Sense of Entitlement

I live with young adults because I'm a college student and I see it every day. I spent three years of my college career living with or spending a lot of time with a young adult that expected her parents to hand her everything. She's terrified of hard work. Her parents are living off the government because they're disabled (read actually too lazy to work) and she would demand large, expensive items for her birthday, for Christmas, and just at random intervals of her life. Her parents would happily oblige and would give her plenty of spending money on top of the items that she would ask for. It got annoying to see and hear her manipulate her parents to get what she wanted. I was appaled at how easily they would give in and they can't see how they're being played. She refuses to work, she believes work is beneath her. She shouldn't have to work because she's a college student and college students DON'T work. Needless to say, that friendship did not last long. She would try to manipulate my partner and I, and even her roommate to get us to do things that she wanted to do, or to do things for her. If she wanted to go out to eat, which was often and we did not want to spend the money, she'd throw temper tantrums and lock herself in her room. I expect that is the same behavior that she gave her parents that actually worked with them. Her parents pay her car insurance, of which they bought her a practically brand new car, they buy EVERYTHING that goes on that car and they buy her clothing, jewelry and other items, all because she cries a bit or throws a tantrum, and she always claims her family is so poor. Needless to say, I'm not like the other college kids out there. I work, I pay for what I can, I hate asking for money or for large, expensive items. If I want those items, then I work hard to get them. I hate asking for other people to buy them for me. I don't feel right expecting someone else to spend that amount of money on me without at least trying to buy something nice for myself. I think a lot of this is societal. I've noticed parents now don't know how to say no. When I was growing up, I was told no. Or I was told that if I wanted something I'd have to save my allowance to buy it. Or I was told that I'd have to work for it. I wasn't bought large, expensive items whenever I wanted. I had to wait. I was parented, I wasn't treated like a friend.

I do not know. I supervise some teens and early twenties staff. Some of them I would trust my life to,(I do trust my client lives to) and some are over indulged and spoiled. I have had good luck with the ones I have, even the spoiled ones. I just know that they will seldom go above and beyond the basic duties. I think the blogisphere gives people a venue for their rants that we never had before. I know that having mass communication can distort the sense of priority, of what kids "need" as opposed to what they want and demand. Parents each generation give their kids more and more, thinking it is love and happiness, but instead they end up disillusioned, when they are not appreciated. That is because the last two or three generations have not known the kind of hardship to make them appreciate their lives.