The United States of America has seen a major change in parenting:  from parents as the authority figures allowing children to have controlled space to grow, to parents who micromanage children, choreograph their days, and prevent their kids from experiencing any mistakes.  These children are Generation Z. While some might praise this new ideology as progressive, healthy, and effective, recent studies have shown that the United States could be damaging its future. Issues such as obesity, vitamin D deficiency, accepted mediocracy, lethargy, lack of discipline, and a lack of problem-solving skills could possibly be a threat to national security in the future.  

Parents nowadays have objections to disciplining their children.  The new generation has changed drastically for the worst with parents not wanting to be a disciplinarian but rather a friend. Everyone has heard the term “helicopter parent,” “snowplow parent,” “bulldozer parent,” etc.  We as a society have dismissed these terms as mocking or condescending, used to describe parents who “care” excessively - to the detriment of their children’s development. What we haven’t figured out yet is that these labels have behind them a grain of truth.  New generation parents feel like they’re helping their children by clearing all obstacles in their paths -- or “snowplow parent.” These well-intentioned parents are inadvertently hurting their children by not letting them solve their own problems. If children can’t learn to do things by themselves, then how will they ever learn?  “It’s hard to deny that parents are more involved in their children’s lives and education than ever before. Parents micromanage their offspring in almost every way,” says Graham C.L. Davey Ph.D.

The United States of America was made great by hard-working pioneers.  When they found obstacles, determined pioneers found ways to get over them.  So, what's so different about this Generation Z? Their parents have made them equals to them at home and have let them have a say in things, such as their nutrition, bedtimes, pastimes, and habits.  Until the 1970s, what the parent said was the final say in the matter. The parents had the power in the household because they paid bills, washed clothes, provided meals, and quite literally provided you with life.  Now parents still do all these things, but they make sure their children are ok with these first. “The point is that kids in the pre-micromanagement and pre-coddling days enjoyed a freedom that kids today, by and large, don’t even know they’re missing. For one thing, we were free to fail, which is the greatest of all freedoms,” said John Rosemond an American columnist, a public speaker and an author on parenting.

These new parenting styles have been linked with a whole set of problems in the United States, such as the U.S. Army not meeting its recruiting goals in 2017, a lack of Vitamin D as a new health epidemic because the “video game” kids are not going outside anymore, and the acceptance of mediocrity in schools - with nobody allowed to fail. Studies have shown that up to 75% of 17-24 year olds are ineligible for service in the armed forces because of having a criminal record, being overweight, or simply being academically unprepared.  ”Roughly two-thirds of adults, and nearly 30% of children are overweight or obese,” says Christopher J.L. Murray, Professor and Chair of the Department of Health Metrics Sciences. This situation is now considered a national security risk that could affect the United States in the near future, the Army missed their recruiting goal in 2018 of 80,000 new recruits for the first time in 25 years. The United States education rates are going down due to mediocracy being accepted, again, since parents are doing things for their children so they can't do them by themselves. Places like Japan have excellent education levels because of the independence that is installed in the children at an early age, they learn to become hard workers instead of their parents doing things for them which is the thing that is usually seen in the United States. The United States of America could be faced with some new major problems if cycles are not changed.