Paranoia Parenting

     Let me tell you "Elf on the Shelf" freaks a few things. If you need to plant spies in your house to get your children to behave, they are probably horrid little brats anyway and don't deserve Christmas gifts! If they are good children already, instilling paranoia into their lives will only backfire later. Trust me.

     As if the whole month of December wasn't hectic enough, you expect me to find creative
 adventures for the narc elf to do on top of everything else? Every day? And how is the elf spying on the kids if he's fishing in the toilet or hanging from the ceiling fan? And why do they call it "on the shelf" when that's the last place I see my braggart friends putting the little bastard?  I'll tell you where my elf on the shelf is today: on the shelf at Walmart! I'm not doing it!

     Not only did Santa see me when I was sleeping as a child, Jesus did, too. And the birds who would get into the chimney. And the bunnies who played in the back yard. And all the neighbors. And all of my teachers, parents' co-workers, complete strangers, and especially God. Any perceived sin I could possibly imagine would be met with severe parental punishment followed immediately by lightning bolts from the heavens. But here's the kicker: I was just naturally a good kid! All of this was completely useless; I wasn't planning on doing anything wrong anyway! The only thing all this overkill accomplished was screwing up my head.

    I'm going to  let the fans of Paranoia Parenting in on another little secret. Not from personal experience or anything. At some point in their life (usually around age 16 or so) your kids will figure it out. It starts small. They cuss, say, when they stub a toe. And nobody hears them! No lightning bolts strike them dead! Nobody appears with a bar of soap! The glorious F word echoes through the empty house, and nobody knows! This will be an eye opener to your kid. They will test their new found anonymity by breaking every rule they can find. They will wear unapproved make up. They will listen to devil music. They will try new adventures in smoking and drinking. They will find a boy or girl and experiment. They will, I promise. Why? Because they can! And the world will not end! Will your little elf friend be there then? I didn't think so.

     But bad kids, I mean truly bad kids who act up just to prove a point, do they care if something else is watching them be bad? In my experience, usually not. In fact, they are generally pretty proud of being bad, so another witness is just icing on the cake, so to speak. Paranoia Parenting does not work with the bad kids. It just makes them more open about what they are doing.

     Hey, I like this term Paranoia Parenting! Has anyone done a study on it yet? We've all had to sit through Helicopter Parents, Tiger Moms, Attachment Parenting, and I'm sure I have missed a few. Let's study the paranoia effect on children! I might be totally wrong, it may really make them better kids. Better kids with ulcers and anxiety issues, but better kids nonetheless. Until they do discover the secret. Leave me comments, here or on the Facebook page, and I'll do a pseudo-scientific study myself! Were you raised to always be looking over your shoulder? Did it make you behave any better? When did you figure out that nobody really cared what you were doing as much as you were led to believe? What did you do about it? Does it affect how you parent your own children? Tell me! I need to know! Otherwise I'll masquerade as an elf and sit around your house so I can see for myself!