Parenting isn't a fashion, though you wouldn't know it from the recent spate of books out there—from Amy 'Tiger Mom' Chua's hard-nosed manifesto to Pamela Druckerman's smug French diatribe to Mayim 'Blossom' Bialik's crunchy endorsement of attachment parenting.
These books present a 'one size fits all' approach to parenting, what with their implicit assertions that there is a right—and by extension, a wrong—way to raise a child, or that parenting is somehow black and white (instead of grey all over). While there is nothing wrong with striving to become a better mom, I fear that such books create an us and them culture.
Parenting is not, in my humble and limited experience, about dichotomies; it is about finding what works best for you and your particular household at any given moment.
The images of a beatifically smiling Bialik, snugly sandwiched between her young sons, suggest an intimacy that parents who don't practice extended breastfeeding or child wearing or co-sleeping can't possibly possess.
Printer-friendly version