It’s Time To Say Goodbye to the ‘Tiger Mom’ and Say Hello to Jellyfish Parenting

Emma Brockes Tiger Mom Jellyfish Parenting Investing in children

By Jo Anne Hubert , Parent Herald Sep 23, 09:21 pm

Parents are passionate about discovering and developing the passions of their children. However, does it have to get to a point wherein cheering on the child's talents and skills becomes investing in human capital?

Emma Brockes, a mother of two, was once a "tiger mom" and is now, slowly but surely, getting away from that role.

She wrote for The Guardian, narrating her story of once being that tiger mom who over-invests in their children's extra-curricular activities. Jampacking her children's schedule, jumping and rushing from violin training to a dance class to another one, and pushing her children to discover and enhance their "passions."

Now her eyes have been opened, realizing that in those times that she was pushing her children to train, they would rather stay home and rest from the long day they had at school. She realized that the passions she is encouraging them to enhance are actually her passions for them. Her children's passions at their age are "playing Roblox, watching Henry Danger and writing each other spiteful little notes."

Most importantly, she realized that what she's making her children do is her trying to invest in them, expecting results in the near future.

What is a 'Tiger Mom'?

Competitive advantage. That is actually what it is, says the journalist and author of "An Excellent Choice: Panic and Joy On My Solo Path To Motherhood."

Parents can talk about "enabling" the child by helping them discover their passions, enrolling them from one extra-curricular activity to another until they find what they are called for and love to do. Yet, under the age of 10, what parents are really doing is preparing them for competitive advantage. Passions in this age are "largely transient, cultivated and massaged by parents."

Brockes, who has been described as the "Mom Goals," shared the moment that awakened her and made her realize that she has become a tiger mom. "My daughter didn't want to practise violin. I wheedled and pressured. I told her it was supposed to be hard, and she might take a while to improve. To my shame, I reminded her it was costing $75 an hour. On the brink of uttering the immortal line, 'You'll thank me when you're older,' I had a sudden, seditious thought. What if we didn't do this? What was this compulsion to furnish them with a suite of accomplishments like tiny Regency ladies in a Jane Austen novel? Why not needlepoint?"

And so, they quit violin. That became the start of saying goodbye to the tiger mom.

The term "tiger mom" was invented by Americans to describe that overbearing parent who ensures that their children's CV shines with all the talents and skills in the world. It is a dynamic a parent can "drift into without ever fully meaning to."

Jellyfish Parenting

Being a tiger mom raises the "unhappy spectre" of ROI (Return of Investment). If parents are concurrently bankrupting and killing themselves to make all these extra-curricular activities happen, they would want to see a return on their investments. There should be something to measure the success-badges, certificates, league tables, scholarships, and the like.

Brockes, upon realizing all these things, typed into Google asking the opposite of a tiger, to which Google suggested jellyfish.

Jellyfish parenting is "boneless, diaphanous, endlessly flexible." She likes that, and she said she is almost there.

However, jellyfish parenting can bring a lot of cons instead of pros if used in the extreme as well. Thus, parents should be warned.

It is the opposite of authoritarian parenting. These parents can project high warmth and communication, but since they are flexible and, as described, "boneless," they can take little control of their children, which can result in tolerating their kids and giving in to what they want. Kids under this kind of permissive parenting can grow spoiled and rebellious if not given what they want.

Thus, at the end of the day, parenting should always be a balance of all styles, a balance of expressing what they want for their children and respecting what their children want, and a balance of gentle and tough love.