NRI Youth Speak Up!

Is the Silver Spoon Really a Disadvantage?

Parents are responsible for providing their children with as many advantages as they can, including the ability to adapt in a multitude of environments

By Jovan Jande

          Being the child of a family with one parent being an immigrant from another country and one parent being the child of immigrants, I have been granted a unique perspective on certain issues as I am not a true first nor second generation American. My parents were able to work hard and provide me with the so-called “silver spoon” in my mouth, luckily. Or is it rather unluckily? This poses the question that parents of privileged children have wondered for years, are children with “silver spoon” upbringings going to lose to the children who never had this life? The short answer being, it really is not up to the children.

          The children did not choose to be born into the lifestyle that they were brought up in, whether poor or well off, but rather they were simply placed in an environment and learned to adapt. They did what humans, and all other animals around the world have been doing, adapting to their situations and determining the best way of survival. This is generally where the controversy begins to intervene. The idea that children of the “silver spoon” lifestyle do not face as many hardships as those of worsened upbringings and therefore will not be able to survive in unfamiliar situations, commonly referred to as the real world. While it may be true that the more privileged children do not have as much experience adapting to multiple environments, the children do have the biological tools necessary to adapt the same way that the under-privileged children did; this is simply because we all, as a species, have the capacity to adapt. So this brings up the idea that survival in the real world is not up to the children, but rather the parents.

          Parents are responsible for providing their children with as many advantages as they can, including the ability to adapt in a multitude of environments. For parents that aren’t able to provide monetary support, their children learn to adapt to more situations as they are often told to work for money or play sports and other activities. While the opposite is true for children with the “silver spoon” as they rely more on the wealth of parents as opposed to developing experiences and learning to adapt to different environments. Thus, in order for children of the “silver spoon” society to achieve as much as the children of lesser money, all that is needed is one simple task: experience adapting. This could range from job experience to volunteer work or any other forms of adaptation.

          Its simple, the “silver spoon” ideology that so many parents face isn’t taken the right way. Any advantage that can be given to children from their parents is an advantage. However, if an advantage like wealth isn’t used in unison with a multitude of other activities to help children adapt, the advantage becomes a disadvantage. Allow your children the ability to adapt, regardless of situation, and the children will be more than prepared for survival.

Jovan Jande

Jovan with Grandfather