What is an "authoritarian" parent?

What is an "authoritarian" parent?

Jayne Major, Ph.D. (Parenting Educator & Child Custody Consultant, Breakthrough Parenting Services, Inc. ) gives expert video advice on: How will giving my child everything he wants affect him in the future?; What is the best way to parent a child?; What is the key to successful parenting? and more...

There are three parenting styles that I teach in my classes.The first one is the authoritarian parent, where "I'm the Boss". Our society has been organized in a top-down fashion from the beginning of the agricultural age. Everybody has a boss, and the boss, whether that's a good person or a bad person, is the one that is in charge and tells us how to think and act. If we don't think and act the way the boss tells us how to think and act, then the big "or else" comes out.The "or else" is some form of punishment. Punishment is always fear; there's always that tension. The person who's the boss has an enormous amount of control and power over us. The downfall of the authoritarian method was that feelings didn't matter. If I was your boss I could have a lot of power over your life and you wouldn't dare speak up to me, tell me how much I'd hurt your feelings or any of that. I mean, you had to do what you were told to do out of fear.