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Kids today or: I miss my copy of Pokemon Pearl
Beck
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
So, my family had some company over today. Friends of ours we knew from Church, about 7 years earlier. They had a few kids, and one of their young children really looked up to me. This is both awesome and totally shitty. On the plus side I can help introduce him to awesome games, on the down-side I'm baby-sitting for a good 6 hours.
After a few rounds of Mario Kart, and a couple hours of baby-sitting, he brings out his Nintendo DS and asks if I have any multiplayer games. I told him I've got Mario Bros. We play that a while, and when I'm putting it back on my shelf, he notices I have Pokemon Pearl. He goes on to tell me he lent his copy of Pokemon Diamond to a friend, Ash, but it was lost. Ash (and Ash's parents) are also assholes, so they wouldn't buy him another copy. The real disappointment is our friends are somewhat down on their luck, money's tight. He asks if I would be interested in trading for my copy. I decline, and give him my copy of Pearl.
I lost my save file, so many hours lost. But hey, it was for a great cause, right? I'm bringing Pokemon back into a kid's life, and that's awesome. He never said thank you, I figure he's just excited. I know he'll cherish it. But things went downhill from there.
He begins to talk about how he'll be trading in his DS, and his new copy of pearl, to put towards a PSP. And a barrage of requests flow from there: Can I trade you my DS for your lite? Can I have your [game], or [console]. I mean, I understand he's 12 years old (and it's not like I'm mad or anything), but dang, I've never really felt so unappreciated before.
So I'm wondering, has anybody had a similar experience? Or, on the other hand, anybody have some totally awesome, somewhat related, stories?
After a few rounds of Mario Kart, and a couple hours of baby-sitting, he brings out his Nintendo DS and asks if I have any multiplayer games. I told him I've got Mario Bros. We play that a while, and when I'm putting it back on my shelf, he notices I have Pokemon Pearl. He goes on to tell me he lent his copy of Pokemon Diamond to a friend, Ash, but it was lost. Ash (and Ash's parents) are also assholes, so they wouldn't buy him another copy. The real disappointment is our friends are somewhat down on their luck, money's tight. He asks if I would be interested in trading for my copy. I decline, and give him my copy of Pearl.
I lost my save file, so many hours lost. But hey, it was for a great cause, right? I'm bringing Pokemon back into a kid's life, and that's awesome. He never said thank you, I figure he's just excited. I know he'll cherish it. But things went downhill from there.
He begins to talk about how he'll be trading in his DS, and his new copy of pearl, to put towards a PSP. And a barrage of requests flow from there: Can I trade you my DS for your lite? Can I have your [game], or [console]. I mean, I understand he's 12 years old (and it's not like I'm mad or anything), but dang, I've never really felt so unappreciated before.
So I'm wondering, has anybody had a similar experience? Or, on the other hand, anybody have some totally awesome, somewhat related, stories?
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And does he have a sports car with a gaggle of fangirls in the back?
No, it's his.
I'd have taken it back.
Because he was being ungrateful.
I'm also more than a little bit of an asshole.
I make no excuses for my behavior.
"Aaron, what's wrong?" I say. He just stands there, terrified. "Dude, are you okay?" And it bursts out of him,
"That boy wants me to steal cookies but I don't wanna'." I look outside and there's an older boy hiding in some bushes outside. I come out the side door, walk up to him,
"I didn't tell him to steal anything!" he screams.
"You're not allowed back in the store," I tell him, and return inside. Then I notice Aaron's gone. He's halfway across the huge parking lot, so I holler at him. He stops, clearly horrified, but slowly returns to the store. When he comes in, I tell him I need to deal with these two customers, but I'd like to speak with him...
(con't...)
Once the customers have cleared out, I come out from the back, go into the front and kneel down in front of him.
"I think that was a pretty brave thing you did, tellin' the truth like that. Being honest isn't always the easiest thing to do, but you were - you were stong - and you should be proud of yourself. I'm proud of you! And I wanna' reward you for that - so pick any two things in the store. Anything you want, and it's yours - on me."
At first he couldn't believe it, he took a good five minutes checking everything out and asking if this was okay or that was okay, and finally decided on a big bag of chips and a two-litre of pop. I told him it was fine, and thanked him again and sent him home.
A few days later his mom comes in, tells me she heard the story and thanked me for being so kind to him - which was nice.
But after that, every time Aaron came to the store he'd be strangely short on funds, and expecting a handout. And every time I had to turn him down.
So really, it was your own fault the kid came back to exploit your kindness. It's good to be good to people. It's horrible to get (or feel) taken advantage of or taken for granted. And it's rare to have one without the other.
...
...
Basically the pokemon thread title tricked me into coming in here.
This is why kids do this shit. Everyone is too chicken shit to say no.
Hell I'm not cheap or I wouldn't have been in situations like this myself in the past but I've never been rich enough to just let something like this slide.
Kids are rude and like other people have already said, they will try and pull this shit if you let them.
If a couple of months down the line and he isn't into that stuff anymore then I'd expect them to offer it back not sell it. They know what they're doing! Most kids are dumb but they aren't stupid.
I want to know more PA people on Twitter.
So you don't value gifts beyond the monetary benefit to yourself?
EDIT: So I understand you're being devil's advocate or whatever because it's fun to do so but can you honestly say you don't see anything wrong with what that kid did?
I want to know more PA people on Twitter.
What I'm getting at is that kids are kids. You can't do them something good and then be ungrateful when they don't return the favor, you need to hint them in the right direction of returning that favor. I believe that's how you really help them out.
I'm not talking child abuse, but my dad used to beat the sweet jesus right out of me when I did stuff to deserve it.
And now I'm fairly well adjusted!8-)
Usually, when I give people things I expect them to appreciate it and put it to use or enjoyment. If they're going to turn around and sell it, they can get fucked. By a whale.
Maybe my opinion comes from dealing with brothers, nephews, cousins and family friends. I know I woulnd't sell something I was given in such a situation and I wouldn't have when I was a child.
If I had wrapped the thing and given it to them for their birthday then obviously a different question.
I want to know more PA people on Twitter.
"Man, that sucks you lost [game] for whatever reason. Tell you what, I enjoyed it a lot and spent a lot of time on it, and I want you to have that experience, too. Have my copy for free."
"Sweet, I can get $10 for this!"
I'd introduce that kid to the back of my hand. I'm sure they would be fast friends.
I'm going to wait for that before I make any judgment calls here.
Can trade TF2 items or whatever else you're interested in. PM me.
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I'm not being devil's advocate. I'm serious. If you give something, you gave it.
This said, I know that what this kid did is assholeish, but then we don't still don't know the timeline. Did he just say he was gonna sell it the second he got the game, or was it days, perhaps weeks later?
So, if I agree that the kid's an asshole, but also that once a gift is given, it's given, and the kid can do whatever the hell he wants with it, how do I cope? Simple, I don't give gifts to people, except some rare cases, such as relatives and people I know will appreciate it. I don't randomly give copies of games to kids around.
Or if I did, I would give it and turn around, not caring what happens with the game afterwards.
It might be worth it to explain to him later on why selling something given to him in that fashion isn't very nice, but I just can't picture retaining an ounce of self-respect yelling at him and demanding some game back.
Maybe this is just because I have several younger brothers, but you have to realize that 12 year old boys are dicks. They aren't innocent little children, and they know exactly what they're doing. Seriously, when I was twelve some kids (the really messed up ones, of course) were trying their first cigarettes or alcohol. You can be firm with them.
Truth!
I never had to experience a "timeout". I was the belt for me and let me tell you, I am very grateful for it.
Actually we did have talks about not expecting free stuff later. I explained that I don't make much, couldn't afford to give him candy every day, and that one time was a reward for something awesome he did. Eventually he pared down his attempts to simply trying to purchase items he couldn't-quite-afford (short a quarter, a nickle). To be honest I can't remember if I let it slide or not - it was a while ago.
So, I'm not sure it's about the beating itself.
The Aaron story reminds me of another. I should note he came across the parking lot from a housing project that was over there - a lot of drug-addled, low-income families. Another kid who often came into the store was a little girl called Angel - and to me, she was as good as her name. The sad side of her story is she'd come in nearly every morning when she should've been having breakfast to purchase a can of pop and some chips. She was sharp as a tack, totally adorable, and curiously honest - if I gave her an extra two dollars in her change she would immediatley turn around and report the mistake, giving me the extra money. Eventually, I had a similar talk with her about her being very honest, and deserving her choice of anything in the store.
Guess what she dressed up as for Halloween. Guess!
Adorable.
*Again, sorry for multiple posts - small PS3 text field.
Re-read the OP, he says the family was over "today", consisting of 'six hours of babysitting', quite a bit of which was taken up by playing Mario Kart by his description, before Pokemon DS came up.
So within a couple hours of receiving a gift to cover his loss, the kid switched to 'gimme gimme gimme' mode and trading in everythnig he was lamenting about just a couple hours before.
Which I suppose would be expected of a 7 or 8 year old, but by eleven or twelve I think most people have developned a basic awareness of courtesy to notice when people give them a gift as an act of kindness and not a monetary boost, and not be so flitty as to forget you even wanted it and start planning for new stuff. Or at the very least have the sense to wait for another day to start talking about it.
We were all certainly twerps at 12, but to talk about trading it all away on the same day to the gifter? What a fucking clueless ingrate. His parents probably never set an example for thankfulness for kind acts and let him trade, resell, or forget about whatever toys he owns because, hey whatever, who cares about saving anything or appreciating your current stuff. It's not that he's twelve, he's just one of those kinds of ingrates, probably not too different from his friend Ash, and probably will continute to be.
If he's up-front enough to try to get more stuff just to have more to trade in for a new PSP, he can handle being set aside and told 'look little buddy, when I gave you that game, it was because your friend lost your copy and you wouldn't be getting another otherwise. But if all you want is something to sell, it's not very fair that you made me think you wanted to play it and keep it anyway. I'd appreciate it if you returned it to me if all it meant to you was trade-in money, because it does mean more to me."