I've talked to some parents with little kids and most of them say yes. A lot of them think that kids are being sheltered too much and I don't mean by like knowing about sex or drugs or anything like that, but by not knowing how to handle things such as losing. A lot of them told me that nowadays kids cant play games like musical chairs, duck-duck goose, or red rover in school anymore because it can make some kids feel "inferior" if they lose or don't get picked and some of them also told me that in sports like T-ball, they don't even keep score anymore because they want everyone to feel like a winner and everyone gets a trophy no matter what. After hearing the parents talk I felt as though it does make kids weaker because how else are kids going to know that they need to improve on and it takes away goals from kids because if they win or lose they will still receive the same treatment, that ain't how life works.

We are making kids weaker. We tell them that whatever they want (short of murder, I guess), not only can they have, but they SHOULD have it, and we're evil if we try to deny them it. (Or even if we try to tell them that they can only get it if they work for it.) We can't let them loose. We can't let them feel inferior. We coddle them with notions that others should conform to their wills. We go out of our way to make kids weaker. Afterall, we need equality. And since it's impossible to be equally strong, we have to make everybody equally weak.

femme fatale wrote:

I've talked to some parents with little kids and most of them say yes. A lot of them think that kids are being sheltered too much and I don't mean by like knowing about sex or drugs or anything like that, but by not knowing how to handle things such as losing. A lot of them told me that nowadays kids cant play games like musical chairs, duck-duck goose, or red rover in school anymore because it can make some kids feel "inferior" if they lose or don't get picked and some of them also told me that in sports like T-ball, they don't even keep score anymore because they want everyone to feel like a winner and everyone gets a trophy no matter what. After hearing the parents talk I felt as though it does make kids weaker because how else are kids going to know that they need to improve on and it takes away goals from kids because if they win or lose they will still receive the same treatment, that ain't how life works.

There's also the fact that a lot of schools, the ones that actually bother still having playgrounds and recess, ban all sports and games and even jungle gyms, that the kids could be hurt on, that they might fall down and get scraped up, it's all banned so they only have safe wittle games to play. They're being made weaker on more level than just one.

Having worked in the school system for the past 5 years, I'd say most definitely but parents are much to blame. We have parents who can't stand to see little Johnny upset in the slightest way and they go into tiger mode because Johnny didn't like being it when it was his turn. Many of the kids I work with come from homes in which they are SO over-indulged and have such a huge sense of entitlement - throwing garbage on the floor is fine because that's what the custodian is for, forgetting homework is fine because you can just bring it the net day, no need to study for a test, and so on.

Society as a whole has also contributed - you can't fail kids because it will damage their self-esteem so they keep getting passed along and falling further and further behind, when all some of them need is an extra year to catch up. You're not even allowed to give kids a failing mark until grade 9 so even if they do nothing, they just get an incomplete and even then, I don't know if the I can go on their final report card.

I had one parent tear a strip out of me because he son got into a fight on the playground and was asked to come up to the "Planning room" to tell his version. This parent was psycho and went off on me to the point where I really felt threatened. Then I got in trouble from the principal because I dared to ask this kid to the come to the planning room to tell his side, when he didn't show up after being told. This parent was seriously out of control but the admin caved because her bark was so loud that they made me the bad guy. IN hindsight, I should have gone to the union and asked to be let out of the contract, as it was just a temporary one and the admin clearly didn't back the staff. That was back in my first year and I was naive and didn't know enough about my rights not to be verbally abused in the work place.

Anyway - so many parents don't want their kids to even get upset so I blame the parents as much as society. Many schools have caved to what the PAC is demanding.

What I would like to know is WHERE in the hell did this all start? When did these self entitled brats become the rule and not the exception?

I think with the generation just behind us - parents who'd been raised by super-strict parents and swore they'd never be the same way, so they went the total opposite. It's the generation between my own and my parents - the generation just having kids now - who seem to think that it's bad if Johnny gets upset and that it's better to give Johnny what he wants to prove you love him. Thankfully, not all parents are like this, but it seems that about half of the kids are being raised as over-indulged, entitled brats.