Spoiled kids? Raise your hand!

I know that parents & grandparents through the ages have told the next generation how much better they have it then the parents & grandparents had it when they were growing up. I have been told the same thing by my dad, hundreds of times growing up and even as an adult.

It always starts with… “When I was a kid….” “We had to WALK to school…in the SNOW…with NO SHOES…UPHILL both ways…” “We didn’t have TOYS…we had to play with rocks & sticks and old tires…” “We didn’t get to go out to eat…our town didn’t even have a café…and we couldn’t have afforded it if it did…”

You get the picture.

I have to say the same thing about my kids. I am the one in my generation saying it.

I noticed this morning that Saturday morning cartoons were on and DS didn’t even seem to care. They don’t get excited about much of anything anymore the Saturday morning cartoons because they may be missing a chromosome have cartoon overload. They have access to cartoons 24 hours a day, on more than one channel. Cartoon Network, Nickelodeon, Nick Jr, (if you have DirecTv this list could go on and on)

I never was ‘into’ cartoons as a kid I was too busy being ‘grown’ and smoking cigarettes but my older brother was and he looked forward to Saturday morning cartoons & after school kids shows. (Sigmund the Sea Monster, Bugaloos, Land of the Lost)

Kids don’t (or at least MY kids don’t) appreciate all the electronics and video games they have. When I was a kid the only video game option was Atari, and only my friends who lived on the opposite side of town from me had rich parents had the Atari. We didn’t have it. Mine have PS2, PS3, Wii, PSP, DS, GameCube… And I still hear “I’m bored” at least 3 or 4 times a day.

My kids have too much crap each have their own tv in their room with a dvd player and a satellite box hooked up to their tv. They can go in their room at any time of day and watch anything they want to. But they DON’T. They want to come in the living room on the big tv and watch all their kid’s shows and get all bent out of shape when I don’t want 2 more hours of Zack & Cody or Sonny With a Chance on my tv.

Kids have sensory overload and have been overwhelmed with ‘things’ to a point they are numb and unappreciative of how “good they have it”. I had to say it. Because it’s true. But telling them how good they have it goes in one ear then goes right out the other doesn’t do any good. If it is all you have ever known then you don’t appreciate it. If you grow up poor then get a bunch of stuff you appreciate it. But these kids didn’t grow up poor. They grew up with all this crap. And once they have all the crap there is, where do you go from there? I can’t fix them being bored. (I was not put here to entertain these kids 24 hours a day.) My job is to raise them with little to no violence against their person feed them, educate them, and send them on their way.

I refuse to be the circus ringleader.