'A boy's best friend is his mother.' Know who said that? Norman Bates in Psycho. Yes, there are plenty of mommy's boys out there in the world, but sometimes people can be suspicious about maternal affection.
In our culture, there are always those who assume that any display of intimacy between a mother and her son points towards something oedipal. A parental gesture which would make one person uncomfortable might be totally acceptable in a different household.
If you want an example of this phenomenon, look no further than writer and mother Lauren Libbert. Lauren provoked controversy online after making an appearance on British talk show This Morning, in which she defended her family tradition of bathing with her 10 and 11-year-old sons.
Check out this video of Lauren's This Morning appearance below:Talking to hosts Philip Schofield and Holly Willoughby last year, Lauren told them that she had bathed with her parents as a pre-teen, and saw nothing usual about it. Weighing in on a televised debate about whether parents can be nude around their children, Lauren stated: "If they're happy with it, we'll have a bath together maybe once a week. It's something we all enjoy."
She continued: "It's something that we do in the house that's very normal. I think it's really natural. What can be more natural than being naked in the privacy of your own home ... I've got a tiny bathroom but we'll all scooch together and have a bath together and my boys are very comfortable with them being naked and me being naked."
Some social media users thought that Lauren was behaving inappropriately: While others were more supportive:She added: "If they start to have issues with being naked, I will take their lead. We're all comfortable about this. I grew up in this environment and I was doing this past puberty but I think it's made me more comfortable in my own skin and isn't that an amazing gift to be able to give to your children if one can be?"
So, what do you think? Is Lauren taking things too far? Or is her family bathtime totally harmless? It all depends on your point of view.