PARENTS BRINGING UP A SPOILED GENERATION!

I did read all of your posts, Lord E, and I was deeply impressed by the work your wife does - the post about the hearing she had to go through was disturbing - it's simply not the people who do their very best in places that most avoid working near that ought to be harrassed that way. <nods>

That said - come on, me Lord - I mean, God fear the day that on A2K we are henceforth only to respond to any post if we make sure to provide a full and fair evaluation of everything else the poster in question has said on the thread as well. I mean, thats just not reasonable, Lord.

I reacted to a specific thing you said, thats all - as posters on a board are wont to do - because that was the thing I had a reaction to. Moreover, the thing was: "there are a lot more "naughty and mischevious" kids today"; so there you certainly did seem to be talking about more than a "very small minority".

So basically, I think you are being ever so slightly unreasonable now, my Lord, complaining that the way I presented your argument would make you seem like "some sort of grumpy old bugger who wants to hang draw and quarter every human under 21". Surely, thou overstates. (Not to mention that it's just an A2K thread, Lord - 4 out of 5 people who will read this thread will know you already, and perhaps it's advisable to not quite take how the remaining fifth might come to momentarily perceive your virtual persona that seriously?)

Now, to the serious part of your post:


I agree with that exactly, which is part of the very reason why I think that complaints about how today's kids are out of control are exaggerated. I would phrase it like this: kids are now being diagnosed as disordered and medicated, for behaviour that in our days was just considered the mischief "naugty" kids get up to. There's something wrong with that.

(Ie, in answer to your question 2) and 3), remember reading Le Petit Nicolas in French class? Half of the kids of Nicolas' class would nowadays surely be diagnosed as ADHD and, quite possibly, medicated.)

I think that, in our ever more controlled environment, where kids get to spend less time just tearing about randomly outside and ever more time inside, or in scheduled activities, or in other 'inside' places where they are supposed to 'behave', the kind of behaviour that used to be just taken into one's collective stride as part of kids' mischief is being noticed more acutely, being seen as a disturbance more swiftly, and eventually, more quickly medicalised as some kind of disorder that needs to be 'brought under control'.

Again, I find that somehow disturbing.

I saw something this week that shed a more compassionate light on at least some instances of how parents spoil their kids. So many children are raised by busy single parents these days, mostly single mothers. So here's the scenario...
Mom asks young jr. to do something, clean up a room, do laundry, put out the garbage, etc. Jr. doesn't do it after being asked five times so what happens? Mom ends up doing it herself, saving time and aggravation, both of which are in short supply. Young jr. sees this and realizes that if he/she sits tight after being asked to perform a task, eventually Mom will do it so, jr. sits on his/her ass year after year and mom ends up doing everything for them because, for her, it's easier and faster. She ends up with an adult jr. who doesn't know how to do a damn thing for him/herself because she simply didn't have the time nor the strength to wrestle with them and force a sense of responsibility upon them.
To me, it's a sad but inevitable cause and effect. What do you think?

Nimh & Lord Ellpus both get smacked bottoms for fighting. Naughty boys!

I'm sorry, but there just isn't an ENTIRE GENERATION of spoiled kids.

Certainly there are a lot of parents that do things differently from how I think it should be done, but that's life.

No one thinks anything of the above theory?

Sure, I think plain ol' fatigue can have a lot to do with it, and not just with the people who have a good excuse for being fatigued.

It takes more energy and strength to enforce rules -- short-term, anyway.

It's one thing, I think, to be physically tired and out of time. It's another to be just too damn lazy to raise your children properly.

I saw a busy working mother this week faced with either risking her job or cracking down on her kid. Guess which road she took? Then it became apparent that this had been the way it was since the child was very young which explained, to me, why this kid is spoiled and expects his mother to do everything for him. My heart went out to the mother. What a shitty place to be in.

For sure.

I was making basically the same point -- that I think there are a lot of people who are forced into fatigue and it's especially tough for them to take a stand, but then there is a whole other group of parents who don't have any particular excuse but are just lazy. They take the path of least resistance -- which ends up backfiring later.

I seem to be saying "an ounce of prevention equals a pound of cure" a lot lately, but it's a saying I like.

eoe, my father used to rant that none of us would amount to anything because my mother didn't make us help out around the house or do certain chores. She basically covered everything herself, saying she would rather just do it than argue about it. I'm not saying she was right, but he was definitely wrong - we're all fine and each of us maintain a decent household. I tend to do everything myself the same way she did, probably because of the role model I had.

I agree with DrewDad, I don't think the next generation is altogether spoiled. I do think many in the next generation are having difficulties getting starting in the real world. Many young adults now return home after graduating college and not venturing out on their own until their late 20s. Part of that might be related to an unwillingness to tough it out and start out without much of anything. Part of it might be the parents not doing much of a push out the door.

Gail Sheehy points out in her book New Passages the reality that life expectancy is now 20 years longer than it was when we were kids. Those 20 years seem to have settled into two 10 year spans that we didn't know of as we were growing up. The decade of the 20s is now, in large part, a second adolescence with kids not beginning their independence until almost 30. The other 10 year chunk is the decade of the 60s when adults are taking an early retirement or semi-retirement and enjoying a second adulthood before settling into what we used to think of as the later years. It made sense to me.

Oh, that's interesting. It does make sense.

I can see this from all different sides.

True, today moms work and have less time to get things done.
In other generations, a mothers day envolved making her own soap, baking bread for the family. killing chickens and milking cows goats, yaks for food.....you get the picture. It's not like they had a lot of spare time either.

I would hope many would agree that follow through and consistancy is key.

I think I told this before, but once I saw these 2 adults men and 3 or 4 kids, aged maybe 6 to 12, at the park. They were all walking the path in front of me and they were carrying picnic stuff. You could tell they had just gotten out of a car in the lot right there. I heard one of the men say to one of the kids in the middle as far as age, "I told you not to do that. If you do it again, we're all going home." He didn't raise his voice at all.

Just a little ways later, the same guy said...."OK then, you made the decision for us all. We're going home."

No fanfare, he and the other guy did a 180, the older kids to, no comment. Maybe the little one looked confused for a second, but just followed along.

The kid who had made the decision everyone had to go home was the only one who got a weird look on his face for a few seconds, and he lagged behind the others, but he went.

I watched them all calmly get back in the car, and they drove off.

If you had been there, you would have seen that this wasn't the case of some power hungry parent who was bound and determined to have things his way.

I bet more often than not these kids had a great time, and there wasn't any whining about who had to do what. They were all for one and one for all.

Some might say that the dad wasn't being fair to the other kids for not letting them have a picnic.
I say the middle kid wasn't being fair because his individual selfishness cut short the fun for everyone.

Thinking about it....I'd say those kids had a lot more fun largely because the day would go so smoothly....No one was going to end up crying or enraged because mom or dad finally screamed at them, or because a sibling poked them one time too many.

Of course, children are put on this earth as Gods test of your patience, and I'm sure it's not only tempting, but easier sometimes just to do it yourself.

Kids, like eoe said, know how to wait you out....they've learned from experience mom is going to rag on them 5 times, maybe 6, and they'll give up.
It seems that the mom would get a lot more rest in the long run if the kid had learned from the get go that mom meant business, and if she says once that the iPod will be taken away for a month if this doesn't get done, then by God, they won't be seeing that iPod for 30 days.

Tougher at first, easier in the long run.

Perhaps J_B, but finally seeing it with my own eyes, a mother put on the spot of either doing chores herself or taking the time day after day to scream and yell and plead with her kid to do it himself, risking not being on her 9-to-5 as she should, really opened my eyes. I've said in the past that most times, parents create their own monsters and surely this woman has created hers but I have to wonder, what choice did she have? Work hard and long to provide for herself and her children and in the meantime, miss out on valuable training time or work less, provide less but have the time at home to go ten rounds daily in order to teach the kids right from wrong?

I you want your kids to help when they're older, you should start 'em off young. Letting your two year old place items into the dryer may take a little extra time now, but will pay off in the long run.

Very much so. <nodding>

It angers me. Maybe 'cause my arse was out the door young, no uni or college fund, we was poor. lol. There never is a point blaming the social class we are born to, but I do think for those who grow up in poverty: There simply is more work to be done in order to rise and do well.

It's kinda funny too. A lot of those parents that have spoiled 20somethings, will have drained their accounts as they get older, and often: guess what?! It's not son/daughter taking care of them. Nope, rarely.

So, I see so many peers and people younger than myself or near my age still living at home with mommy and daddy, they have all material wants handed over, nice fat student loans that they do not 'own' (many do not even take debt seriously. as if the world owes them credit for being there). I could go on and on ranting.......

A part of me is jealous. The way the world is changing: a lot will be the ones in positions of power. Some of them already are, though they do not deserve it. They have the money and luxury of being supported so they have the paper educations. They were taught this or that young.

edit: Yes, I know the irony of me going off on a bratty-rant about this. Decided to let it stand for my own reminders-sake not to indulge in 'poor me'.

The same expert who says there is a spoiled generation also says some parents take their children to school scruffy and don't give them a proper breakfast,so their port of call is the school sweetshop.

My dad could not afford washer dryer or vacuum cleaner. My mom could not do all the house work on her own. So it was on to me and my sister to do all the household washing and household cleaning. My mom did the cooking and washing dishes. I never enjoyed doing it one because I did not want to miss on my studies and second it was too physically exhausting to clean bedsheets and curtains by hand. But we did. I complained but I did. I don't know, remembering all the negatives associated with cleaning and washing, I would ever want my kids to do that kind of work. Instilling sense of responsibility is one, physically exhausting them is another.

So, would it have been better if your mother did the cooking and cleaning AND the laundry too?

I knew it was not possible for Mum to do it all by herself. So I always did what was expected of me. I did complain though. Because it is surely not fun to drive yourself to physical exhaustion by washing heavy bedsheets and curtains.

My parents were very reasonable. If I wanted one day off because I wanted to go play with my friends or had to write the test the next day, they did not mind. I got to choose another day to finish off the washing.

I would surely have been very upset if they wanted me to or forced it upon me to finish the washing day after day without any rest. That is what is not desirable. Yes, we want our kids to help us in the house, but we need to take care of their physical and physichological needs. Sometimes we may have to relax our boundaries and that is OK.


This was not directed at my parents. This was directed at parents who set high expectation to the level of driving kids to physical exhaustion.

Thanks for clarifying.
You ask a kid to do a chore and yes, they're gonna bitch and moan, that's to be expected because we're all lazy bums when you get right down to it but, let them bitch and moan WHILE they're doing what's been asked of them. Let them bitch and moan until it's done.

Children not properly brought up cost their parents £5,000 more a year than children properly brought up!