Why Tigers Eat Their Young

The truth about teenagers

interview by Tamara Letkeman

Quick—who was it that bemoaned: “Our youth now love luxury, they have bad manners, contempt for authority, they show disrespect for their elders and love chatter in the place of exercise”? Was it your mom? Grandpa? Your Grade 10 teacher? Surprise! The quote is attributed to Socrates—who lived nearly 2,500 years ago. But the point isn’t who said it; it’s that grown-ups have been vilifying teenagers since time immemorial. Do they deserve it? Dr. Peter Marshall, child psychologist and author of Now I Know Why Tigers Eat Their Young, recently stopped by to answer some burning questions about what makes teenagers tick.

Which has sharper teeth: a tiger or a teenager? A tiger is more predictable in what you’re going to get from it. But teenagers can go from this nice, soft way of communication—almost like they’re toothless—to grinding away with their molars. And sometimes they’ve got their canines out.

What’s wrong with kids today anyway? Not too much of anything. One thing I’ve emphasized in the book is that really, we get a lot of bad press about kids. There may be a few problems that are peculiar to this generation, but by and large the problems are pretty much the ones that their parents had—that they’d like to pretend they didn’t have and forget all about.

What is the Chicken Little Syndrome you talk about in your book? The sky is falling, the sky is falling, the sky is falling. I traced it back in history—sort of tongue in cheek—to Socrates, who talked about what a rotten lot kids were back in his day. And then you go through the 17th, 18th centuries, all the way into Dr. Spock, who thought that kids were terrible. You start to think: there’s something wrong here, because every generation says the same thing. What happens is people look at a snapshot—“what’s with these kids going around with mohawks” was a big one a while back. Well, think back: if you were around in the ‘60s, parents were just as outraged when we grew our hair over our ears. So just relax and realize that the sky is not falling.

Is the present generation of teens doomed? [laughs] I hope not, because I want them to be looking after me in about 20 years! No, they’re not doomed at all. We have the most highly educated generation of kids in history. Again, contrary to what people would have you believe—that teenagers couldn’t even read The Bobbsy Twins or something—they’re smarter than they ever were.

Guilt-tripping: an effective method for dealing with teenagers? Well, my mother tried it! I always feel very guilty when I say that. Nothing wrong with a little bit of guilt, but management-by-guilt is really not the best way of doing it. Why would you want to make someone feel guilty because they stayed out till 1 in the morning when the curfew was 11? They’re having fun, they broke a rule, they knew what the rule was. Apply a consequence.

Parents are former teenagers themselves, so why the generation gap? I don’t know if there is a huge generation gap. There was in the ‘60s and ‘70s because the values being espoused by teenagers in the ‘60s were quite discordant with the values of their parents. But if you ask kids what their core values are, and what the parents’ values are, the top four for both are family, friends, a good, solid education, and a good career.

I want my daughter to be an engineer—like me—but she has this ridiculous dream of becoming a sculptor. How do I get her to see the light? [laughs] I’m sorry—she’s already seen the light. It just happens to be a rather different light than you want to shine in her life. I guess that would be one issue where I would say, “Follow your dreams.” And if you want to, say, give her the information—we really do want her to know that the life of a sculptor is probably a little bit more precarious than going into engineering, in terms of guaranteed income and career. But if she says, “I don’t care, I want to do that,” I’d say, “You go for it.”

My no-good son took the car without asking and proceeded to ram it into a tree. How do I deal with him when strangulation is not an option? One of our sons went off with the car—now he actually had permission, but he drove like an idiot and he caused considerable damage, and the consequence was he would not drive again until he had worked and paid off the money for the damage…. Chances are if there’s major damage he’s going to be paying it off for a long time. The car will be safe—till the next time.

What is the worst thing you ever did as a teenager? Oh, I think I stole a cookie…. OK, I got kicked out of school when I was 15 and my mother believed that I was going to another high school. I didn’t go once. And before my transcript came out, I hopped on a ferry to Belgium and went to India. And that’s when I got a letter—when she finally caught up with me—saying, “You can lead a horse to water, Peter, but you can’t make it drink. And you’re a bloody horse.”

The third edition of Peter Marshall’s international bestseller Now I Know Why Tigers Eat Their Young (Whitecap Books) is available in bookstores.

—interview conducted, condensed, and edited by SharedVISION editor Tamara Letkeman

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