What Constitute a Parent?

Our kids are growing up in a totally different environment from ours when we were kids. So many things have changed in the last 30-40 years and what was good for us as kids then may not be good for them today, if not downright irrelevant.

 

If you were a kid growing up in the 60s and 70s, most likely you would have parents who had an iron-grip on the family’s affairs. Your parents would have set the rules and boundaries for you as a kid and had been the disciplinarians when you detoured. In Asia, authoritarian parents were the norm. Parents were the providers, the care-takers and the tyrants in the family. You eat what was given to you and you dress what was provided to you. The parents of yesterdays had the last say on almost everything in your life.

 

When I was a child growing up in Singapore in the 70s and 80s, I remember that western ideas on child rearing were slowly influencing our society. The 70s and 80s was the era of the yuppies and human rights movement. Slowly but surely, the idea that children have rights and must be treated as equal started to take seed. Then, instead of the traditional authoritarian parents, the democratic parents became an ‘in’ thing. Even though it did not happen in my home, I had heard of children starting to address their parents by their first names. Many educated parents were looking towards the West for parenting ideas, believing that their parents’ style was out of fashion. These parents start to give their kids choices, believing that their kids were well-formed individuals.

 

When I was a teenager, I remember how people started to embrace the idea of the need to be friends to their children. It was seen as important to understand the thinking of our children and the only way to understand them is to become their friends. Parents started to talk to their kids as if they were equal. Parents tolerated lots of things that their kids were doing which they might not see right, because they believed they must understand that their kids were just growing up. The term ‘Growing Pains’ was very much on people’s mouths. Parents believed that the tantrums and rebellions that their kids showed were just a part of growing up. As their friends, parents must give their kids support and encouragement. Parents were more likely to talk ‘to’ their kids, then to talk ‘down’ to their kids.

 

In the past, kids looked up to their parents for answers, whether their parents were authoritarian or not. In the past, kids consulted their parents when making decisions, whether their parents were friendly or not. Parents used to be role models to their kids, or in the least, a kind of gauge as to what kind of adults they want to grow up to be. Then, somewhere along the line, TV came in, and kids had a wider range of role models whom they want to imitate. But their parents were still very much a figure that command influence. It was their parents who stood out among the friends and role models. It was their parents whom they had come to trust.

 

Today’s parents face a totally different challenge - a robust and information-overloaded environment. Today’s kids have a wider reach and better access to information. Kids nowadays can be much more informed than us parents that we can no longer tell them what to believe in or what is true. In this Google era, our kids no longer need to turn to us for information. It is all out there as long as they have access to the internet. And we, as parents, may not always have the right answers, a fact our kids can easily verify on the internet. In the past, kids had to take whatever ‘truths’ their parents doled out. Sometimes they could verify that ‘truth’ with their friends, teachers or perhaps checked it up on a book. But the ‘truth’ might not be readily available. Nowadays, our kids can turn around and check out on what we just told them. If we were wrong, they could easily shove that tablet or computer screen at us and prove us wrong. Worse still, many parents still rely on that dictionary or reference book when checking out on a word or fact, while their kids just surf the net for answers. Kids these days know that they can get better and faster answers from the internet, and they know better than to depend on their analog parents. In this digital age, our kids are going to be smarter than us at a younger and younger age. So unless we, as parents, stay up-to-date (many of us aren’t), we are going to be speaking a different language from that of our kids.

 

So, how to be a parent these days? If we can’t be that ‘know-all’ parent whom our kids can look up to, can’t we just be a friend to our kids? Hold on there: do our kids need us as friends these days, when they could find an endless flow of so-called ‘friends’ on social media? What constitute a ‘friend’ to our kids?

 

A friend in need is a friend indeed. We all know this phrase. We also know that a true friend gives sincere criticisms (though we may not necessarily like it). But do our kids know what a true friend is? These days, the distinction between who is a true friend and who is just an acquaintance becomes blurred in our world of social media and internet connection. Just go to Facebook and post something and you will find friends clicking the ‘Like’ button to show their agreement and support. It is so easy to like, agree, and support something these days. All one needs is to click on that ‘Like’ button, or ‘Share’ icon. If you get enough ‘Likes’, you suddenly feel that you are not alone, that you have so many friends who agree with you. Should you disagree with your child on a particular matter, he/she can easily find a stream of friends who agree with him/her on the internet. With enough likes and following, your child may translate that into consent for an act.

 

I believe the social media has made us ‘kinder’ people. We are more inclined to give compliments and praises on the net than to criticize a ‘friend’ these days. Because what we say gets read by so many people on our social network that we are less likely to dole out criticisms in case we appear ‘mean’. In the process, people lose track of who are ‘true friends’ and who are just friends. Our kids will grow up (if they have not) with the social media as their main platform for expressing themselves and getting heard. Their idea of who constitutes friends and who do not are going to be different from ours.

 

When I was young, the person who would have a drink with me when I was down, who would listen to my sorrows and complaints, who would lend a helping hand when I was in need, was my friend. This friend would also be the one to tell me that I was wrong and give constructive criticisms. I might not have liked the criticisms but I would know that this friend could be trusted and was speaking the truth. This friend would also be around even if we have not stayed in touch for quite some time.

 

These days, friends are more like the invisible clicks and bits that keep our phones beeping with incoming notifications and messages. We are always online, 24/7. It is so easy to keep in touch these days, regardless of which time zone you are in. It is so simple to share moments these days with digital photos from wherever you are. These days, to be a friend means you are obliged to ‘Like’ something, or comment on something lest your friends feel ignored. Have you ever posted something onto Facebook or Twitter and not have received any comments or ‘Like’s? If this had happened, I bet you would feel lonely, abandoned by your friends. Or maybe, you would suddenly feel unsure of yourself; that no one in this world cares about you anymore? Or have you ever received negative comments on something that you had posted? Unless it was something that had gone virally wrong, chances are that your feedback was positive. A negative comment received from a friend could be devastating and demoralizing. As I had mentioned earlier, people are getting kinder on social media, so a negative comment is really unwelcomed.

 

Today, many parents are ‘friends’ to their kids on social networks. In some cases, parents-kids-communications occur more regularly on the internet than at home. When parents become friends to their kids on social networks, it becomes difficult to reprimand and preach. They tend to be agreeable and supportive. They want to appear as cool and understanding parents than old-fashion and restrictive parents. So, where am I leading to? Should parents be friends or disciplinarians? Should we allow our kids free rein as friends? Or, should we rein them in time-to-time? Should we just give up because the digital era is just too fast for us to catch up?

 

I think it is time we go back to the drawing board and start contemplating what a parent means. The ways of a parent can change. I have demonstrated that parents have changed from authoritative to democratic to being a friend. These are all but ways to being a parent, the ‘how’s. ‘How to be a parent?’ is an entire different topic, something I won’t go into here because every household is going to be different and no one method works for all.

 

Before the ‘How’, we had to know the ‘What’. Unless we know exactly what a parent is, we cannot start thinking of how to be a parent. This is where I think a lot of parents got it wrong. A lot of people thought they are parents because they gave birth to their kids. If this is the only truth, then we are no different from any mammals that beget lives. The ancestry link is only the first step that identifies us as a parent. It brings with it a role that we need to play, and that is to be that guidance for our kids as they journey from a baby into adulthood. A parent is like a lighthouse to ships; navigation lights to sailors; or in todays’ language, GPS to a driver. A parent provides the sense of security, hope and order in the midst of chaos and uncertainties. This is especially true in this digital age. Our kids need guidance in the vast virtual world. Kids do not know what is right or wrong until they have gone through certain stages in life. Parents have to teach what is right or wrong, not the internet. We may not always be right, but it can’t be wrong to teach our kids to work hard and not to kill or hurt anyone for a start.

 

Like a lighthouse, we must show our kids the way. Like navigation lights, we must lead them to their goals. Life GPS, we must ensure they don’t get lost. And yes, I think we need to be a map too, one that shows them where the boundaries are lest they go overboard. This is what I think a parent is. How to be a parent? I’ll leave it to the experts to tell you how. My best advice? Spend less time connected (digitally), and more time connected (with your kids).