Mother's Day should be a private affair

Mother's Day should be a private affair

Mother's Day celebrations may have come and gone, but the issue of whether or not schools should abandon a ceremony intended to honour the students' mothers will come around again next year.

Calls for the ceremony -- which is observed by many public schools -- to be scrapped are getting louder, as it could provoke trauma, if not unease, among children living with a single parent, whose mothers are deceased, and/or do not conform to the traditional definition of what a "mother" should be.

The trend is understandable given how Thai families have changed over time. The Education Ministry, however, has refused to budge, saying that the ceremony is only held once a year and that it reflects "good Thai values".

A conjugal nuclear family consisting of two parents and children is seen as the ideal for the ministry and many others. It was also how most Thai families are primarily structured for almost three decades between 1987-2013, according to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA).

Well, not anymore. Thailand's bureucracy is still using the nuclear family unit as the basis for its plans and policies, but this assumption no longer matches the reality.

In 2015, nuclear families account for 26% of all Thai households -- down from 52% -- while 33% of families consist of three generations living under one roof. The number of couples with no children increased threefold to 16% from 5%, while the number of single-occupant households rose from 6% to 13%.

The same statistics show that the number of single parents also rose from 970,000 to 1.34 million -- 80% of whom are single mothers.

The fact of the matter is, Thailand, especially the Ministry of Education in this case, is holding on to the outdated ideal of a "perfect family". This is why the public worship of mothers -- and by extension, fathers -- is increasingly becoming irrelevant to a growing number of people who no longer fit in the outdated mould.

Students who do not have mothers and/or fathers have expressed sorrow after having to sit and prostrate through such an event. As such, many single mothers said that they have had to let their children skip school on Mother's Day.

The pictures of children offering garlands to empty chairs, or cowering in the corner as their friends embrace their mothers should be enough of a sign for us to rethink the concept of families.

Non-traditional families, such as LGBTQ families, may not be the predominant form in Thai societies, but they do exist. And they definitely do not fit into the society's monolithic definition of a family.

Besides, the public display of devotion to mothers is ultimately a superficial expression of a complex relationship. For some, the mother-child relationship may not be rosy and picture-perfect. It is not just about a sense of duty or gratitude. It can be a difficult relationship, compounded by a mix of emotions that are not easily defined by garlands and/or ceremonial worship.

And when schools endorse this simplistic version of a mother-child relationship, they may end up setting unrealistic expectations among both children and parents of what a parent-child relationship should be.

The Mother's Day controversy also brings into question a wider, more philosophical argument about how far should one take private worship into the public sphere. The issue is reminiscent of debates about the separation of church and state in the West.

As societies become more diverse, wouldn't it be easier to maintain peace and harmony if people worshipped in private? An act of "worship" -- whether it concerns religions, public institutions or parents -- entails strong feelings which may not be shared by others.

There certainly is no clear line regarding what a society should consider sacred and worth worshiping, or how far should it go to protect such value systems and practices. Evidently, the more "sacred" they are, the more stringent their protection will be. In the end, the need to conserve both the practice and individual rights will come head-to-head.

It is intriguing to see that the observance of Mother's Day in schools only began some 10 years ago. The same is true for the idolisation of the military and the monarchy.

In recent years, it has become somewhat customary to outwardly display reverence to the two institutions, which have become increasingly politicised. A debate on whether it is a crime to refuse to stand up during the royal anthem in theatres, for example, is currently ongoing.

As society develops, an otherwise innocuous issue such as a Mothers Day ceremony can turn into a controversy. When it comes to major institutions, things are more complex.

So where is the line between public adoration and individual rights? The question reverberates far beyond Mother's Day.


Atiya Achakulwisut is a Bangkok Post columnist.

Atiya Achakulwisut

Columnist for the Bangkok Post

Atiya Achakulwisut is a columnist for the Bangkok Post.

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