“Self Reliant or Self Centered?”
By
Gerry Niskern
That’s just what today’s parents need, more ways for children to make their demands known. Now they are teaching the pre-talkers as young as six months to use sign language to convey their wishes. “Baby Signs” classes are available throughout the valley.
Shouldn’t children growing up in our complex society start learning early on that sometimes you wait for wishes to be granted, or heaven forbid, refused? Where will today’s children learn patience, a needed virtue in today’s world, if not at home? Kids need to adapt themselves to our demanding environment and it’s imperative we help them by not granting every request.
Our affluent society has spawned a few generations of self-centered offspring.
It is now the birthday party season. When school starts, the “keeping up with the Jones’s” also begins.
Parents are laying out a few hundred dollars to rent a room at a resort so 8 year olds can hang out in between trips to the water slides and restaurants. Some are taking twenty ten-year-old buddies of the birthday boy to play a few games at the paint ball facility. It’s difficult, and you might like to refuse, but come on, “ everyone’s parents lets them do that”: everyone’s parents that are way cooler than you, of course.
A young mother I know, who grew up in another culture, expressed bewilderment at the elaborate guest prizes. “We’ve rented the mandatory jumping cage, hired clowns and magicians, but what is it with these expensive guest prizes?” she asked. Another mother mentioned elaborate tea parties for little girls who are expected to arrive in fancy dress, presided over by a hired hostess.
DJ parties just for fun that cost several hundred are prevalent among the junior hi set. When they get older the stakes are raised. High school kids parents rent a couple of vans and take all their friends to Disneyland for the weekend, all expenses paid, of course.
It is only natural that parents want their children to have more than they had. When both parents are working and under a lot of stress, sometimes they have to skimp on time. They try to make up for it with giving. The Center for the New American Dream that promotes simplified living believe this results in kids who are too focused on material things. Who is going to draw the line and acknowledge that even extravagant birthday parties are just another way of raising very self-centered kids? The special memories that parents hope to create are instead creating a sense of entitlement. The message children often get is that acquiring more will make them happy.
Of course, we all know that the commercialism that permeates our children’s world is very hard to control. Madison Avenue used to try to impress parents; now they have moved directly to kid marketing, leaving Mom out of it. Product images are everywhere on TV, not just commercials but with direct tie-in to shows.
The American Academy of Pediatrics is on record as saying it “believes advertising directed toward children is deceptive and exploits children under age 8”.
If you receive everything you want at age 9 or 10, how do you handle future disappointments in relationships and the workplace?
Most young parents would like to break the cycle and get back to simpler times, but who has the courage to go first? Could they begin with the sign for NO that parents could use and teach the pre-talkers?