Several articles lately are backing my claim that kids are becoming spoiled, evil, narcissistic brats. Even CNN’s Jack Cafferty has included a section in his new book, Now or Never:
Some parents still have this attitude that their kids are too special to be burdened by discipline. And the rest of us are supposed to put up with their little mutants. That attitude really pisses me off.
I hate to break it to them, but the kids aren’t special, and I don’t have to put up with their behavior. If you can’t control your obnoxious little brats, leave them home.
They don’t belong out in public annoying other people, period. I don’t remember a generation of kids ever so indulged and enabled to behave so badly. What’s going on?
I remember as a kid I was expected to behave myself out in public or suffer the wrath of one very angry father. And of all the things that used to piss him off, those expectations didn’t seem unreasonable. Something’s gone terribly wrong here. My guess is it has to do with the breakdown of authority, the collapse of strong family structure, and the abdication of parental responsibility, dictated in part by the necessity that both parents work.
Plus, we have a whole generation of Baby Boomers who are too busy feeling entitled to prolong their own self-indulgent, self-absorbed adolescences to rein in their own kids.
I love it when people call other people’s children mutants!
Then there was this from the Daily Mail (and if you’re just skimming and miss it, I am not Dr. Craig):
Praising children at every opportunity is creating a generation of narcissists who cannot take criticism, according to a leading psychologist.
Dr Carol Craig warned teachers and parents that the constant drive to build self-esteem in schoolchildren had gone too far.
Addressing a head teachers’ conference, Dr Craig said that adults had become too afraid to correct children’s mistakes in case it upset them.
Dr Craig, chief executive of the Centre for Confidence and Wellbeing, said: ‘We are wrong in thinking we have to get the “I” bigger.
‘If we say to people the most important thing is how you feel about yourself, then if a child fails maths and feels bad, it is very tempting for them to blame it on others like teachers and parents. Parents no longer want to hear if their children have done anything wrong. This is the downside of the self-esteem agenda.’
Parents are increasingly challenging teachers over their child’s minor failures at school, such as doing badly in a spelling test or missing out on the lead role in the school play, because they claim such knockbacks are damaging to the child’s confidence.
Since September 2007, all UK schools have had a statutory responsibility to promote the wellbeing of their pupils.
But Dr Craig says the wellbeing agenda has been taken too far by both teachers and parents who are wrapping children in cotton wool and turning them into narcissists.
Speaking at the Association of School and College Leaders conference in Birmingham, Dr Craig said: ‘Narcissists make terrible relationship partners, parents and employees. And we are kidding ourselves if we think that we aren’t going to undermine learning if we restrict criticism.’
Carole Ford, head of Kilmarnock Academy in East Ayrshire, told the conference that a math teacher in her school had corrected a pupil who placed a zero in the wrong place, only to be told:
‘Thank you, but I prefer it my way.’
Dr Craig said: ‘Schools have to hold out that they are educational establishments. They are not surrogate psychologists or mental health professionals.’
A spokesman for the Department for Children, Schools and Families, said the Government’s focus on wellbeing helped pupils learn effectively while helping them to be confident and responsible citizens.
The conference also heard a claim that schools are being treated like identikit Tesco stores where staff are discouraged from showing initiative.
More of the school day is spent implementing Whitehall directives instead of teaching, said ASCL general secretary Dr John Dunford.
Dr Dunford said: ‘In this Tesco management model of England Schools plc, heads are the branch managers, teachers the shelf fillers and bursars the account technicians – part of a “delivery chain” that is about as far from my vision of school leadership as it is possible to get – all summed up in that dreadful word “compliance”.
‘Compliance . . . is the lowest form of commitment, to be encouraged in those who have no job flexibility, no initiative and limited intelligence. Is this what ministers really want of their school leaders?’
What do you think? Those with children, speak up! Only, I don’t want to hear about your children. If you’re one of the parents described in these articles I have a hard time believing that you know how truly awful your parenting is. Self reflection is so very hard, especially for those who need it. Instead, take a look at the other children you encounter, your kids friends, they’re schoolmates, or just children you meet when you take your child somewhere where children congregate.
Are kids getting more self-centered?
