Parents: Making Kids Feel Like Crap One Generation at a Time

No one on earth can quite pour on the guilt like a parent. Since the beginning of time it has been the parents responsibility to be the official "path straightener" for their children. In their parental arsenal are two weapons "Physical Discipline": this is what I preferred as a child. Please just hit me, get it over with and I will do better. The other is "Psychological Discipline" (I think I just made this term up). Psychological Discipline includes things like losing privileges, isolation (sitting in the corner, sitting alone in your room, or if you're my creepy teacher's assistant when I was in kindergarten, making the child sit alone in a dark, spooky arts and crafts closet. That's probably another story for another time though.) By far the most effective form of Psychological Discipline is Guilt!! Parents are (as my friend says) travel agents for guilt trips. I very clearly remember the very first guilt trip I ever took. And dear old dad was the tour guide. My dad, my brother Adam and I were sitting in a car in a store parking lot waiting for my mother to come out. A fellow walked past our car. This man's face was discolored, disfigured and he was just pretty strange looking. Thinking that this was just a naturally ugly guy, my brother and I commence to mocking him something fierce. My dad listened for a few minutes then very slowly turned to the back seat with a very serious look on his face. We grew quiet. He looked at us then asked, "Do either of you know why that man looks like that?" Sensing this was a trick question, we didn't answer. "Not too long ago, that man was working in a store that got robbed. He was shot in the head that night. It's a miracle that he lived. His face looks different now because of the surgeries they had to do to save his life." Then my dad just turned around to let us wallow in our shame. The worse part was that there was no way to make it better, since we couldn't go apologize to the guy. He'd never even seen or heard us. So needless to say, I'm a bit slow to mock strangers to this day. My path was effectively straightened. Now I'm a mom and it never hit me until recently, that I too am now a travel agent for guilt trips. And little Ethan (though I doubt he'll remember this in a few years) took one just last night. The set up is exactly the same. I'm sitting in a store parking lot with the children waiting on Rick to come out. A police car parks near us. Ethan asks "Why is a policeman here?" "I don't know son." Then, and I'm not real sure where he picked up this cliche at only four years old, he says with a very condescending tone to his voice, "Probably going to buy some more donuts." Now at first glance it could have been funny, but I guess you'd have to have heard the disrespect in his voice when he said it. I turn around, "Ethan" I said "you should never ever disrespect a policeman like that. They do not ride around eating donuts all day. If some bad guy were to break in our house the policeman is the one who would come save us. They fight the bad guys every day, and sometimes they even get killed. They are very brave. You should never make fun of them." I turned around and a few minutes later I noticed that he was still silent. "What's wrong Ethan?" His lip quivered and he said, "I feel bad. Please don't tell dad what I said." Even though he may not remember this exact exchange when he's older, I hope subconsciously he always remembers "making fun of policemen makes me feel bad". I guess I'm an official "path straightener" now too.