I'm Proud of You

Where is the Tiger Mom now that we need her?

You will recall that Yale Law Professor Amy Chua created something of a ruckus when she published a book entitled, The Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother. 

In it she explained how she had chosen to raise her daughters to be disciplined and organized, to excel academically and to avoid all frivolities. The mother who threatened to burn all of her daughter’s dolls was certainly not practicing what is now called gentle parenting.

Since her daughters are now adults, we can see that the Tiger Mom way of raising a child works very well. Sophia, for example, went to Harvard, joined ROTC, went to law school, clerked at the Supreme Court, created an online tutoring company, did a stint in the military and got married.

It would not be an exaggeration to say that she made her parents proud. 

Nowadays, the latest in bizarre childrearing advice comes from the practitioners of what is called gentle parenting.

The children brought up thusly tend to be chaotic and disorganized, self-indulgent and undisciplined.

The New York Post reports:

Recently, one woman posted in an online Reddit forum that her sister’s family is banned from her home because of “gentle parenting.” According to the anonymous Redditor, the sister exhibited “zero discipline.”

“During the first two days of their stay, her daughter drew on my walls with crayon,” the user wrote online. “And her son pulled up flowers I had recently planted in my garden bed and threw a rock at my car parked in the driveway.”

“To top it all off,” she added, “they both kept constantly pulling my golden retriever’s hair and hitting my dog in the face.”

Apparently, gentle parents believe that the solution to bad behavior is awareness and understanding, as though children are therapy patients. 

How bad does it get?

Consider this piece of advice, handed out like candy to young mothers.

They are being instructed not to tell their children that they are proud of them, but to tell them that they should be proud of themselves.

Naturally, if you practice this aberrant bit of nonsense, your children will turn out to be narcissistic egomaniacs. Is that what we really, really want?

As it happens, the phrase “I am so proud of you” represents correct English grammar. “You should be proud of yourself” is agrammatical.

The first bespeaks connection. It identifies the child as a family member whose achievements reflect well on other members of the family. If your parents succeed in the world, the reputation of other members of the family is enhanced. If, on the other hand, a member of your family is exposed as a serial killer or an embezzler, your family name is going to be tarnished.

Everyone who does not get sucked up in the gentle parenting silliness knows this.

Unfortunately, if you are the ultimate arbiter of your quota of pride, you are going to end up in a solipsistic maze.

Pride accompanies achievement. Love is less discriminating. You understand that your parents love you no matter how well you did on the last spelling quiz. But, they are only proud of you if you achieved superior results. 

And then there is this. If you ask what motivates you to do your best, to work hard to win and succeed… the answer is-- other people. We are more motivated when we are working to improve the lives of others, whether their reputations or their well-being, than when we are just doing it for our own personal gratification.

So, the dopey nonsense about not telling your children that you are proud of them will de-motivate them.

Besides, as organizational psychologist Tasha Euruch has argued persuasively, you are how others see you, not how you feel about yourself.

It’s all about reputation, and even about face. Keep in mind, you never see your own face directly. You cannot look yourself in the eye. You only see yourself when you see the way others treat you, how they see or do not see you.

The notion that you should be proud of yourself is grammatically infelicitous and in stark defiance of the laws of human psychology, especially those that value reputation over self-love.

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