“How Could a Mother Do That to Her Children?”: Filicide and Maternal Ambivalence in Croatian Media and Online Discourse

Four filicide cases that occurred in Croatia in 2014-17 received wide national media coverage and caused strong public reactions. In each case, the mother of the child(ren) was the perpetrator. This paper will analyse different representations of motherhood, the contradictions and inconsistencies between motherhood as an idea and ideology and everyday maternal practices and behaviours, with special attention being paid to the concept of maternal ambivalence and the expression of violent impulses towards children. Furthermore, the research will also paint a broader picture of the ideology and representations of motherhood. This will include the prescriptive norms of the ideal motherhood present in the public discourse, encompassing the official expert discourse of parenting, as well as the ‘private’ discourse of internet forums covering the issues of parenting and child rearing. The purpose of this analysis is to show how the public profile of the mothers who committed filicide is created on the dichotomies of the ideal, self-abnegating mother and the monstrous ‘non-mother’ (Croatian: nemajka), with all of its horrifying, dehumanising characteristics, and how this influences the general construct of maternity, motherhood and the figure of the ideal mother in the patriarchal family and social structures.