It's great to raise a child who does some valuable things because they chose to, but it's also important to raise a child who understands duty, responsibility and obligation: because those are also part of life.
Why? What makes life that? Nature? A social construct?
I'm willing to bet is the second thing, and I don't believe questioning such things is bad.
If I did only the things I wanted to do in any given moment, I pretty well guarantee you our lawn would never be mowed, the dishes would go undone, dinner would frequently not get made, etc.
Not to be too snarky, but... that you're questioning that makes me wonder if you've ever actually had to run your own household, or work in a real-life job, or generally operate as an adult, which is practically defined as finding that balance between doing what you want and doing what is needed.
Yes there is: At a very basic level, humans need to eat food to live. If nobody wanted to do the work necessary to procure food, everyone would starve.
Maybe at some point in the near-ish future we will have automated away all unpleasant-but-necessary tasks, but that day is not today, and when it does arrive, it will be a new development for our species.
Until then, being a responsible adult will involve at least some modicum of doing-things-that-one-doesn't-want-to-do and it makes sense to prepare children for that eventuality.
I feel like adults do a great disservice to kids in general by not treating them as intelligent individuals.
Responsibility and obligation might be better learned with something worthwhile to be responsible for. Pleasing teachers isn't.
Right -- but there are ways the child can attain that understanding without its parents perpetually lording over them, deciding how they spend every minute of the day.
I didn't see anyone suggest that helicopter parenting is the "correct" alternative.
Only that it is a mistake to raise a child who is taught that they only need do what they want, and not sometimes what is necessary.