don’t, so self-assessment is pretty clearly not a reliable gauge here. I would agree that there are people whose combination of innate personality, life experiences, etc., will lead them to actually be nudged in those directions by having children, but there are plenty who won’t be. And there are plenty of people who will be nudged in much more negative directions by the experience.

As a parent myself, it amazes me how many people who are parents are drawn into a bizarre evangelization of parenting as some kind of universally ideal vocation, with stories about the effect it will have that are trivially refutable by looking outside of one’s own internal narrative of their own experience with their own kids at the rest of the world around them.

This is kind of missing the point. I agree with you that we oughtn't be forcing our kids to do things that are not in their disposition, but in practice we do this all of the time. My four year old doesn't get to choose the clothes she wears, the food she eats, when to go to bed, when to get up, whether she goes to school or not -- for most of her time she isn't in control of her life in any meaningful way. I on the other hand get to choose these things not only for myself but for her.

Given that it would be easy for me to put my foot down (as I sometimes have to), but in general I try to make sure that she is empowered as much as she can be so we can both try to learn what her real preferences are -- but in practice I'd be fooling myself if I believed that she was living the life she would build for herself at this age.

Hopefully what I'm doing now with her will help her to build that life quicker and with less dead ends when she does come of age -- but only time will tell.

I agree and hope people don't take this in a defeatist way. I've found that the biggest impact you can have on anyone's behavior (adult or child) is to set the example. Kids can smell hypocrisy a mile away, and besides, they only know how to act the way the see. Work on yourself, and your kids will follow.

> This is the I better be my child's best friend or do what they want or they won't like me and will never talk to me again parenting style.

No, there's a great honking excluded middle there between the “fuck off” parenting style and the “I must be my kids best friend” style.

At some point, they will be unwilling to listen to you, so you have to enforce something or else you won't be passing down any values to them.

Kids don't magically know what is best for them. What we do is we force a routine until it becomes routine and then you don't have to force it anymore.

Brushing teeth? Some nights/mornings the kid will simply say no. Wearing clothes? Sometimes your toddler will simply say no. Eating veggies? Sometimes your kid will simply say no.

Whatever you do to get them to change their mind (cajoling, threatening, bribing) is, exactly, forcing your will on the child.

There is no such thing as raising a child without having to enforce some rules.

Even the unpaywalled part of the article mentions that experience is too narrow and obviously inadequate. For instance: being parented is quite different from parenting; there's a long important period where the child will have no memory (or only vague disconnected memory) of being parented; and the experience of being parented gives insight into other parenting styles.

> I teach my kids how to parent by practicing it. I learned how to parent my children by observing my boomer parents, and doing the opposite in nearly every circumstance.

The opposite of one mistake isn't the correct action, it's usually a different mistake. Even though you gave zero details, I suspect "doing the opposite" will just set your kids up to repeat your parents' mistakes.

They still are in most safe modern nations.

> so if you do raise children, you're raising children who are unprepared to be parents.

That is such an astute observation!

This is exactly what I'm disagreeing with. If you're putting the focus on parents needing to do something, you're creating an intractable problem. It's hard enough to get parents to do basic stuff like feed and supervise their children. At best, changing views on parenting changes the behavior of the parents who listen to modern views on parenting. There parents are likely not even the ones whose children are most affected. Approaching parents about this is only going to be preaching to the choir.

The solution as a society isn't getting parents to behave differently, it's not tolerating wicked mind-control cults.