Three kinds of conflicts among parents blocked by college students’ circle of friends

【dialogue】

In the Internet age, the distance between people is shorter. College students can keep in touch with their parents at any time even though they are thousands of miles away from home.

What kind of food did the kid in college eat at noon, what clothes he wears today, what he cares about and what to discuss now... In theory, as long as the kid wants, you can see it through the network link.

But can you see it?

Can't.

It’s no secret that young people’s WeChat Moments block their parents.

According to Tencent News’s Annual White Paper on Family Affection in Moments in 2018, 52% of children have blocked their parents from viewing their Moments or have not added their parents’ friends.

"When I started blocking, my parents asked me if they couldn't see the circle of friends, and then I grouped them in friends." said Xiao Ai, a college student interviewed by the reporter.

The parents of the Internet aborigines born after 1995 are not Internet novices either. Blocking them is too rude and grouped so that they can see their children’s circle of friends, but only see what the children are willing to show them.

Xiao Ai's approach represents many college students, but for parents, the essence has not changed: limited shielding is also shielding.

Why do parents want to see their children’s circle of friends?

Why can't parents join their children's WeChat Moments?

This reporter interviewed Yang Xiong, former director of the Institute of Sociology of the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, vice chairman of the Family Education Committee of the Chinese Education Society, and a second-level researcher on this topic.

Different understanding of the sense of boundary

——The conflict between pre-figurative culture and post-figurative culture

Phenomenon: A

certain boy talked about a girlfriend, and forgot to block his parents on the Moments Show. He was immediately asked by his parents to bring him back for a look.

The boy sighed: It's really not that far!

  I accidentally hurt my hand, bleeds, and sends a circle of friends.

Friend: Do you have no money for meat?

Haha.

Mom: Is it serious?

Do you want to go to the hospital for a bandage? You are not careful, saying how many times have you been, you have to concentrate on doing things, when will you grow up, last time... (1000 words omitted here) "Sometimes I am afraid they are worried. Sometimes I'm afraid of them nagging, so I usually report the good and not the worry." Xiao Ai said.

Reporter: Is it related to the sense of boundary for college students to block their parents?

Young people need a sense of boundary to build their own world, and many parents don’t realize this?

Yang Xiong:

WeChat began to be used on a large scale around 2015. New technologies have brought changes in people's work patterns and social styles. This phenomenon did not exist when there were only communication methods such as phone calls and emails.

The function of WeChat gives us divisions in our daily lives.

Dividing circles, groupings, classifications, various groups, various circles such as industry circle, fun circle, fan circle, etc. appeared, and the circle culture appeared.

  The post-90s and post-00s have grown up with mobile communication technology and have been very proficient in using new technologies since childhood.

Many parents use WeChat to be taught by their children, and they are blocked after the children's church. This phenomenon is very interesting.

  Why block parents?

This does not mean that they have a bad relationship with their parents. It is mainly a manifestation of the enhancement of young people's self-consciousness and self-consciousness.

The graduate student I took also blocked me in the circle of friends. He was afraid that I would interfere in his personal life and wanted to maintain his personal privacy.

Many young people block their parents for fear of nagging and worrying. This is actually because they are afraid of interfering in his life and causing unnecessary trouble.

  On the contrary, Chinese tradition is the culture of elders, family culture, and collective life culture. The relationship between Chinese parents and children is a kind of "close" relationship.

From the perspective of the inner cultural and psychological structure of parents, they like to be together, and they like to know you as if they know themselves. In the past, there were discussions about parents peeking at their children's diaries.

This is different from Western culture.

The concept of parents belongs to the pre-figurative culture, while the young people represent the post-figurative culture. The two cultures form a cultural conflict, which is a neutral conflict.

Parents wanting to know more is a kind of love, and young people do not want their parents to worry about it, but it is also a kind of love.

  Now the living conditions are better, the children have their own independent room, and the parents have to say hello when they enter the room.

Today's young people accept the Internet and global culture, and their boundary awareness is much stronger than that of their parents. For example, public and private, working hours and off-get off work hours. Some young people I meet do not answer the phone calls from their work units after work. , Because this is his private time.

  Our society has transformed from a highly integrated planned economy society to a highly individualized market economy society. The deep social transformation has brought about the differentiation of young people's consciousness.

This is a manifestation of social progress. In a post-industrial society and a society with high-quality development, people's distinction between personal boundaries, public and private will be more obvious.

The personal distinction between post-90s and post-00s is obvious. We conducted a survey and found that young people are very tolerant of things that do not affect others, and they are very tolerant of living together before marriage. He feels that it does not affect others, but In public places, there are too many people to line up, and things like walking dogs and not to lead are much stricter. He feels that you are affecting others.

When we were young, we had to report when we got married. We clearly wrote down the name of the subject and where we worked. When I made the report, the leader of my unit asked you whether the subject was a party member.

Now as a leader, the employees of the unit do not know about marriage and divorce. This change is a kind of progress in society.

Behind the care of parents

-Conflict of mismatch between independence and privacy requirements

Phenomenon:

College student Xiao Li: Actually, I have a very good relationship with my parents, and I will tell them a lot, but I still blocked them in my second year of high school.

Because I found that they were carefully looking at each of my WeChat and deliberating what I meant.

They are eager to learn more about me from these few words, and I don’t know why they are a little scared...

  Many parents of college students have experienced such a situation before the college entrance examination. They want to know the status of their children, but they dare not ask at all.

  In anonymous online communities, you can often see complaints like this: When you go shopping, parents have to ask who they are with, and even need to take a video to show them.

The call came back later on WeChat, and occasionally I couldn’t get through, and my roommates, counselors, and fellow villagers would be called all the time...

Reporter: Many netizens believe that in discussions on this topic, many parents are accustomed to revolving around their children since childhood and do not have a life of their own. Now they pay close attention to their children's every move through the Internet. Parents feel that they are caring, while children feel that they are controlling.

How to understand this situation?

Yang Xiong:

We used to be a family with many children. There were five or six children in a family. Our parents were busy with work and couldn't take care of them. We grew up barbarously in a state of freedom. Everyone is relatively independent, and there is no big family life. How much privacy awareness.

After the declining birth rate, the child grew up like a star in the moon. Relatively speaking, his independence was not enough. He still needs to ask his parents for many things, but his personal privacy requirements are much higher. His privacy requirements exceed his independent ability. Don't rest assured, this forms a conflict.

  On the other hand, as children grow older and busier, parents become more and more idle. Parents have a lot of time to spend on their children. Coupled with the social information technology conditions, even if the children are abroad, they can’t wait to video at any time. Then there is not so much time devoted to the parents, and another conflict is formed.

Good sign or little sadness

——The conflict between excessive parent-child education and lack of child-vocational education

Phenomenon:

The surprising thing is that many parents know that their reaction after being blocked is self-reflection and self-blame, reflecting on what they have not done well, and feeling that they should change the way of communication.

One netizen lamented: Parents are more tolerant than we thought.

However, this netizen does not support opening up a circle of friends to his parents. He thinks that blocking parents is a manifestation of independence, and parents should be happy for this.

Reporter: There is now a popular term called "Mabao", which refers to those who can't live without mother's care when they reach adulthood, and they report to their mother in every detail, which is a derogatory term.

Independence is very important to young people.

So how should we treat the phenomenon that parents can't see their children's circle of friends?

Should children be happy to be independent, or to communicate better to "get in"?

Yang Xiong:

This is a common phenomenon and a neutral phenomenon.

  Parents don’t need to be too concerned about the phenomenon of being blocked in the circle of friends. There is a stage of focus in a family relationship. Children are in a state when they are young, they are in a state when they are in college, and they are in a state after they get married. Maybe it’s not good to be blocked for a while. Shielded, this problem does not exist.

  From the perspective of family relationship management, problems can be handled more strategically.

It is no problem for young people to block their parents, but blocking does not solve the concerns and concerns of their parents.

As an adult after college, how do you be a good child, how do you play your role as a "child" in the family?

It requires thinking.

  I propose a "triangular theory of family education". At present, family education in China is mainly composed of three pairs of relationships: mother-child relationship, father-son relationship, and parental relationship.

Family education under this theory includes parent-child education, husband and wife education, and child vocational education.

  In layman's terms, vocational education is the education of children's responsibilities in the family.

We provide various services to the children in the family, and in turn, we must also give the children some rules to complete his social tasks according to his age and self-reliance level. For example, when he is one or two years old, he must learn to eat by himself and go to school with school bags. You should sort it out by yourself, do the preparatory homework yourself, and say hello to your parents when you go home.

Many of our families have never made demands on these daily subtle habits. As a result, many children read well, but other behaviors and habits have not been developed.

  We often discuss how to be a parent today, all kinds of articles are flying all over the sky, and few people think about how to be a child today.

When the child is older and his parents need to be cared for, he does not have this training or awareness.

This creates a contradiction.

  I do not support opening up the circle of friends of young people to their parents. Young people have their own culture and lifestyle.

But I think for young people, real growth is to learn to care about their parents, meet their needs, communicate in time, and face and solve their parents' concerns and needs to be cared for.

(Our reporter Li Yulan)