Kids' Behavior During Easter Egg Hunts

tangomonster

tangomonster

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Yup, I know this is a small thing, relatively...but maybe not. Perhaps it isn't just indicative of an event that happens once a year, but shows how even children feel entitled to get what they want by any means necessary (apologies to Malcolm X---I'm quite sure this is not what he has talking about!).

The paper today had an article about a local Easter egg hunt. An 8 year old was asked about all the candy-filled eggs he had in his Easter basket. He explained that he "took eggs out of some babies' hands." His mother was there as he was interviewed and apparently wasn't horrified hearing this. She mentioned that she would be taking her son on for another egg hunt right after this one.

frown.gif
This is horrifying to me. No, I don't think the babies will have to go for years of therapy to deal with the trauma of having their eggs stolen. No, I don't think the babies will suffer by not having enough candy. But for an 8 year old to steal from anyone, let alone a baby? It's not that they were hunting at the same place at the same time and the 8 year old was faster. There was a section for kids under 3 years and a section for older kids. So this 8 year old just walked up to babies who had already participated in the hunt and took the eggs from them!

I don't care how old this makes me sound---I would NEVER have stolen eggs from anyone when I was 8! I was happy just to get however many eggs I got. I think this really illustrates how kids today are being raised (to just think of themselves and to resort to any means to get what they want)....

And Easter egg hunts seem like a pretty pagan ritual to me, but since they happen the day before the most important Christian holiday, it seems that maybe parents would want to tie in some ethics and morality lessons to this. I haven't seen the WWJD bands lately.....I'm pretty sure Jesus would not condone this type of behavior!
 
What comes around goes around. Assuming this is true (you did read it in the paper, after all, which makes it highly suspect), he'll try to do something similar to the wrong person someday and get his @ss kicked. I've watched both my DD and DGD at Easter Egg hunts, and most if not all of the kids were happy, friendly, and polite about it. My DGD this year found her allotment of eggs early, and then helped some of the littler ones find some. So I wouldn't worry about it. Nothing has really changed. Some people are kind, some are greedy. Same as it ever was.
 
Listen up guys. You better get this straight and start being politically correct and call it what it is, a "spring egg hunt". Don't you know that you cannot use the word Easter. It might hurt someone's feelings or violate their rights. Just wanted to clear that up. By the way, Happy Easter everyone.
 
Sad, but 'bah humbug' comes to mind. Happy Easter...
 
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Community Egg hunt here has had to segregate ages, put the searches in separate sections and add enforcement that keeps kids under their allowed maximum "catch" limits. It's taken years to get to this, but the number of older children with very aggressive behavior towards younger ones seems like it has been growing every year. We always saw a few out of control kids but saying something to them or their parents usually fixed things promptly. Now, unless we have a specific rule we can use to describe why the behavior is not allowed, we are getting both kids and parents with attitude "it doesn't say I can't do that" who more or less ignore any requests to play nicely with others.
 
When they grow up and learn to drive, they will be the ones who cut you off in traffic. Just human nature; it takes all kinds.
 
braumeister said:
When they grow up and learn to drive, they will be the ones who cut you off in traffic. Just human nature; it takes all kinds.
Click to expand...

I was thinking "Future CEO material", but yeah, same thing. Some people are just lacking in empathy, even at an early age. I don't know of a real cure for this.
 
Several years ago a good friend took her grandchildren to an egg hunt sponsored by a local dairy. It is probably one of the largest events around here. She witnessed the mothers running out in the egg hunting area scooping up eggs for their kids AND the mothers fighting and scrapping with each other! There was evidently a "special" egg that would entitle the bearer to a diamond jewelry item. IMHO the children learn this behavior from the adults around them at some point.
 
It seems that the easter egg hunt has moved from a "challenge" of finding something to the "materialism" of getting all that you can.

Maybe I'm too old, but I remember when the joy of the Easter Egg hunt was in the *hunt*, and not in the Egg itself.
 
I'm glad you all agree with me! It's just so sad that this child's behavior was condoned by the mom. Not sure what the reporter thought about it. And nothing more that the officials could have done---the hunt areas were segregated by age. Apparently the 8 year old stole the eggs outside of the hunt area.

How did we get to this point?
 
I had breakfast with a son and DIL this morning. She told me about a parking lot scene at a big minicipal Egg Hunt yesterday. Two well dressed well coiffed women driving nice cars were having a disagreement about a parking spot. Both had cars full of kiddies.

They started cussing at one another, next the old favorite girl to girl b-word, next they each called the other the Big C word. Happy Easter Kiddies, see how classy Mommie is?!

Ha
 
Sounds like good societal training. Gotta prep those kids to fight for early morning black Friday deals! ;)
 
That 8 year old will grow up and be 5' 7" or 5' 11' tall depending upon which convenience store he is robbing.
 
As mentioned, the kid is getting his cue from the parent....

If I had heard those words come from my kid, he or she would have lost ALL their Easter eggs... we would have gone to where the young kids were and handed all of them to the kids...
 
Stories like this are why I avoid the current Easter Egg Hunt community events. Growing up, this was always something my family did at our home. I had two siblings, a brother and a younger sister. We learned that the pink colored eggs were our sisters and never touched them. It was fun for everyone.

These days it seems more like a competition. You even hear parents passing on strategy to kids before the whistle.
 
my sister had to sign a waiver promising not to push other children for her community egg hunt. This wasn't for her 21 month old daughter, but for her.

We were just happy our 14 month old girl knew to pick up eggs. We did a little hunt in MIL/FIL's backyard. We let those 2 and under get a 5 minute head start since each kid has an egg specific to them (had $2 inside it). It left the 9 year old complaining there were too many eggs and it was too hard since he couldn't pick up the easy ones in the middle of the yard meant for those under the age of 2. My daughter had a blast though!
 
I had two older brothers (6 years older than me, and 4.5 years older than me), and this happened to me ALL the time growing up. They'd threaten to beat me up if I told anyone, too.

It taught me to plan ahead, to be smarter or more wily/clever so that I could re-hide and keep my candy, and to refrain from dwelling upon whether something was "fair" or not.

Unfortunately, it didn't make me any thinner! :LOL:
 
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