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LES ECHOS

From China To France To America, A Backlash Against Overprotective Parents

The smothering starts young...
The smothering starts young...
Doan Bui

PARIS – In the U.S., they are called the helicopter parents. These are the hyper-moms and uber-dads who hover relentlessly over their children, transforming themselves into personal assistants on the weekends: driving them to baseball or dance practice, Chinese lessons, screaming at the math teacher who had the nerve to give little darling a B grade.

Overprotective much? Last year, TIME Magazine put a woman breast-feeding a three-year-old on its cover with the title Are You Mom Enough? The cover article described the new attachment parenting trend: co-sleeping, extended breast-feeding, home schooling.

Child rearing is the new national obsession, according to the infinite number of best-seller books on the subject – preaching every parenting method under the sun. It’s all so confusing that the U.S. is starting to wonder if, by putting children on pedestals, they are doing more damage than good. So now it’s hip to be against hyper-parenting (hyper-education) and kindergarchy (rule of the child-king), helicopter parents are turning their children into wimps or land them in therapy.

In 2011, Amy Chua, the famous Tiger Mom, ignited a national debate when she bragged about the results of her super strict Chinese-style parenting in her book Why Chinese Mothers Are Superior.

2012 was the year French-style parenting became the new model to follow. In her opus Bringing Up Bébé: One American Mother Discovers the Wisdom of French Parenting, ex-Wall Street journalist Pamela Druckerman, living in France with her three children, wrote about the merits of a French education. She was amazed, for instance, that French children don’t play Frisbee with their bread.

Tiger Mom vs. Fromage Mom

“Amy Chua and I don’t preach the same educational style,” says Druckerman, “the only thing we have in common is that we question the principle of always praising our children. The famous ‘good job.’”

An American professor who is against hyper-parenting admits that he is extremely frustrated to not be able to write “D-, too much love at home” on some copies.

“We also came of age during the divorce boom in the 1980s,” says Pamela Druckerman “and we’re determined to act more selflessly than we believe our own parents did. In the context of economic instability, family is the last refuge. This is why we are terrified at the idea of hurting and messing up our children.

According to Hilary, an American mother living in France, “the parents here don’t feel as guilty. They get more help from the state: subsidies, childcare facilities -- and the schooldays are longer.”

What about parental authority? “The French parents I’ve interviewed often say they are strict. It’s a positive value. In the U.S., we are less inclined to show our authority,” says Pamela Druckerman.

A French mother of five, Mélanie Schmidt, who is just back in France after spending a few years in the U.S., has another point of view: “The mothers are just as lost in the U.S. as they are on this side of the pond but over there, they’re not afraid to talk about it. At our childrens' American school, every two months there were parenting classes that were very popular. France is thinking about doing the same!” As a matter of fact, Mélanie, who created a parental coaching service in the U.S., is about to launch her own business in France too.

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eyes on the U.S.

The Weight Of Trump's Indictment Will Test The Strength Of American Democracy

The U.S. legal system cannot simply run its course in a vacuum. Presidential politics, and democracy itself, are at stake in the coming weeks and months.

The Weight Of Trump's Indictment Will Test The Strength Of American Democracy

File photo of former U.S. President Donald Trump in Clyde, Ohio, in 2020.

Emma Shortis*

-Analysis-

Events often seem inevitable in hindsight. The indictment of former U.S. President Donald Trump on criminal charges has been a possibility since the start of his presidency – arguably, since close to the beginning of his career in New York real estate.

But until now, the potential consequences of such a cataclysmic development in American politics have been purely theoretical.

Today, after much build-up in the media, The New York Times reported that a Manhattan grand jury has voted to indict Trump and the Manhattan district attorney will now likely attempt to negotiate Trump’s surrender.

The indictment stems from a criminal investigation by the district attorney’s office into “hush money” payments made to the adult film star Stormy Daniels (through Trump’s attorney Michael Cohen), and whether they contravened electoral laws.

Trump also faces a swathe of other criminal investigations and civil suits, some of which may also result in state or federal charges. As he pursues another run for the presidency, Trump could simultaneously be dealing with multiple criminal cases and all the court appearances and frenzied media attention that will come with that.

These investigations and possible charges won’t prevent Trump from running or even serving as president again (though, as with everything in the U.S. legal system, it’s complicated).

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