Are today's kids ruder than generations past? Do they really have a bad attitude and no respect, or is it just perception?

I work for the local government at a museum that specializes in school tours for kids studying Native Americans in the area. I'm amazed by the behavior of the children, especially when it happens in front of their parents. We'll have kids running inside, screaming, ripping displays off of the walls, ruining merchandise, asking if they can have stuff in the gift shop for free, and generally being disrespectful. It's not just at work, it's everywhere. If I would have run in a museum, screaming and yelling, I would have had it handed to me.

Are today's kids ruder than generations past? Do they really have a bad attitude and no respect, or is it just perception?

I work for the local government at a museum that specializes in school tours for kids studying Native Americans in the area. I'm amazed by the behavior of the children, especially when it happens in front of their parents. We'll have kids running inside, screaming, ripping displays off of the walls, ruining merchandise, asking if they can have stuff in the gift shop for free, and generally being disrespectful. It's not just at work, it's everywhere. If I would have run in a museum, screaming and yelling, I would have had it handed to me.

If I had acted that way as a kid, my parents would have drowned me.

Kids aren't rude. They're just often misunderstood. Or unforgiven.

It's probably a combination of little discipline, and living in a competitive, demanding society. But when it comes to kids, they have always been loud. Its just that *you* are older, and notice it more.

I'm still not so old I don't understand kids. My mom ran a daycare, my sister teaches, and I've worked around them since I turned 15. It definately seems to have gotten worse. Yeah, kids are loud, but it's a matter of knowing when to be loud and when to not be loud. The elementary school kids are pretty bad, but it's the teenagers that are the worst. (Not all of them, we have some boyscouts that help out and are great.) One group was playing hide and go seek, with one girl standing behind another, covering the first girls eyes so they were walking blind throughout the exhibits.

If I had acted that way as a kid, my parents would have drowned me.


That is the point. Parents DONT drown their kids for acting rude and disrespectful now a days, then we get mad at kids for not knowing any better, how is that fair?

I know that one of the reason i am in demand as a babysitter is that I am going to enforce the rules that my mother taught me, (general rules about respect) Right in front of the mom, i will tell the kids not speak that way to their siblings and etc. I dont want to be around kids who are rude, and the time to tell them not to act like that is when they are young.

we cant talk about the kids of today w/out talking about their parents

Maybe they learn to disrepectfull from things your sig?

i should hope that kids 12 and under are not looking at my sig.

I think it's fair to say that children are a reflection of their parents and their society. Look at what we force on our young minds. It shouldn't suprise you that a vast majority of them are so bad.

Not that I'm blaming society. I think it comes down to parents who either don't care, or don't have the balls to dicipline their kids. I've met a ton of parents (mostly young parents) who seem to think they are babysitting for someone else.

There are a CONSIDERABLE NUMBER of mitigating factors at work....ONE in particular, is the mass media behemoth called TELEVISION that acts as the "electronic baby-sitter" whilst the parents are elsewhere....Thus infusing the atypical and inappropriate socila skills needed for said youth to proplerly function & interact in polite society..where the youth are sent out to mingle amongst at the shopping malls, dining emporiums, cinemas, etc....when they've had their fill of the telly & the video games.....

christ on a cracker! misunderstood? unforgiven? this is suppose to excuse their behavior?

i didnt act like this. not in public anyway, not when it mattered. outside at home was one thing, but when you go to a museum and i've been to many and been on many tours as a kid in different states i was QUIET. i was behaved and gave very little grief, in private was a different matter all together, i acted like any kid would then. i learned at an early age to say please thank you you're welcome and to hold doors open for people. i was taught it was the right thing to do and i still believe it is and nothing will change my mind on this.

now when i was a kid i had seen other kids acting out and giving their parents headaches in stores, especially the grocery store. the check out lane was THE spot as it had candy! and when a kid is told no...they love nothing more than to immediately lay down on the floor kicking and screaming and crying and the parent is standing there mortified hoping everyone doesnt think they're abusing their child, well some kids anyway. i dont think it happened too often but i do remember watching kids going into full blown temper tantrums back then, and i think i see it more often now.

the mall is a great place for teenagers, and is the greatest place for them to perfect the "shoulder block". i'm sure you're seen this or even had it tried on you by some punk ass kid or teenager. for those who dont know the shoulder block it is simple, you walk in the mall and if you see someone that you might come into contact with you lock your eyes on to them and hope its enough to make them move from "your path" or barring that, show them you dont like them being in your way by hitting them in the shoulder with your shoulder. this is a favorite past time of many in the local mall i try to avoid at all costs (and the mall sucks anyway, too expensive) this behavior isnt isolated to malls but all kinds of major retail stores, target, costco, grocery stores, walmart...

but it isnt just the mall, try walmart, people of all ages walk through there or the grocery stores as though A) they are the only person there, which means they walk right down the middle of aisles or B) know you're there and simply dont give a **** if you're inconvenienced by their rude behavior. now do you need to be told not to park your ****ing cart in the middle of an aisle? you'd say no but you'd be wrong. go to your local wally world and record how many times you see this behavior. it happens more often than you think.


now i think part of this behavior is natural in young people, they are exploring the boundaries set for them by their parents, the people in their environment such as their teachers or neighbors to law enforcement and beyond. another factor is parents not setting boundaries or poor ones, when it comes to respectful behavior there has to be clearly defined boundaries, rude is wrong and unacceptable period, but not all kids are taught this. some parents really are afraid they'll be too hard on their kids if they flat out "law down the law" in certain respects. so what happens? kids dont learn their boundaries and then do as they please and the parents are left feeling frustrated because their kids arent behaving as they had hoped. well mannered kids normally do no happen spontaneously, it takes "training" from parents, repeated reminders and reenforcement, both positive and negative. i think society does play a role in this BUT, an important thing to remember here is parents are more in control of what their kids watch and play with (such as on their PS2 for example) than they think or want to think. i remember when i was told no to something that was it, no discussion allowed. i learned my boundaries, there is a time and a place for everything, when you're very young you are restricted from a lot of things and for good reason, not to give you a hard time or jsut to piss you off. now a lot of times i had to ask why, because i'm a curious person, i asked a lot of questions, but explaining these thigns to children or even attempting to explaining it to them can really go a long way between them thinking you're on a power trip with the "because i said so" routine and them understanding your point of view with things like "because you might burn the house down or hurt yourself if you play with matches".

i think in general kids are more rude, or rather they are more vocal and bold about it than they used to be. spankings are practically outlawed and time out usually consists of them going to a room with a TV a video game system like the PS2 or the nofriendo lamecube. so timeouts dont work when their room is full of toys gizmos and gadgets, and without any form of punishment that means anything they dont learn that when they **** up things are taken away from them. so i think less effective punishment has lead to an increased amount of publically viewed rude behavior.

of course some parents simply dont give a ****, they think its all perfectly natural behavior (yes if you're a ****ing savage cave man!) and have convinced themselves that the kids will outgrow it (fat chance and the odds are agaisnt this in all reality) and have also convinced themselves if they try to keep them quiet they're being mean, again no authority over the kids so the kids think they have no boundaries and noone to answer to so they do as they please...see where this is going folks?

yes TV is a factor but again, parents have more control over what their kids watch than they think (try not having a TV for a change! having a TV isnt a right anyway)

i think some of the more outlandish and outrageous behavior has increased but generally dumbassery and tomfoolery has remained the same, you just see it more often than you use to. maybe compared to kids from 50-60 years ago where talking back got you a few licks with a switch, yeah kids are generally more rude than kids from the past, but maybe not so much more than kids from 10-20 years ago.

i do think effective parenting techniques have also been on the decline, along with basic quality parenting and parent involvement in their kids lives.


BTW watch nanny 911 on fox sometime, this show is un****ingreal. there are kids who act like total savages and the parents...oh boy, incompetent is an understatement. the parents dont agree on how the kids should be punished or treated so without solidarity the kids are left to do as they please, one father was left out of the parenting loop for a long time...the show is probably showcasing the worst case scenarios but i've seen kids act like this in public and with more frequency so i'm question if maybe, just maybe these kids and these parents arent becoming the norm.

I'm still not so old I don't understand kids. My mom ran a daycare, my sister teaches, and I've worked around them since I turned 15. It definately seems to have gotten worse. Yeah, kids are loud, but it's a matter of knowing when to be loud and when to not be loud. The elementary school kids are pretty bad, but it's the teenagers that are the worst. (Not all of them, we have some boyscouts that help out and are great.) One group was playing hide and go seek, with one girl standing behind another, covering the first girls eyes so they were walking blind throughout the exhibits.

They're alot like adults, except littler. :) Really, even the griping and getting loud, when you get right down to it, are just littler versions of adults.

They're alot like adults, except littler. :) Really, even the griping and getting loud, when you get right down to it, are just littler versions of adults.

This is true. I'm convinced that children under three can not be *taught* anything, they will only do what they want, and what they want is to do what they see.

Loud, rude parents = loud, rude kids.

In fact basically:

____ parents = ____kids

Every time

One thing see in today's kids is that they are bringing themselves up. Without boundaries they can not know any different. THis is not an excuse but as an example I'll use what I observe in the complex where I live. There are some families here but mostly there are single parent families that work two or three jobs to make ends meet often leaving their children at home to fen for themselves in reality learning to live by what the child knows and no parent giving boundaries to live by. This single parent family has been growing exponentally ans so we see many children acting like two year olds because they only know that.
I'm sure there are many factors that make up this equation but I look at this everyday and it makes me sad that there are so many kids left alone to grow them selves up.

This is true. I'm convinced that children under three can not be *taught* anything, they will only do what they want, and what they want is to do what they see.

Loud, rude parents = loud, rude kids.

In fact basically:

____ parents = ____kids

Every time

excellent point made. soccer games often bring out the devil in seemingly normal mothers.