What Would the Easter Bunny Say? Helicopter Parents Ruin Colorado Easter Egg Hunt
In pursuit of plastic eggs: How about a little perspective, parents?
I’m laughing over this story, which I read yesterday in the Toronto Star online, about the cancellation of the annual Easter Egg Hunt, sponsored by the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory and held in Colorado Springs, thanks to past instances of overzealous parents hopping (ha!) the rope lines to “help” their children get the most eggs. That’s not funny, obviously. I’m laughing because if I didn’t, I’d cry.
I’d cry because I could just imagine it: A small clutch of parents who arrived early in order to be first at the entrance, pressing their kids against the barriers, whispering in their ears that they needed to jump right in the minute the event started, perhaps pointing out eggs they could see to help them develop an optimal collection strategy. I can imagine the parents right behind those parents, suddenly thinking, “Well, if her kid is going to run in first, I better get my kid up there, too.” And then I can imagine some hyper type having the inspired idea to just jump on in there with the kids. You know, to help, because they just can’t bear the idea of their child coming up with just one egg, or two, or anyway, not the most.
One dad, a guy named Lenny Watkins who took his friend’s child to the event in 2009, is quoted at the end of the piece. If you thought he might have bemoaned other parents’ crazed attempts to get the most eggs for their kids, you’re wrong. He apparently sees nothing untoward, undignified, or even embarrassing about the specter of a bunch of grown men and women leaping the rope barriers meant to corral the kids in the egg-finding area and (one has to imagine) pushing past or knocking over other parents and children in pursuit of the most stuff (and can we point out here that the stuff in question is chocolate inside plastic eggs; it’s not diamonds and rubies or an admission ticket to Harvard).
In fact — this is the part where I felt like crying — he saw nothing wrong with the actions of these helicopter parents in the slightest:
“You better believe I’m going to help my kid get one of those eggs,” he said. “I promised my kid an Easter egg hunt, and I’d want to give him an even edge.”
I get that parents want to give their kids an edge in life. That’s normal; if we are not our children’s best advocates, who would be? But wanting to give our kids an edge should mean things like feeding them wholesome food and reading to them and helping them understand long division, or knocking on dramatically slammed bedroom doors after a decent interval, to see if the soap-opera star within would like to talk about the latest middle-school indignity.
Helping your eight-year-old get the most eggs is not giving her an edge in life, though there’s an argument to be made that doing so gives her an edge in being obnoxious, selfish, and possibly pre-diabetic.
You better believe that a guy like Watkins’ son or daughter is, or soon may be, the kind of kid who selfishly counts his or her eggs (and you can substitute anything else for eggs here — friends, gifts, grades) without a thought to (a) how many eggs one person needs; or (b) how emotionally satisfying it can be, at an egg hunt, to find an egg in the tall grass, look up and notice a smaller or slower child who hasn’t found one yet, and handing it to that child.
Modeling that sort of behavior would be a nice “edge” to give your child, don’t you think?
March 27, 2012 @ 10:09 am
Wow. Good behavior is getting harder to find, isn’t it? Last night we went to a meeting for my 10th-grade boys upcoming Confirmation. They talked ad nauseam about the “no photographs allowed in church” rule. Period. End of story. Why? Because in the past, parents have staked out their spots in the center aisles with flash bulbs blazing so that they could capture every moment. Fellow parishioners be damned! It became such a circus freak show that the archdioceses put a stop to it.
March 27, 2012 @ 10:13 am
Christina, thanks. You’re right; good parental behavior/modeling is very hard to spot. Funny you should mention a church thing — last night, I was at a penance service for the kids in our religion classes with my fourth-grader. There’s a big crowd of kids and parents, and about six priests, and you line up in the aisle to head toward the priest you’d like to talk to. I knew my son, like many, wanted our popular pastor, Father Frank. So there I am, whispering to him, “when they say it’s time, quietly stand and walk over to Father Frank’s line.” At the same time, two other moms practically leapt over the pews with their kids to muscle their way to the front of the line. IN CHURCH.
Sigh.
Denise
March 28, 2012 @ 7:34 am
I think maybe in reality, it’s not that there aren’t many good parents, it’s just that the bad ones stand out more. If there was a big crowd and only two mothers were pushy then maybe that’s not so bad. Even when it’s hard, I try to ignore those types and focus on the positive…there are still plenty of good parents out there!
March 28, 2012 @ 8:14 am
Elise, I agree — I wouldn’t want to believe, and I don’t believe, that all or even most parents are bad or have the wrong intentions. But the ones who do things like push their kids to the head of the line and so on? They stand out,and somehow set the tone for behavior generally. As an overall societal rule, selfishness is rewarded, don’t you think?
Denise
March 28, 2012 @ 9:16 am
I guess it partly depends on how you look at it. On the one hand, it appears that selfishness is rewarded but then when you look more closely at a selfish person’s life, I believe that they are the one suffering. My husband is one one of the best things about my life and he would never have married a selfish person – I “won”. I also think eventually children of selfish parents will treat their parents the way that their parents have shown them how to treat people -they “lose”. I am not perfect and I often times will get aggravated at these kinds of people but I do TRY to tell myself that I would never want to be like them and I am really the one with the better life. I remind myself that I have a choice to either be like them or not. For me, this makes me feel better.
I also try to remind myself of the ways that I am not being such a great person sometimes:) It makes it just a bit easier for me to accept other people’s imperfections…ha ha. But then again, these are just my own techniques for surviving in a world where there are so many aggravating people!
As a side note: I thought it was kind of funny that my son (who is now 19 years old) also went through the same situation as you encountered at his first confession. Much to my dismay, he ended up being “stuck” with the visiting priest who he did not know but in the end it worked out better. Not only was this priest a calm, sweetheart, my son didn’t have to feel uncomfortable confessing to the priest he knew and would see every Sunday in church.
March 27, 2012 @ 10:54 am
I find it aggravating that the poorly behaved parents ruined the event for the well behaved children. I’m sure there were parents out there that stood back, let their kids enjoy searching for eggs, and then taught the little munchkins to share their eggs with the other kids or their siblings. But these kids and parents now don’t get the chance to enjoy the festivities. Sad, but I guess another opportunity to teach that life isn’t fair!
March 27, 2012 @ 10:59 am
I took my daughters to a fishing derby when they were little. Your post reminded me of how annoyed I was, watching other dads (and a few moms) just about holding their kids poles themselves. You’re right that our part is to show them how to fish before hand, ensure they have the right tools to compete, and then make sure they eat right and get plenty of rest the night before. I was deeply saddened to watch one father at that fishing event, berating this young son for not working harder at catching a fish, and for being more engaged in drawing pictures in the dirt with a stick. It has always been incidents like this that keep me doing what I do today… helping and encouraging parents to do what’s right.
March 28, 2012 @ 10:35 pm
Yeah, this stuff really hits home for me because my oldest has Aspergers and we have to more consciously model and explicitly explain appropriate social behavior to him than we do for his brother – a fact that makes us hyper aware of both our actions and those around us. What are we teaching our kids? That winning is everything? That other people’s enjoyment (especially that of people more vulnerable – i.e. kids, the elderly, etc) is immaterial as long as I get mine?
If this is how those Easter Egg Hunts turn out, I’d keep my kids home…
One reason why we joined a church and I reached out to our neighbors is that we believe that being part of a community is important – not for what you GET but learning how to GIVE. That actions have consequences – positive and negative – and that we all need to look out for each other. Kids tend towards the selfish- they don’t need encouragement in that direction…
April 10, 2012 @ 2:56 pm
It is sad, that parents have to ruin a perfectly innocent outing for selfishness. I miss the days of “not every kid makes the team” and “not everyone gets a trophy”. You get what you get depending on how hard you work for it! It’s worked for many of years before now, who decided to change it?!??!! I would like to meet those people. Elise is a better person than me, I am the one with the loud mouth hinting to people to knock it off and let the kids have fun, who cares how many eggs they get. They still will have fun regardless. It is always the parents that most likely cause the problems in alot of situations these days.
April 10, 2012 @ 3:05 pm
Yes, I took my 2 year old daughter to our local borough egg hunt and she walked out with one egg (which is fine because the kid doesn’t need a bucket full of sugar). The irritating thing was that most of the parents did the hunting FOR their kids. As I walked next to her pointing to an egg here or there for her to grab, trying to let her get the hang of this thing, other parents were already there snatching the eggs almost right out of her hand. The best part was when they mock-handed the eggs to their kids (read: dropped them in the basket for them awkwardly while trying to pretend their kid did it all themselves and pulling them to the next egg). I’m not even sure why some of the parents brought their kids in the field with them in the first place.
April 26, 2012 @ 11:52 am
Oh man, this does bring tears to my eyes. I’ve seen this happen in our neighborhood and I found it so sad to see parents screaming at their kids “Over there, Look! Look! You’re missing these…Run…Go!” Their parents were horrified that they weren’t getting enough eggs. One kid was examining an egg, taking such pleasure in feeling it, opening it up, and –of course–the dad had to ruin it by throwing the egg in the bag and telling him to “hurry up”.
Just found your blog – SO EXCITED ABOUT THIS!!! Oh, so nice to know there are like-minded parents out there.