Vive la Différence: Why American Kids Are Brats

ideas.time.com

1 pointtokenadult2 comments

I have a morbid fascination with articles like this, and it bug me. Even though a few ideas in the piece may feel intuitively correct, this is mainly just anecdote driven journalism; no evidence, no statistics, just a handful of observations from what is (probably) an elite-mid atlantic urban neighborhood. Parents may seem hyper-competitive and hyper-protective in her neck of the woods. In mine, not so much. It's pretty lame to say "American kids are brats" based on the handful of interactions the author has had in her community.

Who knows. I'm sure there is some crotchety French expat in the Netherlands bemoaning the state of French kids today.

Ok, let's say the author's methodology is flawed. Does that make her larger point invalid? Should we not, as parents, be mindful of our children's manners?

My daughter is starting to develop her vocabulary now, and this article was a good reminder to me that we need to start pushing "please" and "thank you".

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