In post-liberalisation India and the new millennium in particular, with newly affluent and indulgent parents giving in to their children’s every whim and demand, there is rising awareness that we are raising a generation of self-centred, narcissistic children with an overweening sense of entitlement – Jayalakshmi Vaidyanathan & Mini P On August 9, a Haryana youth drove a brand new BMW motor car into a canal near Yamunanagar in a fit of rage because his father presented him a BMW (price tag: Rs.45 lakh) when he had set his heart on a Land Rover Jaguar (Rs.1.1 crore). The young man wanted his landowner father to know how upset he was over the trivial birthday gift. So he recorded a video of his protest and posted it on social media. Though this example of a spoilt rich brat throwing a tantrum when he didn’t get his own way is over the top, in urban newly affluent households — and even rural India — there is growing disquiet about I-me-myself children and youth of the 21st century. With the country’s small but growing newly affluent class parents conceding every whim and demand of their children, there’s rising awareness that a generation of self-centred, narcissistic children with an overweening sense of entitlement is running amok countrywide. As nuclear households with working parents become normative in urban India, the dynamics of parent-child relationships are changing radically. Within the country’s newly rich haute bourgeoisie it has suddenly become politically incorrect to discipline children and deny them instant gratification. ‘My children right or wrong’ is becoming a normative sentiment and the newly emergent selfie and Instagram generation is taking full advantage of permissive parenting. “Millennial parents want to give their children the best — materially and emotionally. But in their yearning to become ideal parents, they are over-protecting and over-indulging children. However it’s time parents become aware that parenting is not a popularity contest; it’s about raising well-balanced children while providing love, comfort and emotional security. Couples who mollycoddle and over-indulge their children are in effect encouraging them to transform into narcissistic and self-centred spoilt brats incapable of accepting denial and refusal. Learning begins at home and the onus is on parents and caregivers to develop positive social skills such as sharing, caring, empathy and respect for rules and authority in children. Parenting is a responsible duty,” says Vyshakha Chikkanagoudar, psychologist at the Asara Centre for Psychological Wellness, Bangalore. This phenomenon of over-indulged spoilt brats with money to burn is not peculiarly Indian. Around the world, over-indulgent parenting — particularly in newly emergent less developed countries — by the nouveau riche (especially in the political class) has resulted in spoilt brats running amok and setting bad examples for impressionable children to follow. A 2015 study of 565 children aged seven-12 and their families conducted in the Netherlands, concluded that narcissism is more likely to manifest when a child is “overvalued” by parents during her development stages. The objective of the study, jointly conducted by Ohio State, Amsterdam…
