Selfishness and narcissism are certainly not new, in fact the very word narcissism comes from the ancient Greek myth of Narcissus. But it does seem like there's a bit of a entitlement epidemic going around - for example the guy who yelled "get the government out of my social security!" at one of those town hall meetings in 2009. And this is peanuts compared to the AIG executives - they were guaranteed hundreds of millions for nearly driving the country in bankruptcy and they believed they deserved every cent! In this article the authors describe how this culture is affecting children.
http://www.deseretnews.com/article/700174443/The-age-of-entitlement-Selfishness-is-rampant-but-can-be-corrected-experts-say.html?pg=1
This article definitely changed my feelings about how to teach children about money, respect and family obligations. I couldn't help but think of Kant's moral philosophy when reading this - the only truly good acts are those done for the sake of good itself. How soon is too soon to read
Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals?
The entitlement epidemic has more consequences than an increasingly selfish populace. It also causes kids who were raised to believe they deserved the world to grow into listless and unfulfilled adults: http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2011/07/how-to-land-your-kid-in-therapy/8555/
ReplyDeleteMy favorite story about an AIG exec's sense of entitlement:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/25/opinion/25desantis.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&ref=opinion
Tiffany, great article thanks! Raising kids feels almost hopeless, there nare so many ways to screw them up haha.
ReplyDeleteMichael, you should ask QRM for a retention contract :)