We're All Special and Unique, and It is to our Detriment

Great Debates
1

During a long car ride this weekend, Mr. Jar and I discussed the concept of entitlement, unlimited entitlement amongst the X and Y generation, in everything from “I’m going to park in the no parking zone because I’m just running in” to “I’m going to get away raping and impregnating my girlfriend” or whathaveyou. It seems to be across the board, (and there’s a glut of it in Chicago lately with the hubby and I recognizing things like people butting in line at the bathroom at Cubs games, or stealing other people’s newspapers off the front porch, or people wanting failing grades to be abolished in school so they don’t FEEL BAD about not being able to spell).

We came to the conclusion that is similar to the Fight Club concept of ‘you are not a beautiful and unique snowflake’. We grew up in a generation where our parents showered us with cards and plaques and figurines that said ‘YOU’RE SPECIAL!’ or “#1 KID”. I remember having a plaque on my wall that said “YOU ARE UNIQUE!” on it, and I loved it. However, the truth is, no one is SPECIAL. No one DESERVES to be at the front of the line. No one DESERVES to get head cheerleader, or lead in the play or first in his/her class. We are all just human beings, each with an equal chance at whatever we choose to pursue.

The generation AFTER us was treated to the same ‘specialness’ but coupled with the ‘freedom of expression’ discipline theories that supported very little punishment and coddling of tantrums and outbursts.

So

a) do you agree with this loose theory that the poor, mannerless, selfish behavior of the past couple generations is influenced by the ‘specialness program’

and

b)how is it possible to encourage and support your children and to build them up emotionally without leading them to believe they are some sort of chosen person, entitled to everything under the sun, and by the way…right NOW.

2

I don’t know that the changes are as recent as you see them, or as widespread; every generation seems to find something to do to annoy their parents, and being a bunch of slackers is one of the things we’re seeing these days. When I was in high school (late 70’s) it was scaring my parents into thinking I was going to drop out (like my two older brothers did…). Before that, it was being a hippie. Before that, motorcycles. And so on.

As to your second question, there are two ways to downplay rewarding your kids:

  1. Don’t reward them. Make them earn everything they get in life, and let them know that that’s how the system works. If they do great stuff, they get great stuff. Don’t just say, “Wow, you’re precious. Here’s an Acura.”

  2. Don’t give them colossally out-of-proportion gifts (see above). If they do well in school, take them shopping for (some) new clothes. Don’t buy out Dayton’s. Or if they’re into biking, get them some biking accessories. Don’t get them an entire new bike. If you want to give them spontaneous rewards, make them reasonable ones.

Important safety tip: Get your kids used to a level of reward that they’re going to be able to maintain once they’re out on their own.

3

But even beyond gifts and stuff…should we be telling our children that they are “special”? I see birthday cards that say “YOU’RE A SPECIAL LITTLE GIRL”. Isn’t it this engrained belief that let’s that special little girl believe she can drive without a license or skip class or bully other kids?

4

You’re title seems to contradict your argument. It is not that we are not special and unique. It is that we are all special and unique. No-one deserves to go the front of a queue, like you say, but a Head cheerleader does deserves to be head if they have to skills to manage the task. A child does deserves the lead in a play because they are the better performer. Just because we are all human beings doesn’t make us the same in terms of our ability and talents. We should not reward children simply for the sake of rewarding them, even though in a perfect world that would be nice. But you should reward them for their own individual merits.

It could be said, and I have some support of it, that the poor, selfish behaviour of some people can be attributed to a upbringing of unchallenged rewards. But then some people are just born jerks. You cannot teach a child to work hard if you reward them when they fail. But a child can learn themselves to work hard even if they are spoilt just like a child may never learn to do so when taught what would be considered properly. It is an individual case and I think it cannot be judged so generally. If I am called special it does not make me feel like I am better than everyone else, it makes me feel like I am appreaciated for what I do. And this is coming from a spoilt kid BTW.

5

Isn’t there a difference between saying “you’re special” and “your being special makes you better than everyone else?” I was babysitting a friend’s son a few years ago and she said, “Oh we never tell N. that he is special or that something he did was great because life isn’t like that.” I thought that was the saddest thing that I had ever heard. If your parents don’t think you’re someone special, who will? Yes, drawing the line between self-esteem and entitlement is hard but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t give the kid the former.

6

That’s what I’m suggesting, that we find some sort of line. We shouldn’t tell a child that right off the bat he deserves the lead in the school play just because WE think he’s special, or sue a school system for not making OUR SON a valedictorian because HE’S OUR SPECIAL LITTLE GUY.

My OP title implies that teenagers growing up being told “Hey guy, get out there and take on the world…YOU’RE special” are going to be mighty shocked when they get a parking ticket for blocking our driveway.

7

No. And yes. I think it is the absence of parental influence, combined with either an affluent lifestyle or the expectation of future affluence that leads children to grow up into selfish, spoiled assholes. I will select another reference from your source material (Fight Club). We have all been raised to expect to become millionares and rock gods,etc. it is an expectation that has come from too much exposure to media like TV and the internet. Kids come home from school with nothing to do and spend their time watching not idealized, fantastic, lifestyles - beautiful lawyers and bankers who are partners at 26. High school students who are indistinguishable from their parents (I swear that some of the moms on the OC are younger than the kids). Everyone is a millionare living in a huge house or appartment in SoHo.

Ironically, because parents have to both work to maintain a certain lifestyle for their families, kids do not have any actual role models.

8

From your last point-of-view I think that my generation (I’m 18 now) are going to reflect that point. It is true that children are brought up to believe that they can accomplish anything when in reality they can’t. That has hit me recently and because of that if I have children I won’t teach them that life will be perfect. But that won’t stop me saying my child is special and telling them that they should srtive for whatever they may want. Just because they cannot do everything doesn’t mean that they can’t try. Kids think they can be Superman when they are young and they outgrow it. So when they grow up thinking they are going to be famous and powerful and they aren’t then they get up and brush themselves off. I don’t think they will ever change from thinking they can do anything but it is just a case of them learning otherwise and moving onward.

9

I don’t know, jarbabyj. I think it’s fine to tell a kid that she’s special if you’re doing the right stuff with that kid.

I’m sure I got a number of birthday cards that said I was special as a child, but I don’t think I have an overinflated sense of entitlement or ego because of it. Maybe it’s because I grew up with three siblings (one a twin) and I had parents who had a more “old school” approach to their children. I got lots of positive attention from my parents, but the praise I received was commensarate with the level of achievement. My parents had enough going on in their own lives to hold praise and worship services for their children.

It seems to me that a sense of entitlement is difficult to develop in a large household. Maybe because people are having fewer children, we’re starting to see the rise of more “spoiled brats”?

Although I see the harm in telling a child they are special and unique everday, I see nothing wrong with using these words to tell a child how good he or she is if you think they suffer from low self-esteem. I will never forget the day a teacher in middle school pulled me to the side and told me that I was a very special girl. I momentarily forgot about the bullies and my own pathetic loneliness.

10

It is part of nihilism. You DID watch the end of Fight Club**, right?

No, though I disagree with the statement “you are all unique and special,” I do not think the past few generations are especially “mannerless” or “selfish,” and neither are they “rebellious” or anything else. EVERY generation thinks that of every younger generation.

If anything, the past generation has been neglected, raised at day cares, run through a systematic school system, and left behind by parents that are too busy with work or whatever else to spend enough time with them. Sometimes, part of this can be spoiling, when the parent just gives the kids whatever they want so they shut up.

So I disagree with your proposition entirely.

By not spoiling them? You seem to have a hard time drawing a line between the concept of being “special” and “getting everything you want” - the theory is you aren’t “special” in a way that is superior to everyone else, but rather everyone is different, and that is good. Getting everything you want is called spoiling, and that is caused by bad parenting.

11

One thing that continues to fascinate me is the generational treadmill.

This kind of discussion happens with every generation. Everything happens with every generation (barring some major catastrophy, like WWII). Every generation thinks their children are rebellious and wild and lazy and unfocused - and the kids think that they are new and rebellious and inventing stuff.

I saw a recent news article on “car surfing.” The reporter called it a “disturbing new trend” that the kids “invented.” Feh. Car surfing has been around for decades. Before cars, kids (well, rich kids) did stupid stuff on horses, or with trains, and they thought they were being just as unique.

Of special note are true rebellious generations - the Russian Decembrists, the French revolutionaries and “Children of the Revolution” (which can apply to many generations). Historically, entire movements happen in generations.

It is true that generations are usually more “progressive” than the last - the children of the Decembrists went on to lead a charge for serfdom to be ended, and the children of them went on to start the seeds of revolution against the Tsar, and their children to actually doing so and starting the Soviet Union.

The concept here is “what is new to one generation is acceptable to the next generation is normal for the third generation and is scripture for the fourth”

12

I think others have pretty much said everything I want to, so I’ll just waste bandwith like the spoiled brat I am apparently supposed to be.

Saying someone is special like a snowflake does not automatically translate into “you are the messianic snowflake whose specialness is superior to the more mundane aqueous crystalline constructs falling from the sky around you.” It’s like that old bumer-sticker style saying: You’re unique just like everybody else. People snicker and laugh at the apparent contradication, but on a deeper level it is absolutely a true statement. No one in the world today is going to be precisely like you are, but it does not follow that the differences which set you apart also set you above others. Most of them will be neutral, some of them will be good and some will be differences that hurt your chances in this world. Regardless of that, you are still unique.

The key that sometimes gets lost with certain parents is the de-emphasis on so is everybody else. You have to (like I can actually say that as a young adult with no kids self- :rolleyes: ) cultivate a sense of empathy with others that can act as a moderating influence on self-esteem turning into serious ego inflation. It is perfectly acceptable to praise your child for being particularly good at, say, football. That’s a talent not everyone has, something they can be justifiably proud of. It is also your job to remind them quite firmly at appropriate times (ex: you find him picking on another kid about their clumsiness) that other people can be quite talented in equally worthwhile ways. The easy part is always the reward, whereas the hard part is the moderation.

13

Then let’s discuss how someone arrives at an overinflated sense of entitlement. I’ll give a few examples, like my husband at the Cubs game.

He was in a line of at least thirty men, waiting to get into the bathroom. Two guys our age (late twenties early thirties…definitely not ‘stupid kids’ or little kids who don’t know better) simply cut in line and pushed their way into the bathroom ahead of everyone. Obviously they felt they were DESERVING of getting in front of everyone else.

Or at work the other day I had two men simply stare at me, appalled when I told them they could not smoke cigars at the bar. Why not? It’s policy. “We smoke cigars everywhere.” “Not here you don’t, we’re a small restaurant and the smoke affects the food”. “We’re going to ask someone else”.

And my favorite, which someone leant to the discussion my husband and I had this weekend…I was driving down the street and a twelve or thirteen year old kid ran right in front of my car. I slammed on the brakes to avoid hitting him. He flipped me off and said “Watch where you’re going you fucking bitch!” and proceeded to stand in the street so I had to drive around him or else not go anywhere.

Of course there are bad apples in every generation since the primordial soup was first simmered, I definitely believe that, but I guess I just have to wonder how some people find it acceptable to make demands and claim they deserve things and some people, you know…know better.

My parents told me I was special too, like I said. But when I lost the lead in the school play they didn’t march in and demand a recount, does that add any sense to what I’m saying?

14

I fail to see what is so bad about parents telling their kids they’re the tops. I think this is part of the unconditional love that parents should bestow upon their kids: I love you, because you’re my child, and I think you’re wonderful.

Sure, it’s bad to spoil kids, and lavish them with exhorbitant gifts they haven’t earned. But having a parent tell you you’re the cat’s pajamas and cheering you on for doing your best as if you were THE best is not exhorbitant, in my book. Hell, if a kid went to his dad and said “Pop, I got a C- on the math test, even though I worked as hard as I could to get an A”, and the old man replied with a “That’s because you’re mediocre, and don’t deserve half of what you get”, I’d say the bastard oughtta get a swift kick in the nuts. I should think the proper response would be “I know you’re trying; we’ll see if we can find a way to get these grades up to where we’d rather they be. Just keep at it, and keep doing your best; it’s all your Mom and I can ask.”

15

That one, I wouldn’t take too seriously. I believe in that case what you were seeing was the reptilian brain of a 12-year-old spewing forth defensively after a near-miss with his fate. He probably had to ride off home to change his underwear.

The problem is when you see this typical 12-year-old behavior in adults who should know better. I would argue that egotism is not a generational thing, but rather a class thing. An overly inflated sense of self-importance seems to correlate with affluence. I don’t want to hijack your thread, so I won’t name names, but there are certain current members of our political and business elite who seem to think the rules don’t quite apply to them, perhaps because they’ve been able to buy their way out of responsibility in the past. I have some particular misdeeds in mind, but I’m more referring to the context in which they occur and the rationales you hear. There’s an interesting recent book that expands on this observation.

16

Like you said, people are assholes shrugs

I’m not a parent, so I won’t express further opinion.

However, I’ll throw in the line, “give them an inch, they’ll take a mile” into the mix. The more freedom you give people, the more they expect.

However, I’m sure people cut in lines at the segregated restrooms, ran in front of the carriages, and smoked in people’s establishments as much in the past as they do today.

17

I guess I’m some kind of dirty Communist. O_o

I think it is more important to teach them that their peers are equals, and the social skills necessary to function with them.

18

I wasn’t there, so I don’t how their demeanor was. But I can think of some other explanations for their behavior that don’t revolve around entitlement. Perhaps they both had to really really go, or they were in a hurry for some other reason. Maybe they both thought it would be a cheap and hilarious thrill to see if they could cut in line with impunity (I can picture two guys chuckling about that).

That sounds like they have a poor respect for authority. I don’t know how that relates to entitlement issues, but I think of them as two separate things.

Well, that’s just plain out rude. But I don’t know if we can blame “You are Special” birthday cards on that. If anything, it’s the rampant culture of rudeness that is heavily promoted on television…where kids can cuss out adults with impunity, for laughs.

Maybe because our society–American society, that is–focuses so much on rights and freedom and liberty and blah blah blah, all of us grow up believing we’re entitled to stuff. I bet a hundred years ago, people didn’t go around saying, “I have the right to be pissed off!” Nowadays, we feel it necessary to constantly declare what we’re entitled to, especially when we feel like someone’s trying to reign us in.

I have a friend who constantly bitches and moans. He’s a nice guy who can have a normal sense of justice and fairness one moment, but when someone screws up his order at the cafeteria, or loses his paperwork, or assigns him to a bad seat on the airplane, the entire world has to hear about it. You’d think that he’d get used to life being unfair sometimes, but it’s like it hasn’t sunk in yet. I’m willing to bet that there are more whiners today than there were fifty years ago. Whining is more tolerated, I guess, because people have the “right” to complain. Maybe Generation Xers are worse than Baby Boomers because the former were raised by people who didn’t take no truck with whiners, while the latter had parents who were more lenient in that arena.

But is this common behavior? Or are the horror stories we hear about on the news, etc. just isolated anecdotes?

I think the line between overinflated sense of entitlement and desire to rectify an injustice isn’t always clear-cut, though. If I sincerely believe my kid is being unreasonably shafted–like being placed in remedial classes when they don’t belong there–no amount of preachiness from the “Life Isn’t Fair” choir would stop me from seeking redress. Sometimes people end up buying into “Life Isn’t Fair” so much that it keeps them from controlling the situations they have power over.

19

I think there’s a huge difference between telling a kid that he’s tops WITH YOU and telling him that he’s tops with the rest of the world. I have no problem with telling children that they’re the greatest part of YOUR life as a parent, but to give them the idea that they world is their unlimited oyster bar can lead to them being shocked when, in fact, they DO have to get in line for the bathroom.

But that’s exactly my point! What made them think that no one else waiting in a line of thirty really really had to go? Why should THEY come first in the line over everyone else?

20

Jarbaby, what if your kids are special? I know mine are and I let them know all the time. I also let them know that “life is no fair” and that they had to work for what they wanted. Both worked full time every summer after they reached the age of 15. Both graduated from college with dual college degrees in four years. Both are now in grad school working on their PhD’s. And both are still my favorite people, except for their dad, he still wins hands down.

Oh and as far as the 12 year old kid in the street, when I was a kid, low those many decades ago, we always played in the street, and our favorite saying was “Hit me and my parents will sue” as any car drove by. This was followed immediately by slapping the car as it went past. Kids are kids. Assholes are assholes. It’s not a this generation vs that generation thing.