OP, think of it this way: suppose when you were a kid, everyone forgot your birthday: no cake, no gifts, not even a “Happy Birthday!” And suppose when you complained about it, your grandmother said, “You little ingrate! You have food to eat and a roof over your head, and you’re complaining because you didn’t get cake and presents! Watch this video about starving children!” Would you have felt anything besides frustration, resentment, hurt, and a little guilt? Telling the grandkids they’re entitled and should be grateful would be just as ineffective.
Instead of arguing with the grandkids or showing them videos, help them find their own way out of this. Acknowledge what they’re saying without adding any “buts.” Example: “It’s really hard when you can’t __________ [hang with friends, go out to eat, play soccer]. What are some ways you could make this better?” If they shrug, you might say, “I wonder how kids in the past managed. What do you think?” Resist the impulse to make suggestions. The idea is to put them in charge of their own adjustment and entertainment.
This is the best advice. Some people think charity is best given anonymously, but I think kids should see it happening sometimes. When they can see how much a helping hand can mean to people in need it might have more effect. It’s a better a approach than what worked for me, which was promising myself never to be the cheap ass ungrateful mean spirited people my parents were. They talked a big game sometimes, but I never saw them give up anything willingly.
Of course not. You’re offering a rational reason you can’t meet your son’s needs, and offering him an alternative way to meet his needs. Perfectly reasonable.
The key difference here is you’re not using mean words for your son, or trying to shame him for his (eminently normal) feelings. The undercurrent of contempt in the OP just isn’t there in your story.
Certainly. Still, I think acknowledging the kids’ discontent would go a long way. If they feel heard - and empowered - they may feel less need to complain.
What’s the worst that could happen if the kids got something like, “Yeah, it sucks that you can’t X right now. What’s something else you’ve felt like doing but never got around to, that you could have fun doing instead?” Or even just asking them what they’re most looking forward to.
That may be more emotional labor than the OP can afford. Still, that doesn’t make the kids’ feelings bad or shameful.
The first time I took my kids camping, we saw a raccoon in the evening as we were roasting our marshmallows. I chased the animal away, and told my kids about rabies, in an altogether overly graphic way.
Around two in the morning my kids woke me up when they heard noise outside our tent. I shined my flashlight outside and there were a dozen raccoons eating leftover food I’d meant to dispose of properly. Twenty four raccoon eyes shining as they skittered around. My kids were certain they were rabid and would soon come ripping through the flimsy tent material to kill us.
That was the year we started boating instead of camping.
I don’t know the details as the pertain to Australia, but I think it’s quite reasonable to take a position that this is not “the most privileged of times”, and in fact there are clear signs that the “privileged” life our grandparents lived, one of general upward trajectory in economic, health, and social stability metrics, is not one that the grandchildren will get to live.
Frankly, any grandpa’s admonition of “you don’t know how hard I had it back when” is going to ring a bit hollow these days.
Sometimes when kids say they’re bored, what they really mean is that they’re lonely. It doesn’t help much to be lectured about privilege by adults who spent their childhood surrounded by built-in playmates, while they’re still all alone. Air conditioning doesn’t change that.
This is what I was going to say. On a hiking/camping trip, those who put in the work reap the rewards and those who slack-off feel the pain. A good learning experience.
To expand a bit. I was about 14 or 15 when I started doing 4 day hiking trips with my friends into really remote places where there was nothing. No roads, no buildings, no fences, no electricity, nothing man-made. If you don’t provision for yourself carefully and learn how to properly build a tent/fire/bed (and clean up afterwards!) then you will be hungry, wet, cold, bruised, thirsty and suffering. No mobile devices back then, so the entertainment was all locally provided by good friends. Even then it’s only just a glimpse outside of the first-world, but it’s something.
I kind of feel like showing kids how privileged they are doesn’t really help them act less privileged. If anything, it just reinforces how much better off they are than most people and may even give them more of a sense of superiority.
People (kids and adults) evaluate their circumstances through what they actually experience relative to their peers. Not some vague abstract notion of appreciating how people are starving in Africa or grandparents walking six miles through eight feet of snow.
We did a lot of that stuff when I was in the Boy Scouts or at summer camp when I was a kid. While it was kind of fun and taught a lot of good lessons about doing things properly and whatnot. I don’t think it ever left me with a sense of how good I have it because I live in a typical suburban home with electricity and running water.
Makes me think of the anecdotes about parents in Starbucks or McDs or wherever, saying to their kid/s, “Study hard in school so you don’t end up a wage slave like these people!” And then being told that the person serving them either is in their last semester of graduate school, or has a degree but was downsized and is doing what they can to survive.
My mother never did that with me or my sister. Whenever we tried making fun of people in those positions she would invariable say something along the lines of, “At least they have a job. They’re not just sitting at home on their asses.” It was her way of telling me no matter what job someone has they deserve to be treated with respect.
*Like all children I could be a little shit at times. I don’t make fun of people who make my food, bag my groceries, or bring me my Coca-Cola with vanilla partly because my parents thought it was important to treat anyone working with respect.
Sorry, not that easy; no television show, preaching, third party anecdotes will do it.
Find a charity that feeds and/or houses the homeless.
Then take them for a good four hours and work there.
Work alongside them, so–yah know–you can TALK to them about what they experience.
No, not an hour serving Christmas dinner—that is not enough immersion into the environment.
My suggestion for the OP’s grandkids: a film festival:
[ul]
[li]The Diary of Anne Frank[/li][li]Schindler’s List[/li][li]Shoah (all 12 hours) [/li][li]Sarah’s Key (“In modern-day Paris, a journalist finds her life becoming entwined with a young girl whose family was torn apart during the notorious Vel’ d’Hiv Roundup in 1942.”) [Warning: grim spoiler][/li][/ul] During the war, a young girl is hidden from the Nazis in a locked closet, the people hiding her are taken away, and she dies in the closet. Feel free to add your own entries.
Schindlers List is completely inappropriate for under 14s. Shoah will put both kids and adults who havent read extensively about The Holocaust right to sleep because of its narrative structure and lack of context. The rest I agree wiy h.
While history is good, I think you have to be careful to not send the message that suffering and want were things that happened long ago and/or far far away. One thing I do that I think is important is that during good times, I try to point out how lucky we are: not when my son is being a whiny little jerk, but when we are snuggled as a family, watching TV, I sometimes say how lucky we are to have that opportunity, to be a family where everyone loves and supports each other, to have a nice house and the time to watch TV. If we are out walking and it’s a beautiful day, I try to make sure he sees I am appreciating it: not just the day, but the enjoying each other’s company, the fact that our bodies work well enough to carry us effortlessly, the opportunity to go out. But again, I don’t really hammer the lessons when he’s miserable. I focus on pointing out when he’s happy, and how that’s built on advantages not everyone has. But I use a pretty light touch. It’s not like we can’t eat a pizza without a lecture or anything.
Kambuckta, based upon all the advice you got, I’m presuming that you just killed your grandkids. Have the authorities discovered it yet? Are their parents mad?
Manda Jo brought up a very good point: No matter how much you show starving orphans in Africa, it’s *Africa *- it’s thousands of miles away. It won’t stop kids in the US from griping about lack of Wi-Fi or computer games. You need something that hits closer to home.
Finally, the message can be useless if kids don’t want to listen to the messenger. No matter how truthful or important something may be, many kids just won’t hear it from their parents. They might hear it from anyone else, but not from Dad and Mom.