Why French Parents Are Superior

While Americans fret over modern parenthood, the French are raising happy, well-behaved children without all the anxiety. Pamela Druckerman on the Gallic secrets for avoiding tantrums, teaching patience and saying ‘non’ with authority. Of course, the French have all kinds of public services that help to make having kids more appealing and less stressful. Parents don’t have to pay for preschool, worry about health insurance or save for college. Many get monthly cash allotments—wired directly into their bank accounts—just for having kids. But these public services don’t explain all of the differences. The French seem to have a whole different framework for raising kids.

One of the keys to this education is the simple act of learning how to wait. It is why the French babies mostly sleep through the night from two or three months old. Their parents don’t pick them up the second they start crying, allowing the babies to learn how to fall back asleep. It is also why French toddlers will sit happily at a restaurant. Rather than snacking all day like American children, they mostly have to wait until mealtime to eat. (French kids consistently have three meals a day and one snack around 4 p.m.)

Authority is one of the most impressive parts of French parenting—and perhaps the toughest one to master. Many French parents have an easy, calm authority with their children. Their kids actually listen to them. French children aren’t constantly dashing off, talking back, or engaging in prolonged negotiations.

Having grown up very close to a heavily populated French town, Larchmont, I can attest to this fact. French parents are superior! American children for the most part are very ill-mannered, spoiled and completely rule the household. Shocking! So many American families are extremely crude, rude, clueless and LOUD, regardless of financial status. In most cases, the children would be better off left raised by a pack of wolves in the forest.