Was Joyce a Good Mom?

NotASlayer said:
You may as well just say that every Sunnydale parent is a bad parent. After all, they are remaining in Sunnydale which has an appalling death rate for children, so much so that even the schoolkids comment on it, leaving them at a school where not only do pupils regularly die or go missing but where teachers are brutally murdered on a regular basis.
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To develop this further, I don't think you can judge Joyce, or any Sunnydale parent, by what they do in Sunnydale.

Consider. By the time of "The Pack", a mere halfway through S1, various students had gone missing, such as Jesse and Blayne. The cheerleader tryouts had been affected by some serious incidents. A teacher was found beheaded inside a school locker; another - Miss French - probably disappeared without a trace from the perspective of most. And that is just some of what happened. When the school showed it could not even stop its principal from being eaten on its premises, the place should have been deserted the next day.

Sure, we know that the Mayor was covering things up, but these included things that were not; Snyder commented in casual conversation about Flutie being eaten. The only possible explanation is that somehow adults, and children to a degree, were being affected so that they were not thinking rationally. They cannot be judged for poor parental behaviour when no-one in their right mind, with or without kids, would be staying in Sunnydale.

Going forth you had such joys as kids wandering around as monsters in "Halloween", Spike attacking the school in "School Hard", the disappearance of the swim team, the school sending drug-laced candy out, a dinner lady plotting to poison the entire school and so on. No-one would stay around for that and yet they do. It is beyond being a bad parent - keeping your child in Sunnydale and Sunnydale High is the worst bit of parenting ever; everything else pales into insignificance beside it - and into being manipulated in some way.
 
Seriously, parents in Gen X horror movies are always absentee, this was a period of high divorce rates and latchkey kids. Besides, IT is bad parenting.
 
AlphaFoxtrot said:
Seriously, parents in Gen X horror movies are always absentee, this was a period of high divorce rates and latchkey kids. Besides, IT is bad parenting.
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80s were the prime era of latchkey kids. The late 90s were an inbetween era with helicopter parenting starting to take off
 
True, in real life. But, this was a series from the mid-90s, written by 30 year olds, and casted with actors born in the 1970s. It skews towards the the early Gen X experience.

But I do know some Res life professionals from my RA days, I am going to have to sit down and pick their brains about how kids have changed from the late 90s to the present.
 
It just occurred to me on this rewatch that Joyce has her own ''fall' and 'redemption' arc. She starts off as a loyal, loving but slightly oblivious and out of touch mother to Buffy, falls (her romantic/sexual dalliances are arguably as ill-advised as her daughter's!) in season 2, reaches rock bottom in season 3 with her attempts to kill her child and others when easily manipulated in Gingerbread, before becoming such a loved, maternal figure after that: in typical Whedon fashion, she's probably just met the ideal partner when disaster strikes.

I think it's a reason why Gingerbread resonates with me - it shows the dangers of media & public hysteria around particularly emotive issues, but it also displays how matriarchal good intentions can be warped into something sinister.
 
Mott1 said:
It just occurred to me on this rewatch that Joyce has her own ''fall' and 'redemption' arc. She starts off as a loyal, loving but slightly oblivious and out of touch mother to Buffy, falls (her romantic/sexual dalliances are arguably as ill-advised as her daughter's!) in season 2, reaches rock bottom in season 3 with her attempts to kill her child and others when easily manipulated in Gingerbread, before becoming such a loved, maternal figure after that: in typical Whedon fashion, she's probably just met the ideal partner when disaster strikes.

I think it's a reason why Gingerbread resonates with me - it shows the dangers of media & public hysteria around particularly emotive issues, but it also displays how matriarchal good intentions can be warped into something sinister.
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I recently re-watched this episode too and had some feelings about Joyce. As I age, I think I understand her more, and her motivations. What she almost did to Buffy was awful, and I can't imagine how hard that must have been for her to come to terms with that. Raising Buffy alone was not easy, and having to uproot her whole life couldn't have been either. I don't think Joyce is a bad mom or a bad person. I think, like anyone, she was trying her best.
 
To be honest, I think in Buffy or any genre show you have to disregard temporary demonic/magical influences in deciding whether someone is a good person. So I wouldn't hold the events of Gingerbread against Joyce any more than I'd hold the events of Normal Again against Buffy. I think Joyce's somewhat judgmental attitude about Angel was kind of justified considering he went evil in Season 2: she was right to be concerned. I think Joyce could sometimes have made more time for Buffy, and the one thing I do kind of hold against her is how she pushed Buffy away at the end of Season 2 when she found out about her being the slayer. Asides from that, I'd say she's generally a good mom.
 
KaitKat said:
Was Joyce a good mom to Buffy? Did your opinion about her change as the series went on?
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I think she is a loving but imperfect parent. Early on she is written less sympathetically because they want her less involved. A lot of young people fictiin needs non involved or absent parents. Thankfully they move away from than later.

Frankly if my kid were getting into trouble and even expelled and i had to move towns, i might be a bit harsher until i understood she was a slayer. Washing blood out of your kid's clothing on a regular basis cannot engender pleasant thoughts. "Overreaction" would not be surprising.

Once Joyce is in the know, things improve a lot.
 
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@DeepBlueJoy One thing I considered is that Sunnydale may be one of those places where it's hard to move away from because the number of people willing to buy your house is small. Rather like a village that's falling into the sea. But I think that, given what parents could observe, that it is plausible they are being manipulated in some way, perhaps by the Hellmouth's influence, because what they can see is happening is bad enough that at least some parents would say screw the money and just leave. However, it's even commented on how Joyce seems to forgot things she's seen; that seems beyond natural and into the supernatural.
 
hoponlilmama
hoponlilmama
That's an interesting theory, makes sense.
@NotASlayer i think you are right.

It is clear in canon that there is a lot of abandoned business real estate. Businesses will leave when they fail, even if theybcannot sell. No point in staying open if no money is coming in. Homeowners many have fewer options. If they cannot sell, they cannot leave some will move in because real estate is cheap.

In a lot of fic, the fanon idea of sunnydale syndrome is popular. I think there is likely some truth in it - we saw people actively influenced by the hellmouth - why would there not also be major denial as a form of influence? Especially in the time of the mayor. He was creating a functional demon paradise. The only way to keep humans there is to keep them complacent.

In my fic, I have him do lots of spells on the town. (After all we know he did do some tribute spells... Band candy anyone? )

Of course, humans in the real world are capable of a lot of denial. Major badness happens in the world and people seem not to notice. Some even defend and excuse it. Especially when it happens to others - especially others 'not like them'.

I think in Sunnydale, it is partly human nature and partly supernatural. No matter what the excuse is for the rest of us!

No idea how to explain how millions went along with Hitler, slavery, genocide of their own fellow citizens -- and later say they did not know or did not understand it was so bad. Humans are great at denial. We are all capable of being blind. Some of us don't want to see, so we don't.

Many parents ignore the misbehaviour of children. Many parents ignore abuse of their children by others. Often children are told that they lie. Parents have complex reasons for rationalizations.

Many neighbors ignore abuse by the person next door. Even in families where massively horrid things occur, you will often have a child or spouse who literally lives in a different household - their experience is diametrically opposed to their sibling or child. Pure denial or did they get treated differently and get brainwashed? These family members often hate the child who talks to the police and gets a parent locked up.

Children often see and experience evil their parents don't see, maybe because they have not learned to ignore things yet!

Maybe this is why we have all these 'fictional' monster stories of kids fighting while parents are clueless or absent? Maybe some of them are allegorical?

Behind the Wall
 
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