The Entitled Generation

By Richard Ardia

Society has a way of creating labels for cultural changes within our society. The label “The Entitled Generation” has been circulated widely among the population, mentioned many times in the media, and discussed among a variety of educators and parents.

The exposure to this term has adhered to the generation of young people who have been enabled and overprotected by their parents and guardians. A very real softening of the standards applied to previous generations has worked itself into time-outs and explanations or excuses, instead of effective disciplines and consequences.

News reports of children suing their parents and a wide outbreak of young people feeling they are entitled to endless indulgences without taking responsibility for their own actions exists today. This may well be a result of being enabled and disabled by those that have great influence on their behaviors and attitudes.

Far too many parents, guardians, and grandparents have collapsed on the methods necessary to build responsibility and create realistic expectations. Unfortunately, the word no has all but evaporated from common use. We are experiencing a true evolution in the methods used to raise our children and young adults. Today, we celebrate when a child behaves well as it seems to have become the exception rather than the rule.

How did this happen? Why did it happen? Is it truly as bad as some would claim? What can we do to reverse the polarity of the movement? The Entitled Generation will chronologically highlight the answers to these and many more questions. It is very important to understand how and why our methodology for raising our children has changed so much from previous generations.

What were the cultural events that created the need for these changes? The purpose of this book is to provide a complete understanding of this shifting movement, yet to simply identify the causes is not enough to justify the purpose of this book.

The author combines his vast business and management experiences, his time serving as an educator, and his own life experiences to provide fourteen key solutions. These guidelines will combine the best methods in business management with the most effective guidelines for parents and guardians having the responsibility of raising children. The future of our country will always remain in the hands of the next generation.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Feb 15, 2021
• ISBN: 9781646282319

Book preview

America, the Way It Was

One of the first words I ever learned in my life was the word no . This little word, with huge meaning, meant you did not get your own way just because you wanted something. It also meant that your parents were to be respected for their judgment, and they should not be challenged for their judgment. The word no functioned like a Stop sign that did not fall down with the first approaching counterattack. Its use then, as it is now, is a critical step in teaching self-discipline and self-control to children and young adults.

In 1942, the year I was born, the world was deeply entangled in a massive spiderlike web of horror and destruction. World War II was dominating the headlines, and people of all nations felt vulnerable. With the ripples of a wartime environment penetrating the hearts and lives of millions, life itself was a very tenuous commodity. Individual family tragedies were being reported almost daily. and war-related grief and fear spread across the land like a New England fog.

During these years, America was not just a group of states shown on a map. It was a country united in goals, spirit, and competitive determination to win the war and bring home the troops. World War II ripped a piece out of everyone. It shattered many lives and changed the dreams and ambitions of millions of people. On the other side of the coin, it also served to pull together a nation that was made up of a wide diversity of nationalities and cultural traditions.

During the war years, the majority of Americans made a direct or ancillary contribution to the war effort. Everything from old tires to scrap metal were gathered and delivered to holding stations to be used in the war effort. Men, women, and even children participated consistently toward helping the troops win the war. Keep in mind that during this period literally every aspect of manufacturing had been put on hold to accommodate the products and equipment needed to supply our troops. New car models all but stood still until the war had ended in 1945. Americans had pushed hard in the same direction for many years.

Those kind of prolonged national efforts and personal sacrifices have never been duplicated on the same scale and for that same period of time. Only when we were attacked on September 11, 2001, did war once again weld this country together like a single I-beam.

Patriotism Was Strong

Patriotism was at an all-time high from coast to coast. Most classroom students started their day with the Pledge of Alliance to our flag. During the fifties, my high school homeroom began everyday with that pledge to our flag and was then followed by a student standing and reading a passage from the Holy Bible. And during this period, there were no exceptions. If you missed your day to read due to illness, tardiness, or simply the fear of standing up in front of your classmates, the teacher kept records and called your name the day you returned. It was a period and a society that did not allow responsibility to fall through the crevices.

When the national anthem played, our hands crossed our hearts automatically, and there was complete, respectful silence as the symbolic song of our country was celebrated with enormous pride and patriotism. At major events where thousands gathered, the Star-Spangled Banner was sung with great respect and without any personal interpretation or an improvising modernistic style.

Written by Francis Scott Key following the war of 1812, our flag was a symbol of the spirit of America and our desire for freedom. The inspiration for that song began with the first dawn after the Battle of Baltimore, wherein our flag, although torn and tattered, stood tall while surrounded by soldiers who died in efforts to defend our rights and to be sure that the flag of freedom was still standing.

It was a symbol of all that we were, all that we are and all that we could be in the future. Therefore, it should always be considered an American honor for anyone that is requested to sing this song, not an opportunity to improvise this national treasure into a new recording opportunity.

At the conclusion of the war in 1945, we were a country that had huge wounds to heal as the reality of war does not vanish with a headline in the newspaper announcing, The War Is Over. Literally hundreds of thousands had died and were wounded and millions of others had endured this tragic period of history. Americans were exhausted, but we were also fully aware of the need to recover and move forward.

The remaining years of the decade brought about the beginning of a great, new momentum for America. It was as if the war years had halted the swinging pendulum of Father Time and held it in a surreal place for four years. And when peace was finally achieved, the time was right to once again release that pendulum and allow life to return to normal.

At the completion of the war, it was only natural that the sensitivity and appreciation for what people still had left in their lives increased enormously. When you have risked and lost so much and endured personal sacrifices and tragedies, your mind does not relinquish these memories easily. Although for many, it took every ounce of courage and vision to forge ahead. Forge ahead was what they did despite the agony of the past and the uncertainty of the future.

It is accurate, fair, and honest to say that the generation of people that lived through the Great Depression and World War II know firsthand what most others only think they know about personal sacrifice. Reading historical accounts decades after events occurred cannot be placed on the same page of life as those who actually participated in those events.

As the healing process began, Americans once again turned their attention to the future. The remaining years of the forties helped seam the nation into the beginning of the second half of the twentieth century. There was new optimism and a very deep appreciation for freedom, family, God, and all our blessings.

Churches were filled on Sundays, dreams of homes, family life, children playing, church bells ringing, white picket fences, new automobiles, home improvements, and the hope of peace and prosperity filled the hearts and minds of most Americans.

Compared to our current lifestyles, the late forties, fifties, and early years of the sixties appeared to have been a very innocent and idyllic time guided by a generation that learned to appreciate everything they had achieved. Working hard was a way of the times, and there were few fat cats left in the alley.

Sacrifice and the Courage to Forge Change

For hundreds of years and certainly well into twentieth century, people understood what the word sacrifice meant. Giving up something to get something you wanted more was accepted as true part of life. Sacrifice was a catalyst to progress and a character builder at the same time. It was a tradition that was passed on from generation to generation for longer than we can determine.

Our country was built by millions of people who understood beyond words that if you want to move forward in life, you need to be willing to sacrifice something. You have to be ready to pay the price for success. There were no lottery tickets and freeloaders, as they were called, were considered the outcasts from society. The list of entitlements at the time could fit into a match cover.

Earlier in the century, tens of thousands of immigrants had come to America and passed through Ellis Island in their search for new opportunities. America, just the word alone, meant opportunity, freedom from oppression, and a new beginning. It was a place where individuals and families had a chance to convert a dream into reality. Many of these immigrants spent their first year trying to establish new roots in the American soil. For some, it was time to return to their previous native land and bring back family members, friends and future brides.

Try for a moment to envision the physical conditions that must have existed on those basic ships during the early days of ocean travel. The voyage on the high seas was dangerous and unpredictable. Weather forecasting was basic, and the trip took passengers through long days and dark nights filled with fear and anxiety for the unknown. In many cases, the trip lasted weeks. It took enormous vision, courage, toughness, and barrels of determination to make the trip to America. Unfortunately for so many, this was one dream that in all likelihood might have started as a nightmare.

My own grandfather, Pasquale Ardia, at the age of twenty-five came here in 1904 from the town of Formia, Italy. He traveled along with 267 other passengers on a ship called the Republic. A year later, he returned to bring back Mary Prisco, his wife, and my future grandmother. Can you imagine what Pasquale, Mary, and the other passengers went through on those high and dangerous seas? History proved that the spirit of the new arrivals was strong, and obviously, their individual crusades were unstoppable.

The migration into America was similar to a giant river being filled hourly from various tributaries carrying vessels filled with people from small towns, villages, and major cities. This country was shaping and casting the iron melting pot which would ultimately hold an historic, ethnic recipe. Immigrants knew they had a chance to build a better life and escape the hardships and persecutions of Europe. They ventured here knowing there would be enormous cultural adjustments, economic and emotional struggles, and it would take a herculean-like personal sacrifices to build a new life. This generation knew and believed that there was a price to pay for everything. And they were willing to pay that price.

There were no free rides during those days. If it looked too good to be true, it was something to stay away from. They understood the difference between forcing change for the sake of change and forging change for the sake of progress.

The people of that time possessed a steel-like determination as they repelled and rebounded from the physical and emotional challenges of just surviving. Looking back now, it is easy to understand how the individual sacrifices that were made created the architectural plans for the future of our country

So many lives were lost that have never been recorded as contributors. Stories of the time had demonstrated that almost every effort that was made formed another link in the growing chain of events that forged America to stand alone as a great power.

As a result, our nation turned out to be the proving ground for the homogenization of a wide variety of ethnic backgrounds. With language and cultural differences many, it was a very challenging time for communication and socialization. Languages of past homelands continued within the ethnic groups as it was the comfortable thing to do. However, language was a critical factor, and English had to be learned in order to gain the most opportunity from this new country. And it was the right thing to do out of respect for the new homeland."

At the time, it is accurate to say that the backbone of America was strong and unyielding to the pressures of small, special interest segments of society. The occasional wagging tails of society did not even make the good old American dog flinch.

If You Wanted Something Badly Enough

Hard work dominated the period. This generation felt they were entitled to nothing. If they earned it, they deserved it. There were very few people who chose to sit out any opportunity. Society frowned upon laziness, and few could find comfort in making meaningless excuses about anything. There was no pride associated with being out of work, and if you were on unemployment benefits, it was something most people kept very quiet.

Today, we have thousands who brag about being out of work because they can sit back and wait for their checks to be extended and extended by the government. The country has participated in its own form of enablement at the cost of those that are working.

Most parents would not allow a child of age not to work and or assume consistent responsibilities within the family unit. When someone came home and reported they had just landed a job, there was true celebration and a deep feeling of appreciation for having been given the opportunity to prove their worth and contribute to the family. Men and women took jobs they did not like because they needed the money above their own individual interests. Sacrifice was a way of life for most and they had learned it well from previous generations.

It was not uncommon for people to do trades in their mind before taking on another cost. For example, if you needed a new or used car, you were willing to sacrifice the vacation plans and perhaps even the new dining room set you had wanted for years. The thought process began with this simple thought: What do we need most?

People planned for the purchases of major items and declined spending money on other items until they had saved enough to make the purchase. No one expected to have it all, and people were proud to announce and talk publicly about how they had given up something to get something they