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“Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

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    “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

    You all know the sport curling, and you know that the brooms are used to cause friction and remove any dirt, which will help the stone on its way down.

    Curling parents is an expression used here in Sweden for the 80’s generation, where parents “brush” every obstacle which might appear ahead of the kid(s), as to sweep away the hassle. This, often, causes over-protected kids who when one day are faced with a problem they must solve on their own, all of a sudden are not fully equipped and capable to do so.

    I read today that an approximate 10% of all from the 80’s generation attending a job interview, have one of their parents helping out, present, negotiating salary.

    Is that really a good idea?

    #2
    “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

    I understand the concept but can't think of a term in the English language that would translate well. The term I've always known for over-protective parents is molly-coddling, to coddle is to pamper, but I'm not sure on the molly part.
    We do, however, have an entire government that does this, known as the nanny state. They hide or remove anything that may be considered offensive to anybody at all, and set out health and safety practice that requires every potential obstacle or hazard to be surrounded by warning signs and be painted in bright flourescent paint. This is borne out of a fear of having their arses sued for every penny they have because of the litigiuos nature of todays society where everything is somebody elses fault and the theory of where theres a blame, theres a claim.

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      #3
      “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

      In the US, they're called helicopter parents, because they're always hovering around their precious offspring. Curling parents is a great expression, though.

      I've read recently about parents' attending their adult children's job interviews and negotiating with the potential employer. I'm in a position to hire, and that would cross someone off my list, no matter how good they are otherwise.

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        #4
        “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

        Yeah, helicopter parents is the term that I've heard. Besides the hovering, I've also heard an explanation that the parents will "fly in" at a moment's notice to help their children out. I've never heard of a parent present in a job interview, but I have heard (but thankfully never experienced) a parent intervening in grade disputes for their kids in college, contacting a professor and the university administration to complain on behalf of their kid.

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          #5
          “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

          Oh yeah. I've been dealing with one of those this past week (or four.)

          "Why did you fail my precious Bobbins in your course! (he failed the entire program incidentally.)

          "Because he missed nine classes and only turned in one assignment ... late."

          "I'm sorry I can't accept that."

          "Are you saying that he didn't miss nine classes and only turned in one assignment?"

          "No, but that isn't a valid reason to fail him. He's only twenty-four"

          "(arghhhh!)"

          We use helicopter parents too, though on a nationalist basis we ought to claim curling parents, it's great.

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            #6
            “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

            I once had a bouncer (doorman) who wanted to be a waiter. Clean-cut, bright guy and all.

            He turned out to be a shit waiter.

            So after a few weeks, we told him it wasn't working out and that normally we'd let him go, but that he could go back to his old bouncing job if he wanted.

            An hour after this, he arrived back - a seasoned bouncer, remember - with his gray-haired father who tried to convince me that his son was a good waiter, deep down, and just needed more time. It was a really awkward conversation.

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              #7
              “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

              My sister is a helicopter mom. I am trying to convince her that making their own mistakes is how kids learn to cope with life later on, when they're on their own. She's just so afraid to see one of them get hurt that she does everything within her power to make sure they don't. And that includes choosing who they can be friends with and what they watch on TV. I can't seem to convince her that she's doing more harm than good in terms of their emotional development and independence.

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                #8
                “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

                Likewise, FF, my sister is protective of her sons to a fault.

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                  #9
                  “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

                  Perhaps there's hope yet -- most of my parents (of my 8th grade students) cut no slack for their kids. Of 150+ kids, I usually have one or two who whine and feel a grade should be higher or I should accept a late paper. It should be said that our administration is generally supportive of the teaching staff decisions.

                  I've read the reports of hovering parents and it is pretty galling - fortunately my son is fiercely independent and his parents will have far better things to do than hang out at future job interviews.

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                    #10
                    “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

                    I have had a fair few parents turn up to information sessions for Business School. They are typically way more work than their offspring.

                    Fortunately we can influence the process a bit, and the school isn't really wanting that type of student. So in some cases it is brilliantly counterproductive.

                    Obviously, if your folks throw a couple of million at the school you are in.

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                      #11
                      “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

                      Choosing who your kids can be friends with is edging into mentalist territory.

                      Mrs Earth's best childhood friend was forbidden to see her over a teenage note they'd been passing round with some rude stuff about Boys in it. They found each other on facebook two weeks ago. It's clear that they're both still hurting about it. Don't ever do this, OTF parents.

                      (Boys who want to go out with your daughter are different, obviously. I intend to have them all sit a polygraph, do a personality test and write me an extended essay, at the very least.)

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                        #12
                        “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

                        I would so love to be a fly on the wall if anyone came to a job interview where I work with their parents. The Head would chew them up and spit them out in a heartbeat!

                        I tried to molly-coddle my daughter, but she wouldn't have any of it. Consequently she's grown up to be a sensible and intelligent young woman. Although she's a Notts County fan! Why? Why??? I've gone back through everything I've ever said to her, and can't work out where that one came from.

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                          #13
                          “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

                          On the subject of complaining about grades, Scott Kaufmann has some great stories. This letter from a student is awesome in its audacity and missing-the-pointness:
                          My Teacher,

                          I appreciate you taking your inconvenience to instruct us but I really had some problems in your class and I would like to explain them to you now. Every day I wanted to discuss with you about the way you grade my papers and the way you teach the class, but I could not because the things you say in class and your words disturb me so much I can not. You make me completely uncomfortable with the little things you say in the class like how you talk about television or how you talk about when you are grading our papers and trying to be fair. You do not seem to care about our grades only that they are up to your too high standards and I can not talk to you because you make me completely uncomfortable. For example, you say you will talk to us about our grades but you really will not because of how uncomfortable you make me feel with your words and what you say.

                          I will plan to contest the grade you have given me in this class when I get it because I know it will be much higher with any other teacher. I am a very religious man and you are not a bad person but you do not choose your words with enough care like a teacher should. You try to be objective and the very attempt becomes your flaw because you try so hard to grade fairly and comment wisely that you become biased to your own ideas. You criticize our writings because we are college students and young but do not realize that you offend most of us when you do this. I am always offended when I go to your class and have been on many occasions but I never tell you of my offense because you make me completely uncomfortable so I never say a word.

                          You like to lead discussions and that is bad because it is the entire means by which we learn but we do not know what you want from us on our papers. I have honestly no idea what I learned from you in this class because so much time was spent discussing the tiny details in the passages in the book and so if I learned anything it is how to read things in too much detail. I could have read books in too much detail on my own but that is not what I came to college to do because I already know how to read and I would have told you this but you make me completely uncomfortable with your words so I never said a word.

                          By doing this you give us no guidance on our papers. I thought it was lame that you decided to show a movie and a cop out because you chose not to give us any instruction. I know that it was a movie based on the story in the play we read but it was not teaching to show it to us when you could have been teaching us to write what you wanted us to write on our papers instead. The movie was completely racist and very offensive because it contained cultural stereotypes that are often used in disrespectful jokes about people who have their feelings hurt all the time. I was offended by this racism and in the movie and had my feelings hurt by it. If that was supposed to teach me something about the class I completely do not understand.

                          After this quarter I am hurt and tired and feel like talking to you now will do me no good. I wanted to go to your office hours but I could not find the time or make myself because of your words. I feel like my paper was written to the best of my ability in reference to your teaching skills in the discussions. You grade my papers poorly but do not realize that you do so because they reflect your teaching skills. Other people may have done well with your skills but I did not and would have talked to you but what you said about grading fairly made me uncomfortable. I take my responsibilities as a man and I have never complained about my grades but this one I will because I did not need you to teach me how to read or to write. I have made very high grades in all my other writing classes and even though I had many disputes with those instructors we always settled them to my happiness. Now for the first time I can not talk to you to settle my grades because I am uncomfortable to talk or even write to you. I should have stayed strong and like a man no matter how much your words and what you said offended me. I do not blame you because when there is error there are two to blame, the perceiver and the target. I do not know what this email does but I have to get my feelings off of my chest. Thank you for reading this and I am sorry if what I feel has shown you disrespect but these are my feelings and I feel by your words you did not respect them. I love everyone and believe you to possibly be a great person but with your words you have treated me completely unfairly.

                          I am a very religious man and I love every one but I will forward this letter to the head of your department so he can see that I am a serious student who does not deserve the grade you will give him because I write so very well.

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                            #14
                            “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

                            My parents in law properly curl (haha!) my youngest sister in law. It gives me and the wife something juicy to debate.

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                              #15
                              “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

                              The thing about curling is that you have to brush like a bastard at certain times, but know when to let the stone slide gloriously along on its own as well. While trying not to fall over, as it's on ice. If you just constantly brush in front of the stone, it'll plough through everything and end up out of bounds.

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                                #16
                                “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

                                I feel like that should be an extended metaphor/euphemism for something filthy, but I'm not sure what.

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                                  #17
                                  “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

                                  I really don't think it's a good idea to be overprotective. My own mother was quite neglectful (shockingly and sometimes comically so) of me and (to varying degrees) my four siblings but it has made me self-reliant. I left home at 16 and was supporting myself before that. Some of the stuff I was doing from the age of 14 (going to clubs, taking speed, hitchhiking) I wouldn't really recommend, and I took a strange route through education, but the benefits far outweighed the dangers.

                                  My sister, I think, overcompensates but she's typical of most middle-class mums today. My nephew just turned 22 and he is a CHILD, he gets dropped off and picked up when he's on a night out or going round to see his girlfriend, is offered a choice of menu before his dinner is cooked (we never had that, at any age). More than that, I'm afraid to say, he's a nice kid but he's a dead boring conversationalist, his world is so small, his concerns so limited.

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                                    #18
                                    “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

                                    Any evidence for any of this? Is de yoot really incapable of fending for demself? I'm not convinced.

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                                      #19
                                      “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

                                      Quite hard to measure or prove so it's just anecdotal, innit. I just compare the big deal my nephew and my friends' teenage kids make about going into the nearest town, whereas I was going into the West End at that age, and if I missed the last train home, it wasn't the end of the world, I'd improvise. I think they'd expect to be rescued, and they probably would be, and told off for taking such risks, and it would be a major event. I thought it absurd if an adult (another adult, as I saw it) tried to tell me what to do when I was a grown woman of almost 16.

                                      I have friends who were world famous at 18 and 19, so it seems very odd to see people several years older than that discussing their course options, their dental appointments etc. with their parents. Talk about cuckoos in the nest.

                                      I know it's partly a class thing, as well as a generational thing. Working class kids (as I was) were expected to grow up quicker.

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                                        #20
                                        “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

                                        MsD wrote:
                                        Quite hard to measure or prove so it's just anecdotal, innit.
                                        Yeah, but even those anecdotes could be taken to show not that kids can't fend for themselves, but that they won't bother unless and until they have to: that they'll take the piss as long as parents let them. My money's on that.

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                                          #21
                                          “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

                                          Maybe, but I think being resourceful, resilient, adventurous-but-wary etc. comes with practice of having to look after yourself.

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                                            #22
                                            “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

                                            Choosing who your kids can be friends with is edging into mentalist territory.
                                            Well, that's me told. Thing is, seeing as the boy next door broke Young Master Grundy's Nintendo DS and called Little Miss Grundy a fucking bitch I think I was well within my rights.

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                                              #23
                                              “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

                                              Ah. It seems it might have to backtrack on a sweeping generalisation. How disagreeable.

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                                                #24
                                                “Curling parents”, do you have this expression?

                                                PG - That would have been a good opportunity to teach YMG how to decide for himself what kind of friends he wants to have. So in that instance, I guess it's just a matter of making sure the YMG knows exactly why you don't want him to play with the kid next door, as opposed to forbidding him to be friends with someone just because that person is gay, an atheist, a Christian, the wrong race or nationality, etc., etc.

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