How ‘scientific motherhood’ polices and subjugates women | Aeon Essays
Alice Nelson, a cotton mill worker, on her way to work at the Lilac Mill in Shaw, Lancashire, January 1955. Photo by Bert Hardy/Picture Post/Getty Images is a writer and editor based in Hong Kong and London who writes at the intersection of science and culture. She is the editor-in-chief of Initium Media, an independent, award-winning Chinese-language media platform. Edited byPam Weintraub Listen to this essay 28 minute listen In the early 2020s, a trend called ‘gentle parenting’ gained popularity among millennial parents, and I quickly found my friends who are parents of young children getting wrapped up in it. My high-school best friend Macy, mother of two boys aged two and four, explained over coffee that she tries never to say ‘No’. Midway through our two-hour catch-up, the older one threw a small fist when she stopped him from tipping the sugar bowl into his milk. ‘I can see you’re upset because you really wanted to pour the sugar yourself,’ Macy said calmly. ‘But sugar isn’t for
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