There are many cool names for bad parenting styles and they all sound dangerous!
Here’s a handy guide for pinpointing just what kind of bad parent you are.
Remember that bad parenting styles can change over time, so print this out and put it on the fridge to remind yourself how many different ways you can fuck up parenting your child.
Science has proven that every time you cringe in shame, you burn five calories!
Snowplow parenting is exactly what it sounds like. The parent acts as a snowplow, removing all difficulties and obstacles from a child’s path so they grow up to be annoying whiners who think that things should always go their way. This style of parenting is also called lawnmower parenting or bulldozer parenting, both of which sound much more dangerous, and therefore, way more cool.
Snowplow parenting shouldn’t be confused with the classic bad parenting style, helicopter parenting. Helicopter parenting is characterized by parents who constantly hover over their children and take an excessive interest in their lives. To change things up and sound like less of a control freak who has no life outside of their kids, tell your friends this is actually called hummingbird parenting. See, isn’t that nice?
Speedboat parents perform the bare minimum to keep their children alive. They see nothing wrong with tubing, ATVs, dirt bikes, sliding down stairs in laundry baskets, or trampolines. This was the primary parenting style in the 1950s and is also called Mad Men parenting. If you have ever used the phrase, “Bring daddy a beer and go play outside,” you may be a speedboat parent.
Motorcycle parenting afflicts dads who impulse-buy a Harley Davidson after they wake up one morning, get on the scale, and realize they’ve spent the best years of their lives wrestling strollers onto escalators and eating leftover chicken nuggets that were “shaped wrong”. Motorcycle parenting is self-limiting and is usually resolved by a whisper fight in the laundry room and a call to the dealership about their return policy.
Instagram parenting, on the other hand, is almost entirely exclusive to moms who want to shame all of their sorority sisters. It involves forcing your children into clothes that have to be returned within three days, and I swear to God, if you get ice cream on that stupid bowtie, I’m taking your tablet away. Yes, I know the Harry Potter glasses don’t have any lenses. Just put them on.
The children of dumpster parents go away to college and come back six months later to discover everything they own has been thrown away and their bedroom has been converted into a woodworking studio for the Christmas tree ornaments their parents are trying to sell on Etsy.
Jacuzzi parents will leave their children with any relative over the age of 18 who’s free for the weekend because they booked a red-eye to Reno and those dice ain’t throwing themselves.
And finally, Star Wars parenting is when you lie to your children about basically everyone they’re related to, even though they might come this close to committing incest as a result. Star Wars parenting can result in years of therapy and many, many disappointing sequels.
Parents that read this will take great delight in deciding which labels to apply to all their friends and neighbors with children. They will, of course, not recognize themselves in any of the categories. Well done!
As the old joke goes, incest is alright as long as you keep it in the family.