An Ode to Helicopter Parents and the Denizens Over Whom They Hover

                Those of us in the field of higher education (and those of us who have heard anything about the so-called “Millennial Generation”) have inevitably learned of the “helicopter parents.” These are the parents who insist on hovering over their son’s or daughter’s affairs like flies over dog poop, just to make sure the latter doesn’t screw anything up. These parents can be lauded for their care and commitment to their children, choosing to play an active role in their education, rather than showing resigned indifference. However, they can also be criticized for enabling passivity and ineptitude in their beloved offspring, who are, by the way, technically adults. While I have certainly encountered my fair share of helicopter parents since I started working in higher education a few years ago, I have never been more familiar with them than I am now, working in undergraduate admissions at a traditional university. In some ways, it’s actually refreshing to work with parents because they ask good questions, show interest in what I have to say, and generally seem to have their you-know-what together (which is more than I can say for many of the students I work with). However, in deducing that a solid 50% of my daily interactions are with parents, I increasingly view the helicopter trend as an ethical dilemma.

                Now to be clear, I completely understand why many parents are strongly invested in their children’s college education. They are most likely shelling out a significant amount of resources to support this education, and they therefore want their children to receive the best one possible, with the best possible chances of success. Not to mention, they love their kids! In no way do I propose that parents become more disengaged in this process. What I do propose is that their sons and daughters become MORE engaged in this process—and that as parents, they allow space for them to do so. Example: I regularly receive phone calls, emails, and in-person inquiries from parents saying something along the lines of, “My son wants to apply to SU, it’s one of his top choices, so how do we get started with the application process?” Notice the key word here: “we”. What I want to say in response to questions like this is, “Well, if SU is really one of your son’s top choices, then why don’t you have him pick up the phone, sit down at a computer, or open up his mouth and ask me himself? And by the way, it’s HIS process, not a collective YOURS.” It’s easy to either blame the students for not taking enough initiative in their own college search process or the parents for taking over it as if it’s their own. However, the blame is ultimately shared. I firmly believe that the immaturity stereotypically characterizing the Millennial Generation is actually a product of years of disempowerment by their overbearing parents, rather than an intentional decision to forfeit responsibility. And yet, if we expect these kids to act like adults, shouldn’t we hold them accountable like adults? At what age do we say, “You’re old enough to take responsibility for your irresponsibility”? I do my best to direct communication to the student him- or herself when possible, rather than always answering to the parent. But sometimes the only contact I have is with the parent, and in the interest of appeasing them and respecting their role as influential figures in their children’s college decision, my only choice is to treat them as my primary clients.

                The bigger concern in all of this is what effect helicopter parents have on their children’s development and success once they actually make the leap to college and beyond. If Bobby doesn’t have the wherewithal or drive to ask me himself about the college application process that he, himself, will be completing (we hope), then how will he fare when he’s living on campus and needs to investigate other college processes and procedures? Furthermore, when he flounders at taking care of his own business, who will bear the brunt of the consequences? Will it be Bobby, or will he defer accountability to his ever-present helicopter parent who has always taken responsibility for him in the past? The helicopter parent trend is fundamentally damaging to everyone involved. The students don’t learn the essential skills they need to navigate their adult lives, nor do they get to feel the pride of accomplishing something independently. Simultaneously, parents may feel a sense of control and security in keeping watch on their children’s affairs, but ultimately they will expect more of their son or daughter and will be disappointed at his or her lack of self-discipline. I love (facetiously) how many parents balk at the idea of their college graduate coming back home to live in the basement while working a low-paying part-time job, never once considering that perhaps they paved the way for this outcome long ago. Granted, the current economy doesn’t help matters, but if parents want their kids to grow up and be accomplished adults, they have to treat them like grown-up, accomplished adults.

                In what ways can we, as a society, foster more responsibility among younger generations and less control among parents? In what ways can we, as higher education professionals, ensure that students take charge of their own education and parents remain the supporters that they should be? And also, how much of this helicopter parent issue is actually an issue of privilege? I wager that this is a phenomenon far more common among middle- to upper-class families with various sources of sociological privilege and that families with fewer socio-economic resources and privilege do not have the luxury of cushioning their children in this way. At first, I believed that the increase in my interactions with helicopter parents in my current position was a result of working with a younger student population. This may be largely true, but I also believe it is significantly tied to the relative privilege of the population I work with now, as compared to my previous position. When I was working at a community college, I still served plenty of young, traditional-aged students—some of whom were still in high school, completing Running Start or other college credits. However, they generally represented more low-income, racially/ethnically diverse, and first-generation college students than their private school counterparts. I recall far fewer instances of a young student bringing his or her parent to an appointment or having his or her parent be the omnipresent mouthpiece. Perhaps this was because his or her parent was busy working a demanding, full-time job or didn’t know where to start in gathering information about college.

                Regardless of the level of emotional, financial, and intellectual investment parents have in their children’s education (or life in general, for that matter), they must realize that they are not doing any favors by absorbing their children’s educational (and life) duties. The high school and undergraduate years are absolutely an appropriate time to help their children learn how to take initiative, ask questions, get organized, and work hard to accomplish a goal. If not during these years, then when? I would argue any starting point beyond this time is too late. So, by all means, parents should make the effort to check in with their son or daughter about the college search process and important educational matters. They should feel free to accompany their son or daughter to important college-related events. They should also feel entitled to have a say in the financial side of their son or daughter’s college education. But having an investment does not warrant taking complete control. Release the reins. Let your kid be an adult. And students, accept the responsibility!

A Personal Take on Life of Pi

            Life of Pi boldly begins with the lead character’s statement that “this story will make you believe in God.” A tall order, and as an agnostic/atheist (I waver), I was skeptical but intrigued. In fact, when I decided to read the book, after watching the recent Academy Award-winning movie, I somehow had no idea it was a spiritual novel. Not that I took the ending in the movie totally literally, but still, I figured it was more about the mystery of the human psyche and the will to live more than anything else. Needless to say, when my book arrived from the seller on Amazon with a note saying, “Enjoy the book. God bless you!” I started to figure it out.

            However, despite not being theistic, I am not opposed to reading, writing, and discussing matters of philosophy, spirituality, and faith—in fact, I probably enjoy it more than most theists do. Therefore, I still gleaned quite a lot from this book, some of which I find troubling and some of which I find insightful. Here are some of the points I’m pondering…

            Throughout Life of Pi, the author and/or title character express a blatant distaste for agnostics. He describes them as being “muddled…in the thrall of reason, that fool’s gold for the bright” (p. 5). Meanwhile, he touts a flattering affection for both religious folks and atheists because, as the reader gathers, they know how to make a decision about their faith. The religious put faith in God and dogma, while atheists put faith in science and reason. Apparently, agnostics also put faith in science and reason (a fact that Pi endlessly chides them for), but not so much that they are willing to make a claim on the existence of God. As Pi tells it:

It is not atheists who get stuck in my craw, but agnostics. Doubt is useful for a while. We must all pass through the garden of Gethsemane. If Christ played with doubt, so must we. If Christ spent an anguished night in prayer, if He burst out from the Cross, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” then surely we are also permitted doubt. But we must move on. To choose doubt as a philosophy of life is akin to choosing immobility as a means of transportation. (p. 28)

This was my first beef with the book because I have a different take on what Pi dubs “doubt.” For me, agnostics are not so much doubtful as a way of life as they are wise enough to believe that they do not know everything. Whereas theists and atheists ultimately stake a claim in what they presume to “know” about our existence in the world and the meaning behind it all, agnostics acknowledge this cannot be known. Sure, that may lead to some doubt at times, and it may not ultimately be comforting in times of struggle, but I fail to see how the author/Pi harbors more resentment for agnostics than he does for atheists, who in my experience abide by the same logic.

            Nevertheless, I agree with the message of the book that says reason and intellect are not enough to get through life. One must eventually develop some sort of faith, whether it is theistic or not (although the book seems to argue it must be the former). I have been through enough trial and tribulation to realize that attributing everything to reason and science is often small consolation, and I have encountered enough mysteries in this world to understand that even reason and science can’t explain everything (or, even if they do offer an explanation, it doesn’t quite capture the strangeness and wonder of the phenomenon). I’m sure that if I found myself in the very precarious and dire situation that Pi endures, I would cling to an even stronger faith than I have now (that is, if I could even survive such a situation!). In fact, Pi doesn’t shoot down reason altogether in his struggle. Reason keeps him living much longer than he would without it. However, the end of the book reveals that he may have been relying much more on faith and, perhaps, fantasy to get him through than anything else.

            And yet, throughout the book I kept questioning, “Where’s the part that will make me believe in God?” Until the very end, and especially at the end, it seemed the author was operating on the assumption that people can simply choose to believe in God. After telling both stories about what happened to him on his journey across the Pacific—the original story and the more “logical” story—Pi says, “In both stories the ship sinks, my entire family dies, and I suffer…So tell me, since it makes no factual difference to you and you can’t prove the question either way, which story do you prefer? Which is the better story, the story with animals or the story without animals?” The Japanese engineer replies, “The story with animals is the better story.” To which Pi states, “Thank you. And so it goes with God” (p. 317). Contrarily, as much as I may want to believe in God for the comfort and peace it may bring, I don’t feel it is a choice I can make. The idea that some supernatural sentient being governs the universe is so divergent from my reason that choosing to believe in it feels like I’d be lying to myself. After finishing the book, and still now as I write, I am frustrated by the ending. For the author to plant the possibility that Pi was imagining the entire story with the animals, as a deluded alternative to the more sinister story in which everyone cannibalizes and kills each other, seems to mar the credibility of his message. Well, sure, it would be nice if I could just play make-believe every time I’m experiencing pain and suffering, but that doesn’t change reality. It’s just living in a dreamworld.

And yet, this ending makes Life of Pi the feat of literary wisdom that it is and serves as an important allegory. In addition, I found that it wasn’t really the ending that altered my perspective, but rather one passage about half-way through the book. Written from the point-of-view of the author himself, it says, “What of God’s silence? I think it over. I add: An intellect confounded yet a trusting sense of presence and of ultimate purpose” (p. 63). This passage could probably be interpreted in several ways, and perhaps I am interpreting it incorrectly, but this is how I understood it: God doesn’t have to be some supernatural sentient being governing the universe, God can be one’s view of ultimate purpose. The author describes “the founding principle of existence” as love (p. 63). I realized that, indeed, the so-called faith I have in life is in the interconnectedness between all things and our capacity to show love and kindness to one another. Sure, there are plenty of examples that defy this faith: war, poverty, discrimination, the destruction of our natural resources, etc. etc. etc. And yet, if we didn’t believe that we could overcome these atrocities with love, then what’s the point in living?

As it turns out, Life of Pi really is about the mystery of the human psyche and the will to live, but it goes deeper than that. I can’t say this book made me believe in God in the traditional sense of the word, but it did strengthen my existing faith. And, shoot, that’s not half-bad.

Is Generous Tipping Passe?

By most Seattleites' standards, I am a cheap tipper. I grew up learning that 15% was a perfectly reasonable tip, and that's what I stick to today, even with great service (sometimes a little bit more, maybe). However, I usually don't tip below 15% unless the service is really poor, so in my mind it evens out. But there's more to it than that...

It seems that the older I get, the more expensive it is to go out. Yeah, yeah, I know, inflation, but even that being considered, it is quite expensive to hit the town, especially in urban areas where sales tax is usually high. I always get a sinking feeling in my gut when I see the bill and an even sinkier feeling when I calculate what the prescribed 20% tip would be. Nevermind principles, it's simply not affordable for a poor graduate student like myself to tip 20% on an already expensive meal. (And side note: Even though the tip is supposed to be calculated based on the pre-tax cost, most restaurants only print the post-tax total, prompting us to tip on that instead.) It's starting to feel like we're being punished for enjoying a night out.

Now, I've had many conversations about this with friends who work in the restaurant industry, and I realize that servers usually must split their tips between all the other restaurant staff. I also realize that sometimes food service workers don't even get paid minimum wage without factoring in tips. My response to this dilemma is: That sucks, but why treat the symptom instead of the cause? As consumers, we are merely feeding into the inequitable pay configuration in the industry by absorbing the financial burden, instead of questioning why things are the way they are.

I know that servers and other food service staff work really hard, and I appreciate that. I know that hair stylists, massage therapists, and [insert occupation that gets tipped] work hard for their money, and I appreciate that too. But look, so do I, and I don't get no stinkin' tips! Granted, I get paid more than minimum wage these days, but even when I worked in retail and got paid minimum wage for years, I never got tipped for slaving my you-know-what off every shift.

My point here is that tipping has become expected only in certain industries, as if employees in those positions work harder than others. Furthermore, because tipping has become so expected--20% to be exact--it has lost its original intent, which is to reward those who go the extra mile to provide great customer service. Would you tip a cashier, a life guard, or a receptionist for doing a job well done? If not, why not? I assume because it's not expected and might even be considered tacky. And yet, how would you feel about not tipping your bartender the next time you order drinks? Like a total cheap skate, right? There's something wrong with that picture.

If certain occupations are truly deserving of better pay, than they should receive better pay, regardless of tips. Tipping should return to its inherent purpose, and no one should feel obligated to break the bank to reward people for simply doing their jobs. Eventually, employers will need to suck it up and pay their personnel fairly, instead of relying on misguided charity from customers. But the paradox is, they won't do so until we, as consumers, influence the system with our dollars and advocacy for change.

In fact, my boyfriend tells me that in Korea, tipping is not expected or even customary because workers in the food service industry are fairly compensated for their labor, making tips unnecessary. Now, this may mean that the food and drink they serve is more expensive than it is here. But perhaps not, and either way, I contend that the tipping system in the U.S. is broken.

So am I turning tipping into a political issue? You bet your bippy I am! As my feminist sisters and brothers would say, the personal is political, and this is one personal beef I need to get off my chest. I'm not trying to rail against people in the service industry who unfortunately depend on tips to make a living wage. And, I know it's much easier said than done to just stop or reduce tipping for these folks. Perhaps your mission may just be to challenge those who think tipping below 20% is skimpy. But if anything I've said in this here blog resonates with you, then you should consider what you could do to alter our current tipping system. At this point, it's pretty passe...