no love for a brat

I’m sure by now most of the western hemisphere and half of the eastern hemisphere have already seen this video:

I know that I have seen this on my own Facebook newsfeed at least a dozen times usually being described as hilarious or adorable.  Never being one to join the lemmings, I resisted watching it but eleventy-billion people can’t be wrong, right? This kid must be adorably hilarious and if I don’t watch this video I would be depriving my uterus of some serious cuteness.

I have to wonder if all eleventy-billion people watched the same video I did because this was repulsive behavior.  While I love cupcakes a great deal I see no reason to behave in such a way nor would I think it cute to see someone else to do the same.  Even a three-year-old.  And so this is where I am left to wonder a number of things.

Brat Celebration

Where have we gone so horrifically wrong that an entire community (which social media is, whether people want it to be or not) would not only celebrate but validate such disrespectful behavior from a child?  Further, what bothers me more in all of this, why would this be considered adorable and therefore excused? Because if it is adorable now it will then be adorable when this child is nine, then fifteen, and completely adorable when he is seventeen and completely out of control.

I’ve already read enough blogs and articles to know people are analyzing and critiquing the parent behind the camera.  I’d like to point out the armchair quarterbacks but I don’t want to give them web views.  Of course it would be easy to blame the mother who is videotaping her son acting like a beast.  Of course all of us could play child psychologist and discuss how important it is to model appropriate and positive behavior, and my hell, did the boy mention spanking?!

And before I get all the high-and-mighty complaints from people about how dare I talk about parenting, I will be the first to admit that my children can be out of control.  So all you Yadda-Yadda types can suck up all the wind in your own sails.  My own toddler has been known to take her clothes off and run through Target, for hell’s sake, so I know wild.   But here’s the difference, I take responsibility for her public nudity.  When my son broke a horribly tacky necklace at Kohl’s I bought it.  And then he worked to pay me back for it.

We All Created This Brat

You know, it’s being accountable for all the shares and likes on social media that made this kid famous for being “so adorable!” for arguing with his mother, calling her by name, over wanting cupcakes.  Eleventy-billion people just patted that kid on the back and gave him a reward for being a brat.

Sure, what this boy’s parents contribute is a large contribution.  However, our contribution — as a collective whole — is a much larger problem when we celebrate poor behavior.  For all of us who whine and complain about The Entitlement Generation, what are we doing to promote it?  We sit on our asses and click “share” when it’s a picture or video of a kid who is displaying entitlement behavior and either say it’s cute or it’s terrible.  And yet, none of us do the sensible thing and ignore it. We keep feeding the gremlins after midnight and then wondering why there are all these cocoons around waiting to erupt into monsters.

And so, how can eleventy-billion people be wrong? Apparently, they can be extraordinarily wrong. I can’t wait to hear how they respond when the cupcake kid grows up and is trying to convince a judge to keep him out of jail.

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C. Streetlights

I wrote and illustrated my first bestseller, "The Lovely Unicorn" in the second grade and I've been terrified of success ever since.
Published by ShadowTeamsNYC and represented by Lisa Hagen Books

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