Thing is that it didn’t work for them either. They have survivors bias. It’s not that it worked, it’s that they survived so “it couldn’t have been THAT bad” and they do it to their child too. But childhood isn’t something you’re meant to “survive”. That’s not how they grow up well. I’m childfree but I’ve raised 5 kids and I’m very early 20s. I raised 4 male cousins and my baby sister who’s now almost 5 years old. I rejected everything our parents have taught us and I gave them freedom with boundaries and they are thriving. Two got into good STEM universities and are working, two are doing great in high school and my sister is doing great in class and has many friends in school. THAT is what parenting should be. Not pushing someone until they fall down and expecting them to get up and continue, but to open all the doors for them and let them choose which one to walk through. And this method works soooo much better than making them survive. It’s to the point the boys sometimes accidentally call me mum and my sister used to call me mum too. Kids know who they are safe with. Parents don’t realise that surviving isn’t enough and kids will run away to anyone who seems “safer” than them. Gen Z already knows this and so do millennials. It’s actually why so many of us are childfree. We don’t think it’s right to bring children into a world they have to “survive” when we are barely still alive ourselves. We refuse to let them be the next victims. The ones who are having kids are people who are in a space where they can and their kids are being looked after well. We are doing our best for the future kids op. You don’t need to worry about that. And a lot of us are considering adoption too. The kids will be okay.
maybe, parents from younger generations (1980s and later, i mean) might raise their kids better but i have no hope when i see some of the kids and their parents my cousin has to teach... lockdowns really ruined a lot of progress
besides, it's hard to break the cycle if you grew up in that cycle and your parents and relatives (and other parents in your circle) are still on your back with their bs... you don't even realize that you're becoming like them and might even start questioning if it's better to raise your kids like your parents did for you when you see the kids misbehave
i just hope that parents will be more empathetic and proactive, bc how they were raised might have worked out for them but times have changed; they and their kids will be experiencing different challenges and no one knows if their parents' method would work better in this era