Bad Parenting Quotes

• Most children would rather preserve the fantasy of a loving connection with their fathers and mothers, at all costs, even if it costs them their self-esteem. When you're three or seven years old, it's less frightening to think of yourself as an unlovable, disappointing screwup than to recognize the fact that you're living with a monster.

  Keith Ablow

  Mother, Children, Father

  Keith Ablow (2015). “Compulsion”, p.299, Pan Macmillan

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• Good parenting give headaches but bad parenting gives heartaches.

  Shiv Khera

  Heartache, Giving, Headache

  72 Copy quote

• It is not a bad thing that children should occasionally, and politely, put parents in their place.

  Sidonie Gabrielle Colette

  Family, Children, Parenting

  "My Mother's House". Book by Sidonie Gabrielle Colette, 1922.

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• It is our genetic nature as a species to believe as young children that our parents and elders are right. We watch them to see what's what. Later on we can judge for ourselves and rebel if need be, but when we're just months old, or a year or two, and a parent looks at us with impatience, or disgust, or disdain, or just leaves us there to cry and doesn't answer us even though we're longing to be embraced and nurtured, we assume that something must be wrong with us. Unfortunately, at that age it's impossible to think there might be something wrong with them.

  Jean Liedloff

  Children, Self Esteem, Believe

  "An Interview with Jean Liedloff" by Chris Mercogliano, www.continuum-concept.org.

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• If parents wish to preserve childhood for their own children, they must conceive of parenting as an act of rebellion against culture

  Neil Postman

  Children, Parenting, Childhood

  Neil Postman (2011). “Building a Bridge to the 18th Century: How the Past Can Improve Our Future”, p.138, Vintage

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• Sociologists well understand that chaos at home causes violent behavior, educational failure and social alienation among children. Yet, many of us in America stay far, far away from this topic. That in itself is a national scandal. Bad parenting is gravely harming this nation.

  Bill O'Reilly

  Children, Educational, Home

  10 Copy quote

• After puberty the personality develops impetuously and all extraneous intervention becomes odious.... Now it so happens that parents feel the responsibility towards their children precisely during this second period, when it is too late.

  Antonio Gramsci

  Children, Responsibility, Personality

  77 Copy quote

• I saw this anti-drug commercial that showed a kid smoking pot in his dad`s room with his friend. This kid finds a gun, the gun accidentally goes off and kills his friend. Only in America is the villain in this commercial not guns or bad parenting, but pot.

  Bill Maher

  Dad, Kids, Gun

  5 Copy quote

• The government cannot overcome bad parenting. What our leaders can do is publicly condemn irresponsible parental behavior in vivid terms.

  Bill O'Reilly

  Government, Leader, Overcoming

  6 Copy quote

• A Message to Children Who Have Read This Book - When you grow up and have children of your own, do please remember something important: a stodgy parent is no fun at all. What a child wants and deserves is a parent who is SPARKY.

  Roald Dahl

  Children, Growing Up, Fun

  "Danny, the Champion of the World". Book by Roald Dahl, 1975.

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• I really like 'Shameless' because it brings up important issues, but we get to talk and laugh and look at something that's really important, that's a problem, like alcoholism and bad parenting. It's done in a funny, smart way.

  Justin Chatwin

  Smart, Issues, Laughing

  "Justin Chatwin Talks SHAMELESS Season 2". Interview with Christina Radish, collider.com. February 12, 2012.

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• Autism is a neurological disorder. It's not caused by bad parenting. It's caused by, you know, abnormal development in the brain. The emotional circuits in the brain are abnormal. And there also are differences in the white matter, which is the brain's computer cables that hook up the different brain departments.

  Temple Grandin

  Parenting, Emotional, White

  "A Conversation with Temple Grandin". "Talk of the Nation" with Ira Flatow, www.npr.org. January 20, 2006.

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• It is important for a father who feels pushed away [by the mom] to say, in effect, When you do that, I feel unwanted as a father, or I feel my rough-housing is not bad parenting; it's my contribution to helping our child take risks. Women cannot hear what men do not say.

  Warren Farrell

  Mom, Children, Father

  4 Copy quote