Brats much?

Wow. It’s been a long time since I’ve last blogged about anything. It’s been 6 years or so. I usually blogged whenever I was frustrated, annoyed or angry about something. This time, I am annoyed with the kids of today.

Last week, I was at the mall. I had to grab some groceries and a card for my broadband. Right in front of the load retailer (or whatever you call these stalls), is a little playground located in the middle of the mall. It was hard to not notice the fat, obviously spoiled, kid who was screaming at the top of his lungs, saying something like “I want my fries now! I want my fries NOW!” The kid pretended to cry, though I couldn’t see any tears. Hello crocodile tears. Being a mom myself, I was intrigued with how the child's guardians (the couple's probably the brat's parents) would handle their little bundle of joy, and was surprised and disappointed with what they said. “Okay baby, we’ll get you the french fries. Just stay here with yaya, okay?” I couldn’t help but raise my eyebrows in surprise, shake my head and say “What?!” All the nanny did was wipe the kid’s back with a towel, and let him resume his fake crying. That was about 3 minutes of fake bawling. (And yes, I wasted about 5 minutes of my time just observing this family. Creepy, right?) He was prolly thinking "Must.stay.consistent.with.the.fake.crying." At last, the fries arrived and the fake crying finally stopped. The kid didn't even thank his folks. When his mom handed him the cup, he brought the fries to the slide and continued to play while eating. Kids are messy eaters, I should know. (I got one heck of a messy eater myself, and I repeatedly tell her to not litter.) The parents of this brat, after giving him the bleeping fries, were nowhere to be seen. Well, the nanny was there... texting the entire time! Voila! What else did they expect from a bratty kid who’d go down the slide holding a cup of fries in his hand? About half of the P140 cup of fries was fed to the inanimate floor and slide. Not only did the kid manage to give the people within a 10-meter radius a migraine (there was an echo while he did the pretend crying thing), he also managed to make the maintenance people's jobs a tad harder.

I did not write about this to tell people how to be parents. I am not a perfect mother. Far from it. I just can’t help but compare the kids of my time versus the kids of today. During my time, if a kid started to become annoying, a healthy spanking was definitely on the way (in my case, my mom would pinch me if we were in public and spank me if we were in our house). Back then, if a kid pretended to cry just to get something he or she wanted, the parents would either tell them firmly to stop or would not pay them any attention until they get tired of their fake crying. We didn't even need explanations from them. "Because I said so" worked real well then.

I am a firm believer of what Rizal has said – “Spare the rod and spoil the child.” I don’t want the adults to end up bruising, physically abusing, or excessively hurting the kids, but if the kids start thinking that they are the boss instead of the child, a good spanking should be in order.