When I first joined CC, I was struck by the many posts of FA applicants who were seemingly angry that colleges had not given them enough money. It came across as surprisingly entitled to me. So I don’t see the “entitled” attitude as being class-based. I think it is an in-born personality trait that can be corrected over time.
My son is not generally a person who feels entitled.
But as a child, he felt that our family of four should be entitled to four birthday cakes a year, like every other family of four. However, this didn’t happen because he and I have the same birthday. On that day, our family would buy only one birthday cake because there was no way that we could eat our way through two of them before they got stale.
So he felt deprived. And he convinced his sister that she should feel deprived, too.
For years, we solved this problem by buying an extra cake on a day that he and his sister always wanted to celebrate – the last day of school.
Was this spoiling? I didn’t think so at the time. It was not very expensive, and I think it’s a good idea for kids to feel that parents will listen to their concerns and do something about them at least some of the time. But maybe we went too far.
I would have preferred to celebrate the day when school reopened in the fall, but I never told the kids that.
Also, perhaps I was the spoiled one because I never bothered to make a birthday cake. I always bought them from the bakery.
I tell my son that the difference between being ‘spoiled’ and being ‘pampered’ is that a spoiled child expects to be pampered.
Often I pamper my son, but if I get a whiff of him being spoiled, I call him out.
To my great surprise, and his credit, he accepts his good fortune with grace, and gratitude.
Which makes it easy for us to pamper him.
Hey, @Marian, my son and I also share the same birthday–but I’m the one who didn’t get a cake…
I think it is best for each family to do what suits them and not compete with others.
It just makes the one who has less feel bad. Money provides a comfortable life but not all wealthy are happy, they have problems too. Life is full of ups and downs and we should make our kids strong enough to deal with the challenges. You can live in a big home one day and then be forced to sell it and move to a smaller place. Flexibility and adaptability to changing circumstances is key. Don’t take things for granted and be thankful for what you have.
I have experienced the ups and the downs and I have learned that no matter what happens always keep two feet on the ground and stay true to yourself. What you have may seem little but be thankful for it because someone else out there has less than you.
As far as entitlement in regards to college. There are many ways to reach ones career goals.
Not everyone can afford the most expensive school but if you are smart you will still be able to reach your goals hopefully without much debt if you are self motivated and driven to work hard and not let obstacles come in the way of your goals.
I was always the one who didn’t get a cake, too. My son’s name was always on the cake on our shared birthday. But my kids didn’t care about whose name was on the cake. They cared about the fact that the whole family got to eat it. And we were eating one cake too few per year, in their opinion.
frugaldoctor–when it comes to Birthdays and Christmas–all I can do is shake my head. And not in an approving way.
My BIL had a similar experience with his parents and to tell the truth it was just a lousy, confusing childhood experience that he carried with him for years into adulthood. His parents were good people but the mixed messages are all too real for a kid. He celebrates both with gusto now.
Marian–I would’ve had two cakes–cake is cheap. Or like Hunt it would be ME that didn’t get a cake! Or do like my family–we often can’t get everybody together or the BD is on a weird day in the middle of the week. We just move the celebration to another day. We did this forever when I was little so the party would be on a weekend (I think most everyone did). Kid gets his BD and you when school starts (a real celebration that kids don’t understand!)
My friend’s BD is the day after Christmas but her parents always made sure it was a distinct celebration much to their credit.
I think that post 22 is right on–it’s the acceptance of good fortune with gratitude that is the difference between spoiling/entitlement and pampering.
@gouf78, as I told another person a few minutes ago, it was always my son’s name on the cake on our shared birthday.
That wasn’t the issue anyway. He didn’t care about whose name was on the cake. He cared about having the opportunity to eat cake – something we didn’t often do on days other than birthdays. His issue was that our household was being cheated out of one cake per year.
The cake situation was nothing compared to the issues we faced with our daughter, who noticed that her mother and brother were getting presents in the mail from relatives toward the end of March every year and she was getting nothing. It took years for her to understand the reason. Somehow, even when it was pointed out that Dad wasn’t getting presents either because it wasn’t his birthday, she felt deprived. For a very long time, there was a week or two every year when she felt that nobody loved her.
In our family I never get a birthday cake or celebration. Daughter and I are born 5 days apart. (hers comes first) She will go out with a few friends on the actual day and gets a cake on her birthday and we go out for dinner together on the weekend. So that is one cake a year.
I grew up in an immigrant single parent household in one of the worse parts of New York City. My mother worked 3 jobs, we spoke a foreign language, and personally I never felt that we fit in our neighborhood. I rarely received birthday presents or Christmas gifts specifically because of finances. Trust me, I hated it when I heard about my friends getting gifts or spending time with their fathers. I vowed to shower my kids with gifts if and when I had them. However, as I got older I realized that I had a level of motivation that my classmates lacked. I cherished things they didn’t and tolerated extreme circumstances they wouldn’t and was thankful when they were quick to complain. Ok, I am not sure if this was just my personality, but this tolerance was something that my whole family had in common. We lived without for so long that anything more was appreciated.
So, by the time I became a physician, my wife and I thought really hard about our child-rearing philosophy. We agreed that our children, by default, would not face anything resembling the struggles we faced as children. Moreover, due to the fact that we were now middle class, we may inadvertently give too much. We agreed that birthday and Christmas gifts were big entitlements for kids and probably the most meritless events that they would encounter. We decided that we wouldn’t give our kids these gifts. Despite our personal beliefs, we did not restrict our children from participating in birthday parties for their friends, and we did not restrict family members from giving them gifts. For the most part, they would get 1 or 2 presents from the 2 family members who were eager to five them. In the past 18 years, they may have had 3 birthday parties organized by the grandparents, but all 3 kids celebrated their birthdays on that day.
I know my D1 was not happy about it during first and second grade because her friends had parties (usually at some country club). She would attend those and wonder why she couldn’t have a party. She also felt slighted when she visited homes after Christmas where other kids were showered with gifts. But by 4th grade, she thought the birthday party and Christmas gift thing was silly (her own words). She observed that kids expected gifts that mostly they didn’t use or need. I know from that time on, she was completely fine with it. D3 piano teacher remarked that she was her only student that couldn’t be motivated with a gift or toy for performance and was just happy with accomplishing a task.
With D1, I think we achieved what we wanted. She has been very happy despite being a minimalist! We had to force her to get her driver’s license, force a car on her (seriously, she didn’t want a car), and do so to establish a level of independence we would feel comfortable with to attend an OOS college. We offered her spending money and she steadfastly refused, saying that she was fine. Recently, we went to the bank to deposit some cash she had laying around the house and I was surprised that she had several thousand dollars in her bank account. For which I asked where did she get all of this money. She reminded me that she had collected loose coins over the past 16 years and amassed thousands and that she had not spent any of the money she received as gifts over the years. Yes, we had 20+ containers of coins laying around the house that she collected. Good for her, I may need a loan. However, this is an example of having a lot simply due to the economics of her parents and not her hard work. Fortunately, she is grateful.
In reality, the kids live in an upper middle class neighborhood, big house, private schools, never go hungry, never go cold and are never in fear for their safety. They would have to be out of their freaking minds if they expected me to give them birthday or Christmas gifts on top of all the things they have. But this is our philosophy, others have to choose their own and deal with the consequences good and bad.
Marian–when I was REALLY little my mom bought ME a present too along with my older sister’s BD presents.She never could stand to see little ones left out.
I agree with those who say it depends, that it is easy to blame indulgent parents for kids being entitled, but sometimes it is about the kid themselves. For example, I have seen kids who are very good looking, who end up feeling entitled because they are good looking and got attention for it, that things would revolve around them, even though the parents discouraged that kind of thinking. Likewise, you see really bright kids who because of their intelligence had things come easy, and they kind of grow up expecting that they will always be the center of things, the brightest kid in the room, entitled to being the center of attention is the way I would put it. I have met kids who came out of elite schools with a sense of entitlement, like going to a school like that entitled them to skipping the hard work and such (and I also have met kids out of some not so great schools, who did well in school, who felt the same thing, also met a lot of kids from elite to not so elite schools that worked their tails off and had no entitlement). I think it also depends on entitlement and how you define it, to me entitlement means you assume that for whatever reason, the world revolves around you and owes you something, rather than realizing that what you get out of life is a combination of things others have chosen to give you, out of love and respect, and the things you yourself earn. I liked what someone said about gratitude, and there is a weird kind of entitlement I see in this world that seems to be the opposite of it, but isn’t, and that is the person who thinks like they did everything themself, no one helped them, ever, and therefore have no reason to feel gratitude towards anyone or worse, feel like they may have a duty to repay that gratitude, by paying forward or whatnot, that is another kind of entitlement in my opinion, the entitlement of feeling like they grew up in a bubble, lived in a bubble and therefore owed no one anything at all.
Frugal doctor, growing up, I never had birthday nor Xmas presents either. But I’m a joiner. I celebrate every holiday with cakes and goodies. And of course birthday parties for my kids every year. It’s a big deal in our family when they were younger. As in my husband and I usually took a day off from work for their parties. Today I still do give them money for birthday celebration. Are my kids spoiled? No more than their counter parts. My motto in live is to live well and celebrate life. Let’s not be so hard on our kids just because we grew up that way.
frugaldoctor–You have reasons for how you raised your kids. But it sounds very much like the frugality (for lack of a different word) that many American depression era parents have. I “caught” that “save a dime” mentality from my parents It made sense of course in their history. In part, it makes a good saver but not necessarily a good money manager. It comes from a self-deprivation vibe that isn’t all that great in another era and under different circumstances. I would guess it is the reason your D saved all those coins rather than treating herself. That was me. I still today do not spend money on myself. I can spend it on others easily, just not me.
@DrGoogle that is good for your family and I encourage you to do what works for them. Surprisingly, other than D1 having a hard time for about 2 years, the other 2 kids don’t have a problem with it. That’s all they have known as normal for them. Just as it is normal for the Jehovah Witness child to not celebrate any birthdays; I don’t believe that their parents are being so hard on them either. When I dropped D1 at her dorm, she thanked me for raising her the way that we did.
But I think the whole point of the thread was to understand the origins of the entitled sentiments. In situations that are not caused by mental illness, my belief is that parents haven’t said “no” enough because they are afraid of being too hard on their kids. We chose to say “no” for a very popular tradition and it got the point across to our kids that there are no entitlements in this household. They get to enjoy so many things that we didn’t have growing up and so many kids who are too poor to log onto CC don’t have either. My kids need to focus their appreciation on those things.
If you ever get a chance, listen to This American Life episode 550:three miles. This was such a powerful episode to remind me of the implications of what my kids have and what other kids don’t have.
http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/550/three-miles
PS: Can you imagine what an impoverish kid would think if they had the opportunity to log onto CC and read what our kids whine about?
@frugaldoctor, you had your reasons for the way you raised your kids, and obviously you and your spouse put a lot of thought into the choices you made. And evidently your kids understand and do not resent those choices. So it all seems to have worked out for you.
But choices like yours might not work out so well in other families.
There’s a difference between the situation you experienced when you were growing up – not getting birthday presents because your parents couldn’t give them to you – and the situation your children experienced – not getting birthday presents because their parents chose not to give them.
And except when they’re very young, kids understand this type of difference.
Parents who grew up in frugal circumstances and who feel that this had a positive effect on their development may want to re-create this situation when raising their own children. But I don’t think it’s really possible.
“My parents could give me birthday presents but they don’t” is just not the same thing as “My parents don’t give me birthday presents because they can’t afford to.” And kids will react to these two different situations in different ways.
My kids haven’t had “wish lists” since they finished grade school, and even then they aren’t all that concerned about whether they actually got what was on their wish list. We gave them a bit of spending money every time we went on a trip that they could spend as they chose (about $5/day for the duration of the trip). D would often buy something she liked and S would generally save most or all of it. My kids are incredibly tough to shop for, since they purchase what they want or need with their own funds but do seem to have an attitude of gratitude, which I like.
Yes, my parents fit the former description, and it made me feel upset, deprived, confused, resentful, envious and embarrassed; a whole host of negative feelings I could not even put into words. As a result, I am perfectly fine living frugally if I have to, but big whoop, I give freely and generously to my kids and others; my kids are thankful and appreciative and happy.
I agree with Marian. I can understand why parents may not want to over spend on presents, but there is something to be said on gift giving. We give gifts to people to show our appreciation and love. A gift can be a lunch/dinner out with someone, a hand made present, it doesn’t have to be expensive.
Life is short and can be hard at times. I like to celebrate life, and my children’s births were one the happiest events in my life. If I don’t celebrate that, what would I celebrate?
There were years when my parents couldn’t really afford to give me presents for my birthday. It’s only a few weeks after Christmas and we didn’t have a lot of money. They would put in numerous extra shifts in order to make sure that I always got something even if it was a book or a CD.
Do I remember what I got for my birthdays? Nah, not really. Do I remember that my parents busted their backs to make sure that I would have something for my “special” day (even though I never have and continue to not care about my birthday)? You bet.
To each their own, and everyone is more or less allowed to do whatever they wish within their families. I just know that even as a poor kid, I’d have hated to grow up without ANY sort of presents. Not because I cared about the stuff, but because ~to me~ it is such a wonderful way of showing that you care. Again, not the “stuff” but everything else around it and what they represent. “Hey, I love you enough that I didn’t mind working several extra hours in order to make you feel good.” or “Hey, we might not always get along, but I know and love you enough to know that you really wanted that book and I wanted to make sure you got it.” or whatever. Again, it’s not about the “stuff.” There were years when I was older when I got Meijer gift cards- and they were PERFECT.
Of course, giving presents is not a *substitute *for anything. My dad’s mother tried to substitute money and gifts for love and affection and would hand out money to her kids like they were candy… but was never really a parent to them. She was cold, mean, and neglectful. Today, only 1 of her 4 sons has any kind of relationship with her (and that 1 is not my dad).