The-Conquest-of-Happiness-by-Bertrand-Russell

The virtue of obedience, which was formerly
exacted without question, has become
unfashionable, and rightly so. Psycho-analysis has
terrified educated parents with the fear of the harm
they may unwittingly do their children. If they kiss
them, they may produce an Oedipus complex; if
they do not they may produce a fury of jealousy. If
they order the children to do things they may be
producing a sense of sin; if they do not, the
children acquire habits which the parents think
undesirable. When they see their baby sucking his
thumb, they draw all kinds of terrifying inferences,
but they are quite at a loss as to what to do to stop
him. Parenthood, which used to be a triumphant
exercise of power, has become timid, anxious, and
filled with conscientious doubts. The old simple
joys are lost, and that at the very moment when,
owing to the new freedom of single women, the
mother has had to sacrifice much more than
formerly in deciding upon maternity. In these
circumstances conscientious mothers ask too little
of their children, and unconscientious mothers ask
too much. Conscientious mothers restrain their