The Best Parent Ever is better than you, because everything you do is wrong. And by “you,” they mean all the parents of North America, Europe, Australia, and the more developed parts of Asia and South America.

The only people who truly know ANYTHING at all about proper child-rearing are impoverished mothers living in mud huts in the Third World. Nearly every new parenting theory embraced by the Best Parent Ever starts out something like this: poor women in Africa or India can’t afford diapers/food/babysitters, but somehow their kids turn out phenomenally better than yours. Next come the over-priced books and classes on, say, Natural Infant Hygiene, Extended Breastfeeding, and Attachment Parenting. This is followed by the disapproving stares and ferocious forum posts directed at anyone who strays from the Best Parent party line.

Yes, Imperialism is alive and well in the Best Parent’s world. These days, it’s not enough to steal a poor nation’s natural resources and culture. We must also co-opt their child rearing techniques — and profit from it! One book or instructional course offered in any of these natural parenting subjects will cost the Best Parent Ever more than the Mud Hut Super Mom who inspired it earns in an entire year.

So take that, naked, starving, poopy-covered children of the Third World. No juice boxes or Pampers for you. You and your parents are at the vanguard of the latest parenting trends. Keep up the good work, and maybe in a few years, we’ll send Bill Gates over to drop off some vaccines. You may live a life of hunger and misery, but at least you have inspired that most important person of all, the Best Parent Ever.

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The poll is closed, and Michael Jackson (31%) has narrowly beaten Britney Spears (28%) as the parent most likely to make us cringe.

It’s no shock to most of us that Mr. “Beat It” topped this particular chart. What did surprise us was how close the race was. Apparently Best Parent Ever readers feel the sad and pathetic recklessness of Britney Spears makes her almost as bad a parent as an alleged child molester and a monkey.

It makes sense to us. People hate bad mothers. They really hate them. Almost as much as they hate alleged child molesters. And bad mothers must be made to suffer – not just by courts and social workers, but by anonymous poll voters in mid-level blogs.

So take that, star-struck parents everywhere! You’re not famous, so no one cares how you raise your kids. But at least you don’t make the Best Parent Ever cringe like Britney Spears or Michael Jackson.

The Best Parent Ever is better than you because they have the most incredible babysitter in the world, which they will never, ever share with the world, no matter how much the world begs.

This is because the name and phone number of a good babysitter is one of the most-closely guarded secrets in Terra Parentis Optimus (Best Parent Ever Earth).  Best Parents will gladly reveal every sordid marital secret and hideous medical problem in their lives.  But ask them the name of their babysitter?  You’ll get nothing.  The Federal Witness Protection program has looser security standards than the typical Best Parent Ever protecting a babysitter’s identity.

Why?  Because a Secret Babysitter is the Triple Crown Winner of Best Parent Everness.  (1) For starters, the not-so-simple act of finding and retaining a Secret Babysitter automatically makes you better than all the other parents.  (2) Being able to boast about your incredible “date nights” while the Secret Babysitter watched your brood reminds everyone, again, how much better you are than them.  (3) And finally, keeping that Secret Babysitter secret is one of the best ways to re-enforce the exclusivity of that very special club called…The Best Parent Ever.

So take that, socially-starved parents who haven’t left the house in years.  You’re not missing anything — except a WHOLE LOT OF FUN!!!  Don’t worry — the age when you can leave your children home alone will be along in, oh, about a decade or so.  And by then, the only things you’ll have to worry about are the rowdy house parties and unwanted pregnancies your teenagers will insatiably pursue while you’re out trying to see some C-list romantic comedy.  Kind of ironic when you think about it, which The Best Parent Ever will be doing, as they gleefully sip date-night Merlot tomorrow evening, blessed by the bounty of their Secret Babysitter.

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