I Am Special!
“I deserve good things, I am entitled to my share of happiness. I refuse to beat myself up. I am an attractive person. I am fun to be with.” – Stuart Smalley
In my last entry, I alluded – in somewhat of a big way – that I and many others are frustrated with the fact that every child needs to be an all-star. There aren’t losers. There aren’t competitive kids – they’re all winners in their own way. That’s a yarn full of crap and is a disservice to our children. And, yes, this is a notion brought about by fluffy liberals and progressives who don’t believe in anything negative and in the human nature to overcome negativity by becoming stronger. They’re probably the same parents who have raised this new crop of allergic-to-everything kids. Obviously, so many kids are medicated instantly when an illness swoops in and administered psychological care upon a crying breakdown. Otherwise we wouldn’t have this climate at all! Give me a break. When I was a kid there might have been just one “allergic” kid and their maladies were most often real and the students competed against one another to win – and to lose. Never mind the fact that no longer can our kids play dodgeball with those ultra-bouncy balls – Nerf balls are now the norm. WHAT?!?!?!
I know this may just seem like a rant, but the implications of this behavior go far beyond what we understand. Like I stated, parental skills such as these produce overly selfish and self-serving children. In the face of loss, these kids have no idea what to do except for either 1) cry or 2) force the issue until they win. Neither option helps them in what becomes the real world. But then, we do have George W. Bush – a child still that cannot deal with anything but pure allegiance – as our infamously terrible president.
Here’s a sample from an interesting article brought to my attention by my dear wife concerning all this and more:
“Frere Jacques” in preschool, for example. French children may still sing it as “Brother Jack! You’re sleeping! Ring the bells!” But in America the once innocuous song has been converted to: “I am special! I am special! Look at me! ” No surprise that the little train that could is exhausted: It’s been laden with super-sized American egos.
Now, go and tear down those egos, folks!
I heard a report on NPR that “tag” was being banned at a growing number of elementary schools because fat kids typically have a permanent status of being “it.”
Isn’t one of the most prominent concerns of upcoming generations childhood obesity? How the hell are we (as a nation) supposed to remedy this disease without “free play” games such as tag? Trust me, those fat kids never joined the basketball, track, or soccer team at my school. They either played tag, or stayed fat (or played football, and stayed fat, which I never understood).
Right.
The mere fact that the kids are out there playing tag in the fist place is a good thing! To ban it because the slower, unfit, or overweight kids can’t hang is PC to the ridiculous. An appreciation for competition is something that every child needs to learn and not through a hand-held controller, either. America is so obsessed with white-washing everything and making sure that every kid is on an even playing level that it seems that honest competition as a skill has been lost. There are winners, which is great! There are losers, which is great, too! It affords the losers an opportunity to learn and maybe even excel so that they don’t lose next time. Ah, and when this happens, it keeps the winners on their toes as well, or they’ll not be winners for very long!
I never understood the fat kids that stayed fat during football season, too. ‘Tis a mystery, my friend.