French Moms Ain’t All That Great
French mothers do not have some magical formula for raising well behaved children.
Heather Horn reveals that, contrary to the hype created by a new book an a WSJ column based on it, French mothers do not have some magical formula for raising well behaved children. Rather, it appears that the American author based her research on three or four minutes of casual observation of some rich French women.
But do welfare mothers make better lovers?
Hmmm, now I’m going to have to start adding “In Bed” to all your post titles to humor myself (always works great with Santorum, BTW).
@Franklin: White House’s Revised Contraceptive Proposal Unlikely To Satisfy Critics In Bed.
Yep…. works for me.
(Actually I heard you were supposed to add ‘in bed’ to fortune cookie sayings)
I’ll be honest, I didn’t see that one coming!
Shocking, isn’t it, how anecdotal evidence ends up making for lousy social science?
@Steven L. Taylor:
Charles Murray, you are being paged
Actually based on purely personal observations while living in France for awhile I’d say French kids are way more polite and well behaved than their US opposite numbers. It’s not remotely scientific but there you are. Sorry if this doesn’t satisfy your apparent Francophobia JJ.
@Brummagem Joe: Nah, it was just a snarky post linking to a column bursting a bubble.
My reaction to the original WSJ piece is that a more relaxed, less kid-centric approach to parenting makes a lot of sense and it’s quite probable that other cultures take such an approach. But the notion that there’s some magical approach to parenting that results in toddlers that never misbehave or interfere with adult “me time” but has somehow eluded Americans is just silly.
I have spent plenty of time in France, with and without my children. I have seen lot’s of French kiddies acting up, melting down and, well, acting like children. Yes, they can deconstruct a resturant as well as ant American child. Actually, to think of it, the French people I know seldom take their kids out to eat. I wonder why?