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4 Ways to Raise Ruthless Kids (Like Succession’s The Roys)
Want kids who value thoughtfulness and a charitable spirit over the abysmal sin of wealth? This essay ain’t for you.
I stared at my eight-year-old daughter.
She stared back, unwavering.
She’d done this on purpose — worked around the rules to get what she wanted. This behavior had become a pattern, and I had to decide whether to punish her, or let it go.
My daughter is a figure skater, and I’d created a star chart to motivate her to work hard on the ice. Her coaches could award her 1, 2 or 3 stars per lesson depending on the effort she put in. Each star earned her 10 minutes of free screen time on the way home from the rink.
But I’d never said that part — on the way home.
She knows she’s allowed unrestricted access to educational apps in the car, so she’d played with Duolingo during the long commute home. And then — as we prepared for the mad rush of dinner, bath, bedtime — she said to me, boldly, with only a hint of shame in her voice, that she’d now collect her free screen time.
I slipped my hands into my pockets, narrowed my eyes at her, and sighed.
She held her ground…and her iPad.
