Monster Parents
19 09 2008
This summer, Fuji TV aired a drama called “Monster Parents,” and it earned 6th highest rating among the top 20 TV dramas of the season. Below is a segment of this TV drama. You can view the rest of this show on veoh.
The term “Monster Parents” refers to parents who make self-indulgent, outrageous demands of their children’s school, and it has been a social problem for the past decade (wikipedia).
A Bungeisyunju- a Japanese magazine, article, “Monster Parents Will Destroy Schools” (March 2008) reports several “monster parent” cases. For example,
• A father found a beehive along his child’s route to school. He insisted the school was responsible to protect the children, and demanded teachers to monitor the beehive daily to make sure that children did not get stung.
• After repeated attempts to lift him, an overweight child was assigned to lift up his classmates for a piggy-back athletic game. The mother of the children called to complain daily to the teacher’s home, claiming that her child had been mentally traumatized by the experience. The phone calls, mostly after midnight, continued over a period of several months until the teacher became neurotic and put her career on hold.
• Suffering from continuous complaints by parents, a 23 year-old new teacher committed suicide in June 2006, in Shinjuku, Tokyo. Another new teacher, a 25 year old, also killed herself in October 2006, in Nishi, Tokyo.
Sociologists point that changes in social values and a growing lack of respect for the teachers as background of this new cultural phenomena. After the World War II, traditional Japanese values such as patience, efforts, and self-discipline have declined, while individualism and the idea that one should say what they want to say and get what they want to get has grown, especially with Japans’ rapid economic growth.
In addition, parents who experienced the “bubble economy” when many high-pay jobs were available, had little respect for the teaching profession and according to some surveys was one of the least-desirable professions to enter following college. The rise of education-levels among parents may have also contributed to a loss of respect towards teachers (Wikipedia & Bungeisyunju, March 2008),
Below are links to articles related to Monster Parents. Please read them and share your comments.
• ‘Monster patents’ threaten Japan’s schools UPI Asia.com
• Japan’s ‘monster’ parents take center stage Times Online
The fact that I’m shocked not by the occurrences described by the above articles but by the fact that they’re happening in Japan probably speaks to my tendency to think of the Japanese education system (and by extension, Japanese people as a whole) in the traditional, stereotypical sense. Granted, most of my exposure to the Japanese school system has been through reading manga, which probably shouldn’t be taken as a reliable source, but even talking to fellow students who come from Japanese families, I got the impression that education was a pretty serious business in Japan. I’m not suggesting that it isn’t taken seriously by students, but the shenanigans that are being described above are something that I would expect to happen here in the States. In fact, I had several classmates in high school who routinely had their parents bully teachers into submission.
I’ve had several discussions in my freshman seminar that come back to the point that my generation is what’s called the “me” generation – we want everything our way, and we want it NOW. I had the impression that this was a mostly American phenomenon, but after reading through all the above material, I’m convinced that it’s not, even though the description of changing values to include emphasis on individuality and the right to an opinion still feel distinctly American to me. It makes me wonder if everyone my age behaves this way, or if the “me” generation is limited to certain cultures, and if this behavior was influenced by the Westernization trend that has been going on in Japan since World War II.
I felt the most interesting part about the Times article, specifically, was reading the comments posted about them on the news sites by people from around the world. Opinions seem to range from apologetic of the system (mostly by Japanese posters) to outrage (mostly by Americans), and quite a few posts by Japanese teachers that express the difficulty of the situation. Many of the other posts place the blame for the situation on America, apparently drawing on the same ideas that I went over in the previous paragraphs.
Whatever the cause of this situation, I find it utterly sad, and I feel for the teachers who have to deal with this on a daily basis.
What interests me most about this is that a television show is being made out of this and it is receiving national attention. American classrooms also face similar issues which often stem from a teacher’s limited power to exercise authority in the classroom. In grade school, I can remember many parents that were competitive and adamant about their child. Although, I have never heard of a parent driving a professor to suicide. Perhaps the academic competition between students drives parents to act this way, but their behavior is very childish. Behaving in that manner will teach their children to act that way, and that will not go over well in their peer groups. Respect is also a huge issue that faces classroom teachers, because many teachers can not exercise authority, and the students know this, so they take advantage of it. The result is that many classrooms are unruly. This also reminds me of parents at little league games. It has been a social issue in the past years. Many parents will get obsessive about their child’s performance in a sport game, and act completely out of line. There was even a fatality that resulted from a fight between two parents. The Will Ferrell movie, Kicking and Screaming features a character like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6n-paRU-7o&feature=related
I think that these parents need to step back and evaluate their behavior and realize what a horrid example they are setting for their children.
I was quire surprised to find out that lots of Janpanese kids can be indulged to such an extent. My impression on the characters of Japanese kids are self-disiplines, highly motivated, hard-working, polite, and creative. Now i found out that after WWII, such valuable traditional characters declined, and were replaced with individualism and pursuit of unlimted freedom. However, this is not hard to understand when the media constantly reflets the image of Janpanese youth under lots of employment pressure and lots of high expextations from parents. It;s probably similar to the American teens in the 1960s, when students just want to free themsleves to unlimited extent.
Also, i was amazed by the amount of disrespect paid by both parents and students, since it went against my assumption of the Japanese traditonal values. But then again, i can understand that when i know that because of oppression on women, mothers don’t have much to do, and as a result, have lots of freetime on giving excessive cares to their kids. I found it ridiculous when there were 25 snow whites but no witches.
The fact that teachers don’t get high pay is the same in China. One of the reasons that America is definately the best place in the world for higher education, i guess, is because the society and the government pay enough attention to the importance of education, and teachers get modest pay. That may be the reason that not only people with an education major, but also professional people are willing to share their experience with students
After I read the articles about monster parents all the blood in my body is boiling. The parents that who make unreasonable demands of their children’s schools or teachers are either lost their moral or too protective to the child. When I first saw the word “Monster Parents” I thought it will be the parents that are making unreasonable demands to their children not children’s schools or teacher. I think that education should have a basic standard that everyone should follow, so that the new generations are able to withstand the society pressure after they start working.
As in the articles, and in real balanced society parents are suppose to be apologizing for their children mistake instead of finding a reason to protect their children from being punished. As the article mentioned Japanese parents’ are used to be apologizing for their children mistake, but where is that attitude went? Is it because of nowadays most parents nowadays label teacher as a very low profession? I am very agree to one of the comment I saw in the articles. “Elevating each child to the same level is not doing the kid a favor. By learning to cope with small disappointments (like not being chosen to be Snow White in the school play) children learn to cope with the big disappointments that life will eventually throw at them.”
I as an Asian have always thought that Japanese are patience, read whenever they can, and very polite. Their culture should be like that, but after “Monster Parents” appear all this good value will be demolished easily. This is a very bad life cycle. First, education is very important for children so they can get the basic knowledge in how to survive in the real society when they grow up. “Monster Parents” being too protective for their child will become obstacle for their children to be able to withstand society pressure and learning how to strive for success in the future. Children that are being over protected by their parents will eventually receive pressure during work or from the society and felt difficult to cope with. This will increase the rate of committing suicide.
Therefore the final results of too many “Monster Parents” will make several negative issues emerge from the society in the long run. 1. Unproductive worker due to the lack of knowledge. 2. Higher committing suicide rate due to unable to cope with new element “pressure” 3. More unreasonable generations which make all the good culture inherit by Japanese perish. With all these negative effects Japan can face serious problem in their economy and their society if the government do not find a good way to stop “Monster Parents” unreasonable request. I hope that the Japan’s education are able to produce the generation that are able to withstand pressure in the society, strive for success and inherit all the good value that Japanese should have. Let’s hope that Japan’s government are able to successfully deal with this issues so that Japan will not face terrible “Monster Parents” effect at the end.
It was like a scene coming out of a soap opera
“Aww, mommy will help you. Mommy will protect you.”
But it is not just ‘mommy will protect you’ anymore; it is also ‘mommy will take them down for you.’
One would think a situation where rich snobs are being protected by their parents from any allegations against them is unthinkable. They are the ones who need to learn to cope with real life, which is not covered with rose petals (a Thai proverb meaning life is not always smooth). They need to learn to push themselves up to the same level as their peers, not having their peers lowering their abilities to the same level.
But it is happening, and it is happening in Japan. Apparently, parents who think their children are gods would not understand that schools are places where their children learn how to manage life. Instead, they believe that it is the schools’ duty to make their children feel privileged. Parents are going overboard with their demands, and they seem to have no boundaries to which how far their power could go. ‘Monster Parents’ are just like that – unthinkable. Why would you want to ask from the schools something so unreal, so unimaginable, so off limit?
This problem of ‘Monster Parents’ is not an example of a wrong turn in Japanese culture per se though. Of course, we have all learned that the Japanese place so much importance on respect and modesty. More importantly, collective good receives a higher priority than individual benefit. “In the past, Japanese parents would apologize to the teacher and school for their children’s behavior (UPI Asia).” Now, they deem themselves customer who exchange money with the school in order for their children to receive education – the kind they wish. In other word, their individual selves are more important.
So, why am I saying that the Monster Parents are not really an example of a damaging change in Japanese culture?
The reason is, this is the Japanese culture. Having parents going around harassing teachers is a part of the Japanese culture – it just takes on a different form. I know it would be confusing to understand – and it may outrage many people. But the truth is, the Japanese has been using the “harassing method” for a long time, just the targets have changed.
Let me explain in detail about my standpoint. Looking at Japanese politics (good thing I’m studying this), it has been a protest politics. Protest is a part of Japanese political culture. They have the right to protest and they have been using that right. Of course, protesting is not the same thing as demanding ridiculously from the school, but you can look at it from a different way. If the parents are not satisfied with what they schools offer their kids, then they have the right to complain. They have the right to voice their concern. They have the right to influence a policy change in their kids’ school. It is now the same thing, isn’t it? The parents are protesting, not the government, but the school.
And perhaps the similarity is here. If you look further into what strategies they use in political protests, you would also see another common point. The Japanese has the world’s most dangerous way of protesting. When a Japanese person was abducted by the North Korea government, his/her family went to a government building that was associate with this type of crime and started yelling at the building, well, not literally the building, but the government officials who walked by. They were doing this to ask for some type of reaction. They needed something to be done. They harassed government officials until some of them had to resign. It is called a psychological violence.
Does that sound familiar? From the Times Online article, “Within the category of monster parent Professor Morotomi identifies the most potent strain: the “teacher hunters”, who conspire in small groups to ensure that a particular teacher is dismissed. Occasionally, he said, this involves physically mobbing their victim at the school gates and screaming abuse until a letter of resignation is signed on the spot.”
So for me, it is another protest. It is targeted at schools instead of government buildings. Of course, it is outrageous, but it does not reflect a change in the Japanese characteristic at all. They have been doing this kind of things for decades. This time it’s just spreaded to school.
I’m not saying it is justified that parents harass teachers; it is bad for the society as a whole. I do not know for certain what is the source of this problem. Maybe it is the education system, or maybe it is the parents. I would suggest the schools to change their policy – make it harsher and harder for parents to make unreasonable demands. At the same times, parents should still have the right to protest the schools if they deem that the schools are not meeting their commitments. It has to be a mutual solution that would solve this problem.
This topic totally changes my point of view towards Japanese parents. Thought not all parents treat teachers like that, but this is already considered a serious problem. Those parents really need to think with their brain… Where they got their educations—SCHOOLS, and who educated them—TEACHERS!!
Those parents really make themselves look stupid and also make others somehow create a stereotyping towards Japanese parents. I remembered watching movie or news and somehow recalled that Japanese parents used to be very polite to the teachers, and I really thought that they have good relationships with the educators. This topic really makes me felt the other way round. REALLY…
I watched some episode of the “Monster Parents” and plan to finish it. While watching… I really can’t tolerate those parents. I was like:” if I was the teacher, I will…punch her?!? (too violence, am I?)”. But some of the statements or proofs are not even…reasonable. “Every girl takes the role of red riding hood?” Just because every parents wants their children to be the main character on stage? That’s really ridiculous. Some people mention that by elevating each child to the same level is not doing the kid a favor. By learning to cope with small disappointments (like not being chosen to be Snow White in the school play) children learn to cope with the big disappointments that life will eventually throw at them. I strongly agreed.
In my opinion, if these kind of ‘culture’ still growing and expanding in Japan, new generations kids will for sure grow up “well taken care of”. But once they get out of school and step in the big society, they will not be able to cope with the pressure and a whole lot more of disappointment.
According to the article of Time magazine, there are “monster parents” who can’t wait to torment teachers with challenges and complaints. There are “helicopter parents” who hover around the school, waiting to swoop down at the first sign of trouble. And then there are “dry-cleaner parents” who simply drop their unruly children off at school and expect to have them all cleaned up by the end of the day. Then the article spells out what many teachers consider the ideal parent: “a partner but not a pest, engaged but not obsessed, with a sense of perspective and patience.”
Parents being involved is okay, but they need to draw the line somewhere. Harassing teachers (especially to the point that they commit suicide) crosses the line of how involved. Yes, the teachers are responsible for the students’ learning, and parents do need to step up if something is horribly wrong, but certain instances the parents need to lay off. Parents nowadays seem to be meddling in the school affairs.
I understand that parents want their kids to be treated like everyone else, but having 25 Snow Whites to be fair is ridiculous. “There are parents who have secretly placed recording devices in their children’s classrooms, and others who have demanded that the results of sports events be changed to reflect expectations rather than the reality on the field.” This is out of control. I guess the kids and teachers have no “private” classroom, and there can be no such thing as losers, they just worked really hard. There are obviously no more accidents nor mistakes. Then these monster parents can be ‘teacher hunters’ which sole purpose is to get rid of a specific teacher. “Here, students are not failed…If you sit in a test and write only your name and fall asleep you are not given an F for that test, you are given a C. A student who hits a teacher is not suspended or expelled. A student who cannot control himself in class is not removed.” Having this problem, I can see an increase in bullying, suicide, and people to be more closed within themselves.
http://www.upiasia.com/Society_Culture/2008/06/19/monster_parents_threaten_japans_schools/1386/
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helicopter_parent
blog.360.yahoo.com/blog-LT4JfBswaK2GzvYEJSp8f1Zh?p=426
jonathanturley.org/2008/06/08/godzilla-v-the-japanese-monster-parent-japanese-experts-report-a-new-giant-mutation/
http://www.nowpublic.com/world/monster-parents
tw.myblog.yahoo.com/hcdeming/article?mid=888&prev=889&next=887
Education in Japan is very important. Students have to pass exams to get into high school. I found it interesting though that a tv show was being made of “monster parents”. It’s a different way to address the subject. Parents can be in general very controlling over their kids and feel a sense of competitiveness. This happens here in the U.S. but I didn’t know that it was happening to such a horrible extent in Japan. It is a very serious problem when people are committing suicide. Since the end of WWII views that were very traditional didn’t have the same importance as they did before. The article also mentions that parents have little respect for teachers and are having troubles dealing with the rise of more education levels. It is sad on the side of the teachers and the schools that they are giving into the demands on the parents. This can be changing the outcomes of the kids from having a normal school experience. It’s not right of the parents to demand things from the school sending a bad messages to their kids as well. It shows that with enough effort you can change anything to make it what you want, instead of sometimes having to deal with things the way they are. Yes the parents have a right to ask the schools to change situations they find bad but only to a certain extent.
I am watching this drama series now. Without reading the articles linked in this blog, I would have thought that “Monster Parents” will not exist in reality. Parents’ attitudes in this drama might be over dramatized for the audiences, but the director for this show did a great job in telling us the true meaning behind each cases. In this drama, despite being threaten by the parents, the teachers do not want to take any actions that might harmed their students, all the teachers put their students in top priority. I believed that this really exist in Japanese culture; the Japanese school teachers take full responsibility as a sensei and think from the students point of view before making decisions. The extreme demand from the parents were tried to be fulfilled not only to please them, maintaining school reputation, but also to avoid any negative effects on the students. The teachers have the rights to file lawsuits on the “monster parents”, but they choose not to, instead fulfilling all the demands requested, so that students will continue their studies in a positive environment. In today’s world, every parent is indeed “monster parent” in heart. They want the best quality of everything for their children. As the population of highly educated young parents increased, the demand for education increased as well; better school, better qualified teachers. Evidence already proved that “monster parent” did or still exists in Japanese parents, but I believed this does not only represent Japanese parents in Japan, but also parents around the world.
While I was reading the articles, I started out feeling anger towards the parents and then sympathy for the children, and finally I was wondering how many parents in Japan are actually classified as “monster parents.” I think that negative events always outweigh positive events in the mind, so I began to wonder if the problem was extremely widespread where almost all parents are like this or if only a few are actually like this and the articles just make it seem like there are a ton. Anyways, this situation can be compared to “helicopter parents” in the US. However, I always thought of helicopter parents as being more controlling of their children rather than the teachers. If a mother has a complaint about a certain teacher or has an issue with the education system, why does she not simply go to the school at talk to the teacher or principal like a civilized person? Something they may not realize is the fact that teachers are people to. Teachers have lives like any other person; they have children; they have spouses; they have friends; they have issues with certain things, but they don’t go to a child’s house to question the parents as to why the kid never does the homework. (do they?) All teachers are trying to do is their job, why must parents butt in whenever something isn’t EXACTLY how they want it. Not everyone can win. There will always be someone who is unhappy about something. One set of parents forces a teacher to do one thing, but another set wanted the teacher to keep it the way it was and is now pissed off because the teacher had to change something in order to keep from being tormented by the first set. It is a never-ending cycle.
25 Snow Whites and no Dwarves and no Witch? What is with these people? What about the male students? Were they forced to play Snow White also? So what if one girl gets picked to be Snow White? That is a part of life; you win some you lose some. It is not always about one child being favored over another. Maybe that child was just better at acting and memorizing lines. Different people will get lead parts for different plays depending on a thing called type-casting. Sometimes one person just fits the part better than the other. For example, a director wouldn’t normally cast a pale blonde girl to play an African American from Harlem in a play. It’s just common sense. If a person gets everything he/she wants as a child, what’s to stop him/her from thinking it will be the same in the grown-up world? Disappointment is a part of life, and it shapes us into stronger individuals because we know that we can’t always get what we want, and it isn’t the end of the world if we don’t.
Something else that I just thought of is how this made me think of the movie “Mommie Dearest,” which is about Joan Crawford. Joan is an overly controlling, sadistic mother, and you would know what I am talking about if you were to watch the movie. There are parts where she is nice and her daughter is extremely happy and loves her mother. The little girl often gets everything she wants, but once again, Joan Crawford was crazy and would often go off over insignificant minor details. Of course it wasn’t teachers she was going off on but rather her children.
This is the trailer for the movie “Mommie Dearest” – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EjRaU8hRVJs
I see this as a serious problem in the United States as well. There are parents who paralyze the school because they don’t allow them to do anything on their own accord. I’m from a very small school district where this can be even worse because one parent is able to rally the others together to “terrorize” the school. I think this hurts their children because it stops them from getting the education they deserve. It also harms the teachers and administration because they can’t make a make without being attacked by bothersome parents.
I think the TV show Monster Parents might have exaggerated the situation a little bit. Some of the episodes I watched seemed a little unrealistic. In the first episode, the teacher falls to the ground screaming when a parent calls to bother him. While I understand that two teachers have committed suicide over these monster parents, I think the show took it a little too far.
I also think that this is something that is not unique to the school system. Back home, I know of a set of monster parents who do whatever they can to get their kids out of trouble. They bought their son a brand new pick up truck (He was 17 years old, lived in a huge house in the suburbs, had no need for a truck, and had never worked a day in his life). Right after they bought him this truck, he went to Taco Bell and threw a pop bomb through the drive through window (a pop bomb is when you take your drink from the take out window and then throw it into the little take out cubicle thing. The intent is that the pop goes everywhere inside.) While he was speeding away from the window, he hit a car that was leaving the parking lot. Instead of being upset, his parents hired the best attorney they could and scheduled his court date on a day when there was a very lenient judge so he would not face harsh legal consequences. They did everything they could so that their son did not face any of the consequences of his actions.
Monster parents have been a problem in America for a while now and I guess Japan is starting to take on this western cultural problem as well. I think there is a growing sense of having the right to give their kids the most advantages. The only problem is that they are doing more damage than good. I keep thinking about years and years ago when students had the utmost respect for their teachers. Back when a teacher could spank a student if they were out of line. I think back then the teachers had more control and the students probably learned more. If parents would just let go of the control and let the teachers do what they are hired to do there would be fewer problems.
I saw the posters advertising for the Monster Parents drama, but I never truly understood what the drama was about. After reading the articles about monster parents, I found myself quite amused. The idea of “monster parents” seems to be so un-Japanese–an idea of trying to put yourself and your child before others and disrupting classes. At the same time, though, it also can be disguised as trying to get the child the “fairest” education possible, where they are not picked on or discriminated against. Of course, this idea is pushed to the extreme until every one is hurt, and no one is truly helped.
A lot of people have said that this phenomenon is comparable to the US, but I disagree quite a bit. In the United States, parents may often participate in the school system in negative ways, but our schools are much less strict, much less cut-throat than the Japanese schools. I think this phenomenon would be comparable to the United States if parents followed their children around to college classes, not high school classes. After all, in the states we do the majority of our learning in college, while in Japan a majority of learning is done in high school. Imagine, then, your parents following you to you collegee classes and interrupting them. How embarassing.
Also, I think the monster parents are truly a Japanese occurence because of the intense pressure Japanese schooling puts on the children. Parents, who recognize that their child is being put under a lot of pressure, go crazy, pushing for their child to receive the best education, the fairest treatment, so the child can get a good career in the world. I think it is also a way for parents whose children are not doing as well as they had hoped to vent, to release some frustration on someone other then the child or themselves.
In my personal opinion, such phenomenon happens because of the educational level of the parents. Few decades ago, education was not as accessible as now. Many parents may have lesser education background than the teachers teaching in elementary schools. Therefore, the parents respect the teachers for their knowledge.
However, a younger generation of parents have received education and maybe much more than the teachers teaching in elementary schools. This has caused power imbalance in terms of knowledge and expertise.
With that, parents tend to blame all the responsibilities to teachers by using all means, even though the fault is with the parents or their children sometimes.
I think this is a trend that happens in other countries as well as in Japan, just maybe not quite to this extent. Going through public school here in the U.S. I have seen some parents go to great lengths to get back at a teacher for “wronging” their child.
I would think that if Japanese society wanted to cut this behavior back that teachers would grow more firm in their decisions. The schools themselves should be firm in the support they give for teacher’s decisions. Teachers should not be left alone to defend themselves, because when you have small groups of parents all pressing the same sort of issues on you, I can see how that could become a daunting task.
As for Japanese media televising “Monster Parents,” I am not surprised. From my perspective it seems that if parents are willing to go so far as to mob teachers, then they would be glad to share all their stories and ideas to be televised. This is just an example of media putting whatever sells on the air, similar to a lot of the “reality TV” that we see here in the states as well.
In the end, I do not believe that school administrators are here to appease the parents. They are here to do what is best for the development of children, and they need to stand firm to let parents know that these decisions are best for the children.