63 pages • 2 hours read
Jessamine ChanThe School for Good Mothers
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2022A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
The Unrealistic Expectations Imposed on Mothers
The School for Good Mothers explores the unrealistic expectations imposed on mothers, as well as the impossibility of being a “good” mother when judged by cultural standards. Almost everyone around Frida criticizes her mothering. Gust doesn’t want her to have an epidural, Susanna wants her to use cloth diapers and buy organic foods, and her parents want her to bring Harriet to visit them more. Most of the people judging Frida’s mothering are not mothers themselves and don’t understand Frida’s specific position as a Chinese single mother who has a job, depression, and heartbreak over her husband leaving her for a woman whom she now has to interact with regularly. When neighbors call the police on Harriet’s behalf, Frida is labeled a “bad” mother and sent to a “school” where American society’s expectations about motherhood are reinforced.
Many of the school’s and government’s expectations, decidedly American, are based on myths and enforced by people who are not parents. The instructors and counselors say, “A good mother can do anything” (173), even lift cars or fend off bears, for their children. They claim mothers’ needs should be met by caring for their children, so they should never experience “loneliness” (the desire for romance) or any other negative emotions, which would affect their children. They should be able to cure fevers with hugs and subsist on just oatmeal with no resulting health problems. They should be able to watch the instructors abuse A. I. children for a year, while being separated from their real children, and not feel bad about it.
Considering mothers are people like any other person, most of them fail the program and don’t regain custody of their children due to empathy and stress. They were set up for failure by a curriculum with impossible lessons based on myths. Although the dolls resemble real children in that they experience real emotions, the drills with the dolls are artificial and do not prepare the mothers for real-life scenarios. For example, the mothers must convince the dolls to eat food although they have no nutritional needs; this process does not teach them how to feed human children.
Additionally, the curriculum is culturally biased in that it disadvantages immigrants, people of color, LGBTQ+ people, working-class people, teenage mothers, and others who don’t fit the instructors’ stereotype of a good American mother. The program is mostly made up of these types of mothers, as these are the typical targets of Child Protective Services (CPS). Once enrolled, these mothers are doubly set up for failure; for example, the school feels that Frida needs to unlearn her Chinese habits, which are causing “intergenerational trauma” to Harriet. Although the school’s and CPS’s expectations are unrealistic for all mothers, they’re informed by bigotry, making them even more unrealistic for some.
Although unrealistic expectations are imposed on fathers as well, the differences between the schools for mothers and fathers, as well as the outcomes of their custody cases, illustrate the double standards in American culture’s expectations for mothers. Although Tucker is the one who pursues Frida, he regains custody of his child, whereas Frida is blamed for being “distracted” and loses hers. The mothers must repeat the mantra “I am a bad mother, but I am learning to be good” (83) and “I am a narcissist. I am a danger to my child” (157), whereas the fathers’ mantra is “I am a father learning to be a good man” (226). Embedded in these mantras are two important ideas: Fathers are allowed to be “men” (people) in addition to parents, whereas mothers are defined only as mothers, and the fathers are not explicitly labeled as “bad,” while the mothers are both bad and dangerous.
As such, Frida is blamed for Tucker’s mistake more than he was: She is scolded for wanting to be with a man who let his child fall out of a treehouse. Meanwhile, Tucker is allowed to pursue Frida and get his child back; even Frida’s ex-husband Gust is allowed to have an affair while keeping custody, whereas Frida is punished for holding hands. Again, mothers are expected to prioritize their children, and any interactions outside of childcare are seen as their fault, an example of their supposed lack of devotion.
In addition to being impossible and unreasonable, the expectations placed on mothers are often contradictory. The expectation that mothers resist “loneliness” is contradictory because the school appears to be teaching the women to be stay-at-home mothers, which would imply they should have spouses who are breadwinners (regardless of their spouses’ sex). The school’s expectation that the mothers develop empathy and display the ability to protect children is contradictory because the mothers are not supposed to interfere or feel negative emotions when the instructors repeatedly abuse their A. I. dolls, nor are they supposed to feel negative about being separated from their real children. However, Frida is punished for performing well and has to kidnap her child to show her devotion, for which she will again be punished.
The Ethics of Government Interference in Parenting
When the mothers arrive at the school, Ms. Knight, the director, welcomes them with the mantra “Fix the home, and fix society” (82). This explains the justification behind government involvement in parenting: The home is viewed as a concern of the state because citizens are raised there. In order to ensure the “right” citizens are being raised, parenthood must be policed. However, the project of “fixing the home” is undertaken in an ineffective way. The School for Good Mothers questions the ethics of government involvement in parenting by taking the current system to one potential logical conclusion. Given that CPS already has parenting classes and rehabilitation programs for parents, these are incorporated into a fictional boarding school to illuminate the futility of trying to produce “good mothers,” especially when those teaching them are not parents or experts in parenting, child psychology, or the like.
Frida’s classmate Lucretia compares taking motherhood classes from non-mothers to “taking swim lessons from people who’ve never been underwater” (138). Not only are their expectations unreasonable, but their methods of teaching are ineffective. The mothers learn how to take care of A. I. dolls, not human toddlers—cleaning the dolls in a specific way, turning them off during lunchtime, and preventing them from dying by touching snow. The liquid inside the dolls is toxic to humans, so mothers have to wear goggles when changing diapers or cleaning wounds. While rescuing dolls from fake burning buildings or cars, the mothers have distracting images of their real children play on headsets. It’s unclear why the lessons bear little resemblance to actual parenting scenarios unless they were designed by someone who doesn’t have children, or if they were simply designed to torture the mothers rather than rehabilitate them. The novel reveals the contradiction that motherhood is assumed to require expertise, and yet working for an organization that evaluates mothers and “protects” children from abuse and neglect does not require expertise.
The scenes where Frida and others lose custody of their children also highlight the problematic ethics of government involvement in parenthood. Far from “protecting” children from further harm, most of the children seem confused and upset when separated from their parents. Harriet throws tantrums, bites social workers, wets herself, and tries to run away when she’s separated from her mother or has to talk to her in unfamiliar ways (via different locations with strangers or video calls). CPS then uses these behaviors as evidence that Frida is the problem. In reality, Harriet behaves this way because of the grief of losing her mother and the frustration of not understanding why. While Frida leaving Harriet alone for two hours may have left her with “a faint, wounded feeling that could calcify as Harriet grows up” (19), CPS escalates the situation and further traumatizes Harriet, Frida, and others in their family by forceful separation.
When the state is deeply involved in parenting, it brings up issues of race, nationality, socioeconomic class, and more, disadvantaging those who don’t appear quintessentially “American” based on the opinions of whoever happens to be working for CPS and the court system—which is mostly white people. When Frida’s therapists try to blame her parents for her problems, Frida feels that “Chinese families are more reserved…You can’t judge them by American standards” (46). However, nobody in the court system seems to have any sympathy for this position.
Frida’s lawyer Renee urges her to act less Chinese, arguing that “[t]he judge probably won’t see Frida as a person of color. […] Most of the judges are white, and white judges tend to give white mothers the benefit of the doubt, and Frida is pale enough” (69). This tactic doesn’t work, and Frida is sent to “school,” where she continues to encounter cultural differences that the instructors use to mark her as a “bad” mother, such as her not being a natural at high-pitched “motherese.” The school also views those in lesbian relationships as “unmotherly,” kisses on the lips as “European” and therefore inviting of child molesters, and using other children as positive examples as “Asian” and “shame-based” (i.e., Frida pointing to another doll as a positive example for Emmanuelle).
The United States is not the only country with organizations similar to CPS or whose government interferes with parenting and family structures. The Chinese government has its own problems, which is why Frida’s parents immigrated to the United States in the first place, bringing their extended family with them. However, after all this work, the American government still labels Frida’s parents as “bad” and punishes them by severing ties with their only granddaughter.
The Ethics of Artificial Intelligence
As a dystopian science-fiction novel, The School for Good Mothers illustrates several potential problems with the use of advanced technologies, including artificial intelligence, in the monitoring, instruction, and evaluation of parents. The novel shows that the use of such technologies can be ineffective as well as abusive to humans and artificial intelligence. Additionally, the use of advanced technologies and artificial intelligence is rendered even more dangerous by the myth that such technologies eliminate “human error,” bias, and subjectivity. More trust is placed in the “data” collected using these technologies than human testimonies, despite how new and imperfect these technologies are (as evidenced by various A. I. doll malfunctions). The use of faulty, inappropriate technologies dooms Frida’s case, showing one of the worst possible outcomes of using A. I. to determine whether or not parents should keep custody of their children.
Allegedly, the schools use A. I. “dolls” instead of real children to protect real children from harm, while still allowing the parents to practice skills on child-like entities. The problem with this is twofold. At times, the dolls are more human-like than the instructors seem to think, leaving the dolls vulnerable to abuse. The instructors hit the dolls to make them cry, and “[t]he hitting is real. The pain is real” (114). The instructors subject the dolls to physical, sexual, and racial abuse for the purpose of educating parents. The dolls are affected by this treatment like real children would be, becoming either aggressive, withdrawn, or scared. At other times, the dolls aren’t human-like enough for the lessons the instructors plan, leaving them vulnerable to other types of abuse. For example, the dolls don’t need to eat, so the instructors force-feed them to teach the mothers how to change diapers. Ironically, the mothers’ attempts to protect the dolls from the instructors are never considered “maternal” by the court system.
The mothers consider the program “psychological torture” because they have to watch the dolls go through abusive situations, and after forming a year-long bond with them, lose the dolls like they do their real children. Frida recognizes Emmanuelle’s humanity and teaches her “to be human” (290), viewing her as “her little friend. An orphan. A foundling” (138) rather than a robot; she considers Emmanuelle to be “not a pretend daughter but a temporary one” (138). The mothers’ shared ability to recognize the dolls as lifelike entities who require love proves they are more maternal than the instructors, but in order to use the A. I., the instructors have to continue believing there is no real harm being done.
The ethics of using A. I. in this way are further complicated by the dolls being pitted against the women’s real children. At times, the instructors give the mothers phones to call their real children while still being responsible for their dolls, telling the mothers that their first priority should be “their child.” When the mothers all call their real children, they are reprimanded for neglecting the dolls. Frida also feels guilty for developing a real bond with Emmanuelle and spending so much time with her: “Frida feels like she’s cheating Harriet with every embrace. More for Emmanuelle, less for Harriet” (130). The cameras inside the dolls detect any negative emotions the mothers feel, and the humans interpreting the data make the assumption that these emotions indicate a lack of maternal capacity rather than natural responses to stress. Ultimately, the school’s use of A. I. does not eliminate bias or abuse, instead exacerbating both.
