Parents In the Mainstream Media
With so many adolescent protagonists at the forefront of entertainment, we frequently experience stories told from the eyes of a teenager. What happens, however, when said stories follow a certain pattern that can teach problematic lessons and be damaging to our society as a whole?
In the mainstream media, the roles of parents as the hero’s guide are nearly nonexistent. The most common example of this is The Orphaned Hero trope, where the protagonist is parentless. The parents’ death is usually used as a plot device for the hero’s motivation. Unless the hero is old enough to be alone, he or she is raised by another adult figure who sometimes isn’t even from the family, like Alfred and Bruce Wayne in Batman.
Another example are stories where the parents are alive, but they are too busy or don’t care enough to know what their kids are doing. In these situations, the parents’ disinterest is the reason for the character’s sadness, sorrow, and rebellion. It also allows the character to do as they please, leaving the parents to only appear to scold the protagonist, or when they need a few words of wisdom.
One of the most common and problematic example is one in which the parents are nothing but minor obstacles the protagonists have to face: the overprotective dad who gets in the way of his daughter’s love life, the naive mom who wants to stop her son from fighting dangerous monsters, the goofy parents who are risking their kid’s rise to popularity, etc. These overused tropes are shown time and time again in the mainstream media, making parents out to be fools who know nothing of what their teenager is going through.
We are also shown kids resort to talking back and disrespecting their parents when they can’t reach an understanding. In the Hunger Games, we know that in the dystopian, poverty-stricken District Twelve, knowledge of mental illness is limited. Katniss is aware of her mother’s depression, yet we see her snap at her mother and blame her for their hunger, even after Mrs. Everdeen makes an effort to take care of her daughters better.
What we watch heavily influences us, and there is much to be said about watching the main character, whom we’re supposed to look up to, act condescendingly toward their parents so they can seem smarter or for cheap laughs and giggles, as in the case of almost every sitcom (I’m looking at you, Disney Channel).
Just as we’re breaking the tiring tropes surrounding female characters, we should also replace the tropes surrounding parents, and parenting in general. Parents can be cool, too, and to portray something as important as family in a positive light would be a breath of fresh air amongst all the stories tailored to make it seem as if a bunch of teenagers can do it all alone.
