Parents are too afraid to let their kids fuck up. I see helicopter parents like this all the time, and I think it has a profoundly negative effect on the kids. Of my friends from high school, the ones with overbearing parents just went crazy after high school. They ended up dropping out of college or having some sort of significant existential crisis, as they didn't really know how to deal with life in an independent manner. The best way to learn is to make mistakes. There's also no better time to make mistakes than when you're a kid, because you just don't have that many responsibilities...and the only real ramification is that you might get a stern talking to from your parents or get grounded. But instead parents are focuses on preventing any mistakes in the first place, which stifles any growing up that is supposed to happen.