Basic Trope: A character whose parents were abusive, incompetent, or otherwise dysfunctional does their best to do a better job with their own kids.
- Straight: Bob grew up in a genuinely Dysfunctional Family. His dad drank like a fish (and was either out drinking, or sleeping off a hangover), and his mom was always in some kind of dramatic crisis (often one that she created, or at least majorly contributed to). When Bob marries Alice, and finds out she's pregnant, Bob swears to do better by his kid than his parents did by him.
- Exaggerated: Bob's Abusive Parents were Complete Monsters. They both beat and raped Bob (and his siblings) almost daily, they used his name to sign up for loans and credit cards they never paid back (thus trashing his credit before he even reached his 18th birthday), they left him alone for days at a time while they went off on romantic getaways, etc. Not only has Bob cut off contact with them, he promises himself that he will never be that horrible.
- Downplayed:
- Bob was raised in a very strict environment, and it gave him anxiety and a perfectionist streak. He promises not to raise his kids that way, and to celebrate the good instead of focusing on their mistakes or grades.
- Bob's parents were terrible. Bob himself clearly carries scars, and sometimes does things he regrets because of it when raising his own children, but is fundamentally capable and well-meaning.
- Bob doesn't have kids of his own and may or may not be considering having any, but still tries to be a Friend to All Children in spite of having Abusive Parents.
- Justified: Bob is a caring person, who doesn't want to inflict that pain on anyone else, least of all his own offspring.
- Inverted: Bob grew up in a loving, happy, almost perfect family. When he has kids of his own, however, he is neglectful and abusive.
- Subverted:
- It's not the issue of how to raise the kids, but rather whether or not to stay with Alice.
- Bob decides that he doesn't want kids, and schedules a vasectomy right away.
- Double Subverted:
- Bob decides it's better to divorce Alice instead of "staying together for the kids," because he remembered when his own parents did exactly that and how negatively it affected Bob and his siblings.
- The reason Bob doesn't want kids and decided to go for "the big snip" instead, is because his parents were terrible at being parents; he doesn't want to take even the chance that he'll make the same mistakes. (One of which, he feels, was having kids in the first place because they felt that they "had to," or were "supposed to," not because they actually wanted kids.)
- Parodied: Bob's mother won't let him leave the table because he won't eat his (overcooked, mushy) peas. When he grows up, he swears he'll never let peas into the house.
- Zig Zagged: ???
- Averted:
- Bob does not have children.
- Bob came from a very loving and functional family.
- Bob's parents were abusive and he's no better.
- Deconstructed:
- Bob's parents were the root cause of a number of psychological hangups that followed him into adulthood, so when he becomes a parent, he tries raising them differently in order to avoid inflicting those complexes onto them. Unfortunately, this results in children raised by a father who neglected their emotional wellbeing and denying them a more structured childhood out of a misguided attempt at giving them independence, resulting an a completely different set of hangups fueling familial dysfunction.
- Bob's parents were all a bunch of control freaks and he swears that he won't be like that to his children. While he tries to raise his kids with a hands-off approach, this is based less on his family's wellbeing and more out of spite against his parents, thus making him less willing to shift gears when his style of parenting causes problems for his kids down the road.
- Reconstruction: Bob is still a well meaning parent who learns from his mistakes and does better when raising his kids, something his parent never did.
- Enforced: Bob was previously established to have abusive parents, and the audience would worry that The Chain of Harm would ensue unless the work specifically showed him as avoiding this.
- Lampshaded: "It's the age-old worry, Bob — will I become my father?"
- Invoked: After a lifetime of living with parents who had addictions, dysfunctions, and were always fighting, Bob grows up, leaves their house, and eventually marries Alice. One day, Alice tells him she's pregnant. Bob flashes back to his crappy childhood, and promises himself that he'll never raise the child the same way he was raised.
- Exploited: Someone sets up parenting classes at the local adult education center.
- Defied:
- "I didn't get to have a good childhood! Why should my own kids?"
- Bob deliberately avoids having children, unwilling to take the risk that he might be a bad parent.
- Discussed: ???
- Conversed: ???
- Implied: Bob is a good father, and he seems uncomfortable regarding the subject of his parents, of whom little is known.
Back to Breaking the Cycle of Bad Parenting
