When I was younger, I used to have a friend who would get more and more unpleasant as the month wore on (I know what you’re thinking, but you’re wrong—it was a guy.) Anyway, every month would follow the same predictable pattern: as the month progressed he would slowly but surely alienate all of his friends one by one, until by the end of the month there was no one left for him to hang out with. After a few days of his own company (and, I assume, some honest introspection), he would morph back into a charming guy, his friends would return, and all would be well.
Until the end of the next month, when it would happen all over again—to a degree. In the years that I knew him his periods of unpleasantness got progressively—albeit infinitesimally—smaller. In fact, after twenty or so years you could hardly tell the difference between his two “sides” anymore—which was a blessing for everyone.
And, yet, even during the worst of it, to the best of my knowledge no one ever once took him aside and pointed this pattern out to him, nor did they ever put into words why one week they were willing to tolerate his company, and the next week they weren’t. It just seemed like it was understood: when you’re a jerk, no one wants to hang out with you; when you’re a nice guy, everyone will come back. Simple. And effective. And also, in today’s world, totally unrealistic—at least at the grade school level.
This is because there seems to be a disturbing trend among some parents of elementary age children to subvert what I like to think of as the natural social order (where nice kids have friends and mean kids don’t) by mandating inclusivity at all costs. I don’t know how many times I have heard a parent ordering their child to “play” with another kid, even though there is obviously some sort of personality conflict at work.
To be clear: I’m not talking about genuine instances of bullying here—those nasty situations where kids belittle each other in a bid to gain more social power—I’m talking about when kids simply don’t want to hang out with another kid because that kid is unpleasant. I’m talking about making kids play with the kid who always breaks the crayons or pushes his way to the front of the line. I’m talking about stepping in, as a sort of parental deus ex machina, and reworking the natural social order so that the kid who exhibits the most antisocial behavior actually get rewarded for it instead of punished.
Sometimes I think that adults are worried that, if left on their own, even for a twenty minute recess, kids will devolve into a “Lord of the Flies” state—that the only thing that is stopping them from fashioning spears and hunting each other across the playground is adult supervision. The truth, I think, is that most kids are more apt to react with decency, compassion, and yes, censure then we give them credit for. Most kids, if left on their own, will do the right thing—and sometimes, believe it or not, the right thing means being not so accommodating. Take the above example of my old friend: what, I wonder, would he have been like if every time he descended into nastiness we had all been “forced” to hang out with him?
Would he have ever seen the error of his ways? Would he have changed (even as slowly as he did) if it hadn’t been for the shunning? I doubt it.
Some lessons can only be learned the hard way, and unfortunately (or fortunately, perhaps), the Golden Rule seems to be one of them. Even on the playground—scratch that: especially on the playground.