Charles Saatchi: Child abuse? Guilty on all counts

charles saatchi pg 32

19 April 2012

Although I grew up in the security of a loving family it never occurred to my parents, and others of their generation, to try and find ways to keep the children amused and entertained at all times — organising sleepovers, tickets for the cinema and theatre, and presents being handed over on a weekly basis.

Today’s parents feel so guilty about spending too little time with their offspring, or not sticking by all the Principles of Perfect Parenting, that we have created children who have been pandered to, catered for, to the point where their futures must hold much disappointment.

Instead of gifts at Christmas and birthdays, weekly presents remove the excitement of anticipation, or the sense of receiving a real treat. Treats are now two-a-penny. Instead of Children’s Hour on the BBC to look forward to, there are now multiple television channels, DVDs, Facebook, PlayStation, Xbox, theme parks, Summer Camps, Winter Camps, iPods, 3G mobile phones, etc, etc.

Have I spoilt my children to unsustainable levels of satisfaction? Guilty on all charges, m’lud. But why not spoil them, and thoroughly?

The notion that children shouldn’t be provided with every available pleasure at all times, that an excess of gratification creates unrealistic expectation, that the rest of their lives cannot match up to — is hard to argue with.

So why bother? A pampered child will be able to look back at a childhood of warmth and pleasure. Even if later years are less delightful by comparison, the first 20 years will have provided them with many pleasing memories.

Most children can work out that your efforts are just a means of trying to buy their love and put you down as an easy mark whom they can readily take advantage of, until something better or more enticing turns up.

The most invaluable insight into nice behaviour we have been able to pass on to our progeny went something like this: “It is better to be charmed than to charm.” By this we meant that what makes people feel good about themselves is feeling as if they have been charming, interesting; in short, have been listened to.

The notion that one should oneself be riveting or aim to be quite the most fascinating person in the room is a vulgarity and just sheer, misplaced vanity. Trying to be charming is self-indulgent; allowing oneself to be charmed is simply good manners.

My own parents were very quick with advice: “Don’t say you don’t have enough time. You have exactly the same number of hours per day that were given to Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, Albert Einstein, Mother Teresa, Charles Dickens.” Clearly I have never overcome this breeding ground for inadequacy.

“I had the blues because I had no shoes, until upon the street, I met a man who had no feet.” My dad drilled this depressing little homily into me in the hope of instilling a sense of proportion about my wailing for a transistor radio.

I was so irritated with his sorry tale, I shoplifted a radio from Woolworths.

My dad did also tell me to “Do what you love and love what you’re doing, and you’ll never work another day in your life,” though he kindly saved this homespun wisdom until he had come to accept that I wasn’t ever going to amount to much of an academic. They were around before the era of pushy parenting, and taught us that if you needed a helping hand, there was one at the end of your arm.

Also, nowadays, parents strain to get their children into posh schools. One of our children’s first schools was so posh that when a teacher asked the class “Who is Mohammed?” a small boy stuck up his hand and quietly answered “our chauffeur”.

Children today don’t seem to talk in terms of growing up to be train drivers or nurses, as earlier generations may have. How much nicer to be a child now, believing that you will be indulged and gratified throughout your hedonistic life.

People often wonder what plays the more pivotal role in children’s fate, nature or nurture? Do they mean what would happen to a two-week-old baby, mother a crack whore, father unknown, if it was adopted by a caring, wealthy couple from New York’s Upper East Side, and grew up in a magnificent condo, went to top kindergartens and schools, and got a place at Harvard, Yale and MIT?

Or what would happen in a parallel universe when a wealthy New York couple forgot their baby at a diner while driving through rural Tennessee to admire the local toothless rednecks sitting out on their porches? The baby was seen as a gift from the Almighty by a fervently religious but slightly retarded local woman, and grew up in her home in a rundown estate, where petty crime and brutality were an everyday occurrence. Little schooling, and working behind the counter in the local hardware store at 15. No offers from Harvard, Yale or MIT.

Now you may well be thinking that environment is a greater influence on how life turns out than genetics. And that the crack baby ending up at Harvard proves the point. The well-heeled baby ending up selling claw hammers reinforces the point further.

I wish I could offer a satisfactory resolution to this verbose bit of whimsy but, as always, nobody knows anything much — certainly not about the interaction of genes and environment, or how their variables play out. Answers on a Post-It please.