Have you heard or said how entitled kids today are? Maybe you think they expect too much and aren't as strong, resilient, capable or whatever as you or other adults?
Maybe you can't imagine how they live - having so much, insisting on so much and texting so much.
Maybe you think they are terrible and we were better.
Maybe you admire them and wish you could trade places.
Maybe generalizations make you uncomfortable or you just aren't sure what you to think about the generational changes or what it means to be entitled.
I am pushing fifty and have a 13-year old and I'll admit to thinking, "Please let her not be an entitled puke."
I grew up with poverty, adversity, challenges and with less technology, self-confidence and class status as she has. I've worked hard to make her life easier and can't always relate to her experience of childhood (not the good part but not the hard parts either, she's a person of color so she contends with racism and I did not).
We don't share all of the experiences of our children. We can't know entirely how it is for them just because we were once kids.
But we were once kids so we do know some stuff.
And sometimes, it is true that while I adore my daughter I can't always relate to her.
The world has changed. Her world is different than mine was.
In many ways, kids today have it far easier. And yes, some kids have more, say more and expect more than any of us ever could or did.
They agree to less, accept less and do less than many of us did.
Maybe that is exactly what we helped teach and want?
I'm knee deep in parenting and I can't pretend to have a lot of perspective or wisdom. There's been no distance or well-considered insights or meditations from in a tree branch as I look down or back on life. I'm still trying to make it to school drop off and pick up on time.
I do have this article to share though. It resonated over and over and over. I nodded non-stop. It's a fresh take on the idea of how entitled kids these days are especially in comparison to we adults. It's something I hadn't heard before.
A snippet:
"Many in my generation would like you to believe we just rubbed dirt on the pain and got over it. Trauma doesn’t work that way, and no we didn’t.
We didn’t have iPhones and constant screens, but we weren’t sitting around reading great books and practicing piano, either. We played a lot of inane video games (Frogger?) and watched a lot ton of rotten television shows that were sexist, racist, and bad art. (I see you, Love Boat.)"
A link to the entire "We Weren't That Resilient" piece.
I'd love to know your thoughts about entitlement, parenting and if kids today are less resilient or, as the author suggests, that is total bullshit.
P.S. Other fantastic first-person writing from the friends who discovered this piece of writing can be found on Dawn's blog and Arwen's blog. The author of this article has a blog too.
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