Train the little monkey
 

Video of Tiger Woods

How do you guys feel about parents who push their children to do something, whether it be acting, or music, or body building (Little Hercules), or sports.

I can't help but feel pity and anguish for children who are treated like monkeys by parents who, rather than allowing a child to naturally discover talents and interests and support them in those, force them into a narrowly defined path.

This goes for a lot of things. We've all met "that guy" who is working toward Law school because his dad is making him do it, or someone who is working in an industry they don't care about because they have to inherit their dad's business.

I suppose there are good things about it. A child like that has a set purpose, something to work toward. I can't help but feel that they are missing out on one of the great beauties of life, though, because they don't ever have to find out who they really are (or even philosophize about what individuality or personality might really mean). Their life is to fulfill the objective set by an overbearing parent. Are they satisfied by their career, or are they really just working to earn the love of that parent?

If I ever have kids, I would not force any sport or life-path on them. I would encourage exploration, experimentation, and I would support them in whatever they chose. Videos of "child prodigies" and "child stars" disturb me. I think kids who are forced to be the mold of their parent are denied one of the most basic human rights: identity.

I wasn't pushed to do anything. At all.

Now I flip burgers.

I was pushed, but I sort of jumped away and took a different route.
Some people like and even want that guidance from their parents, others simply get raised and forced to depend on it. It comes in all types I think.

I think that the line between encouraging and forcing a kid is a bit blurry, some kids have really short attention spans, and I'm not talking about attention deficiency disorder, I'm talking just regular childlike short attention spans. My older brothers gone through a phase like that, I have and my little brother is in one right now.
Basically, for him it means he plays a game for a week then gets a new one before he's even halfway through, instead of finishing the game.

I wanted to play music as a kid, so I began playing the piano, but the very moment when it became hard I wanted to quit and do something else, like sleep. But my parents encouraged me, despite me not wanting to play, and I ended up playing more.
Even though I quit later, I don't think of it as a waste, I learned about music and rhythm to some extent.

But some parents go to far, like the parents who dress their 6 months old son up in hockey gear. *shudder*

I was never forced to play music when I was a child. My father has been playing music ever since he was 12 years old because he liked it when his father was playing drums, just like his father liked to play ragtime on the piano.
My family is a long line of musicians, not because we were forced too, but because it's a talent that has been passed down through our blood. I had no interrest in playing music before I was 12, and before that I wanted to paint or be a vetrenarian(sp?) because I like to draw and I love animals. But when I started to play a musical instrument, I liked it, and I wanted to continue playing. My parents have always encouraged me for whatever I wanted to do, but my father kind of knew that I might developp a certain interest in music someday, so he made me listen to a lot of Beatles and jazz as a child...I liked it, and I did not feel forced into anything.

If I ever have children one day, I will not force them to become musicians...I will do like my father did: make them listen to a little bit of Beatles and jazz and find out if they like it or not. Like me, they will choose their own paths, even if there's a huge possibility that they will like jazz music just like me.

See this is a mistake a lot of people make. Yeah sure sometimes its all about parents pushing but not always. Even when the parents push like that the kid isn't going to get to prodigy levels without talent and at least some interest in whatever he's doing. The real tragedy of most prodigies and stars is that they are both talented in and at one point liked what they did but their parents beat it out of them by pushing to hard.

The kids that are stuck doing something that hate rarely make it to any noticeable level of fame because they have no talent or interest at all. That fact is always apparent and its what makes their stories truly tragic. They tie there happiness to success in something they hate, and that hate prevents that success.

Have you seen any of the documentaries on him? He was the one that started working out all on his own because he saw his parents do it. They actually tried to slow him down a few times and all it did was make him angry. All his parents did after that was take him to a doctor to make sure he wouldn't hurt his development. He's said several times he likes what he does and he even tried to take a break once. It didn't take him long to get bored of being a "normal" kid and he started working out again all on his own.

Just saying you can't look at a talented, yet very young kid, and immediately assume they've been forced into it. Just because you, and most other kids, never had the talent and dedication to reach that level doesn't mean some other kid didn't all on his/her own. (With a little support from his/her parents.)

Sithdarth I don't know what you watched to make you think that Richard Sandrak aka Little Hercules worked out on his own, but just read the wiki page to see what I mean. His father gave him steroids, never let him eat normal food, and isolated him to keep him entirely focused on body building. The kid didn't even have a single friend until his dad went to jail. The notion that his parents tried to slow him down is simply a lie. They've made a lot of money from their son having the body he has. I saw LH on Howard Stern once, the kid sounded emotionally and mentally stunted, and seemed socially awkward. That's not talent, that's cruelty.

Did you read the Wiki. All the crap about steroids and his overbearing father has no source to it. In fact it was actually a professional trainer that did most of his training when he started to get famous. He and his mother both contend that it was to make sure he didn't overdo it and harm himself. (Not to mention he was strong since well before he could even walk.) I watched a documentary in which the kid got to tell his own story. He said a couple of times that he may not have had friends but he still had fun. He even said after the training let up and he was allowed to do kid stuff he still preferred a rather strict seeming work out.

God forbid a parent deny their kid junk food. Its not like he wasn't getting proper nutrition. I mean for one the kid was buff as hell and he's not mentally retarded. Its pretty clear he wasn't starved in anyway. If only more parents had that kind of courage we wouldn't have 600 pound 13 year olds on talk shows.

Also, its not like kids don't get emotionally and socially stunted all on their own. I mean there is nothing saying that the kid didn't prefer working out to playing or that working out was playing for him. I mean they guys dad was obviously an jerk and abusive that's enough to account from any physiological problems. We don't have to throw in forcing the kid to do something he hated. The fact the kid continues to do it despite no longer being under any pressure attests to the fact he likes it. That or he likes the fame and money that comes with it and frankly that's what motivates all famous people. Its not really a bad thing.

I've seen a couple documentaries on this kid, and it's as if he has stockholm syndrome. His dad has drilled certain things into him.

I'm sorry but feeding your child only lima beans is just as bad as feeding your child only cookies and icecream. An 8 year old with a six pack is just as abhorent as an 8 year old with fat rolls. Extreme lifestyles are ultimately unhealthy. The dad wanted to make his son a movie star like Arnold Schwarzenegger. What good is fame and fortunate if your child can't even relate to other kids his own age?

The idea that they need a professional trainer "to make sure he doesn't overdo it" is laughable. They are playing the spin game. Unfortunately they've been doing it so long and LH has never heard anything BUT spin that he's probably a true-believer, just like a stockholm victim.

My point is that the parents took TOO active a role in forming his personality and lifestyle. They trained him like a little monkey SO THOROUGHLY that he will never have the opportunity to be anything else, to have an untampered identity.

Tiger Woods, Michael Jackson, Little Hercules... there are tons of examples of kids who are pushed into a role and follow it for the rest of their lives (because they are so conditioned, if they fall out of it they crash and burn). They lose something sacred, they really do. Maybe if left to his own devices, Woods would have played football. Maybe Jackson would have practiced medicine. Maybe Hercules would become a professional poker player. I don't know. Instead of introducing the thousands upon thousands of possibilities, their overbearing parents defined their world for them, thus changing them forever.

I hate to say it again but any child that reaches prodigy status has talent and interest in what he's doing all on his own. Even so called brainwashed people don't suddenly become good at something. Straight practice and discipline won't turn someone with absolutely no physical, or in some cases mental, talent into a prodigy. Any kid that has reached prodigy status got there mainly because of talent. Some of them do have overbearing parents but its not like the parents forced them to start. Starting is always the choice of the prodigy its generally the parents that get obsessed and ruin it by time the become adults. (Much like child actors.) In short, the kids would have eventually gotten into their respective fields it was just accelerated. Depending on the amount that can be the tragic part of it.

This is of course distinguished from the overbearing parents that push their kids into doing something the kid truly hates. These kids never get past a shall we say the "local" fame level. There is a ceiling they just can't break through and its because they don't have talent and deep down hate what they are doing and resent it. Frankly these are the bad parents.

While parents of true prodigies are sometimes a little obsessive they have a right to be. Not that its the idea situation for the kid but its not nearly as bad as the parents that push a kid whose into drawing to try and become a Major League baseball player and then wonder why he gets stuck in the Minors. They are both quite a bit better than parents who out right abuse their kids.

1) I highly doubt those extreme diets are actually what he grew on. Children need crap loads of fat for proper mental development. Everything I've seen of the kid suggests that he does not have an IQ of 60-70. It highly doubtful that kid was lacking anything at all, except maybe a little taste.

2) I'd lay money that the kid has that genetic disorder that ups his muscle mass and increases his metabolism. The fact that their were rumors that he was always strong supports that. Of course those are about trustworthy as the ones about his diet. The fact remains he really would have had to train outlandishly for that kind of strength if he didn't have an advantage like that. I doubt steroids as well as that would have seriously impacted his growth and there is no evidence of that.

Expect to fork over a truckload of tuition money for this "exploration", then. :p

I have a cousin who's been forced to play soccer, take dance lessons, take advanced swimming lessons, and play an instrument. And in the car on the way to each of these things she listens to audio tracks that teach spanish. I don't know whether she's going to end up a superwoman or bulimic.

On the other hand though, like Arlan said, I have another cousin who was pushed to do absolutely nothing and was given everything, basically spoiled outright. Now he does drugs, has dropped out of school three times, and "is trying to start a band".

Then I am the odd man out. I was pushed to just get through school. My dad told me I could do whatever the hell I want to do and he'd support me as long as I got through college. And I'm having an unusual amount of difficulty doing that. There are factors on both sides of the equation that effect how any one person is going to turn out. The end result doesn't just depend on the parent or child independantly.

I think I'll take the route my dad took and start by cattle prodding my kid through college then set him loose in the sandbox o' life.