Meaning of Spock-marked | Babel Free

Definitions

Spoiled by an overly permissive upbringing.

derogatory

Examples

“1970, Raymond Apthorpe, University of Sussex. Institute of Development Studies, People Planning and Development Studies: Some Reflections on Social Planning Governments might, like⟳ those of America and Canada, produce⟳ cheap brochures explaining to parents how to bring⟳ up honest, unanxious, kindly, non-bed-wetting, co-operative children. And that in rich countries with high literacy levels such advice has its effect can hardly be doubted by anyone who has had recent contact⟳ in universities with the first Spock-marked generation of middle-class children trained in habits of autonomy from an early age. ('No, darling, it's up to you. At two and a half you are old enough to choose⟳ yourself whether to wear⟳ trousers or a skirt.')”

“Yet the fact remains that half-baked and half-digested ideas about the absolute necessity of leaving a child 'free' and 'happy' have⟳ produced what has come⟳ to be known as the 'Spock-marked child', […]”

“[…] flood⟳ of child-rearing guides that had by now inundated Spock-marked middle-class parents […]”

CEFR level