Teen Got Caught Stealing Again and Got Punishes
"My fourteen year old daughter was arrested for shoplifting make-upwardly this calendar week," said Marie, a working mother of ii girls. "Is this just normal teen beliefs, or is it something more serious? She'due south grounded for a month and I've taken away her iPhone and computer privileges, simply to tell the truth, I'thousand all the same in shock. I'yard furious and I don't fifty-fifty know how to talk to her most what she did."
No thing what parents you take, no matter what mental health diagnosis, no matter what stage you're in, it's wrong to steal because it hurts others.
Many parents have asked me over the years, "Is shoplifting a candy bar or cosmetics or wearing apparel the same as stealing?" The truth is, stealing is stealing. It's criminal, antisocial and worst of all, information technology corrodes a child's evolution, character and integrity through the use of justifications and excuses. However, shoplifting candy bars from a store and stealing with aggression are ii very dissimilar acts.
Stealing is wrong, and the best mode to empathize information technology is to examine your kid'south thinking. Kids who steal oftentimes feel entitled to what they're stealing, even though they or their parents can't afford it. In that location is a violent sense of competitiveness among teens and pre-teens these days regarding having the cool stuff, wearing the hip clothes, and sporting hot make-up or accessories. Many kids will resort to stealing as a response to this phenomenon. Sometimes kids even steal for the sense of excitement information technology gives them, or exercise it under peer pressure.
A big part of the problem is that our society's message is completely absent of a strongly objective morality. In most movies and songs today, the bad guys practise good things and the skillful guys do bad things, and everybody looks the same. So kids justify what they're doing. It'southward not surprising when kids develop these ambivalent feelings about integrity, character and the difference between right and wrong.
The "Five Finger Discount"—What's Behind a Child's Thinking When He Shoplifts?
A child'due south thinking behind this blazon of behavior is that "No 1 will get injure and the store has a lot of money." They rationalize that they need to have this stuff in lodge to be accepted. They might say, "My parents won't allow me to buy clothing or makeup similar this, so I have to steal it." Simply remember this: It'south our chore as parents, teachers and therapists to strongly defend the concept that stealing is incorrect. Tell your children this: "Stealing is incorrect for two reasons: It's illegal and puts yous at risk of being arrested and prosecuted. Information technology'due south also hurtful considering when you lot have something that doesn't belong to you, somewhere, someone down the line is being hurt." Go far existent to your child past explaining that if they shoplift cosmetics or video games, the company adjusts its price upwardly to insulate itself, and all the remainder of united states pay a piddling more for it considering of it.
If your child is defenseless stealing, in all cases, there needs to be meaningful consequences for the beliefs. To you every bit a parent, the nigh important aspect of your child'due south decision to steal is the way of thinking that preceded the stealing. She should pay whatsoever the consequences are for stealing, and too write an essay on how she justified it. Ask her, "What were you thinking before you stole this?" Remember this: It is in the examination of the justifications and excuses where the true learning volition have place.
Certainly consequences similar making her take the stolen item back to the store, apologizing and making financial amends are all very good parts of the equation. That kind of accountability tin be very productive in deterring futurity stealing, if accompanied past an examination of the faulty thinking which drove them to do it. Y'all too might give them the consequence of, "You tin't go to the mall for ii weeks. Two weeks of no stealing." If parents ask me, "How do I know?" I say "Don't worry most it. They need to get another chance. You're non there to be a cop." Ever requite them the adventure to earn your trust back.
Stealing with Aggression: A Whole Different Mindset
"Aggression" means a "threat of harm or violence or the employ of harm or violence." Some kids have gotten to a level of stealing where they are willing to physically assault someone else to have what they want. When dealing with stealing with aggression, the focus has to exist on very strong consequences to deter future behavior, likewise as a very focused test of the thoughts, not the feelings, the thoughts which underlie this blazon of behavior. When people steal with aggression, they're clearly maxim, "I want that bad enough that I'll hurt you if you don't give it to me," which is very unlike than a shoplifter who says, "This won't hurt the company, they have a lot of money." Information technology's a very dissimilar mindset and has to be addressed with vigor.
Permit me be articulate: Stealing with aggression is hardcore antisocial beliefs. When you deal with individuals who showroom criminal behavior, you'll often notice that one-on-one, they can exist very mannerly, pleasant, and intelligent. Many criminals take avant-garde social manipulative skills. The divergence between a criminal and a non-criminal is that the criminal is willing to utilize violence and aggression to get what he wants, while the non-criminal has very strong boundaries in those areas. Then when children are willing to utilise violence and assailment to get their way, it tin can exist a key indicator that they are quite far down the incorrect path. Of course there are always isolated incidents where kids volition threaten other kids to get their way. Adolescent blowing tin can sometimes lead to threats. The astute adult has to ferret out which is which. But make no fault, if your kid is using threats of violence and assailment to steal, he has to exist dealt with very sternly. Again, it is very difficult to counteract the media forces in our social club which constantly advocate assailment and violence as legitimate means to solve problems. Our media promotes the idea that if you lot want or demand something bad plenty and you lot have a good excuse-making system in place, you can justify annihilation. And y'all can use aggression and violence to achieve your terminate.
And then hither's the bulletin kids are getting: "If you can justify it, and so it's OK to exercise information technology." And we all know that kids tin can justify annihilation. And then social club has to react very strongly to assailment and threats involving stealing or annihilation else. I mean, look around you. Await at all the violence and assailment, senseless killing. Now remember about this: in the minds of the kids who are committing that violence they believe information technology's the OK thing to do. If you look below the violence, to the thinking patterns, it's very scary. That's why yous run across situations similar Columbine and Virginia Tech, where kids commit horrible violence on other kids and justify it because they perceive themselves as victims. Stealing is wrong and hurtful. But stealing with aggression and violence is much more problematic and needs to exist dealt with aggressively.
If Your Child is Stealing inside the Family, Everyone is Paying the Price
It'southward common to hear that kids steal from their family members. Younger kids after all don't accept the level of moral evolution that leads to them understanding that this type of stealing is wrong and hurtful. This has to be taught with patience and firmness. Stealing within the family unit should have the same consequences as stealing from a shop, whether it's from a sibling or a parent. Labeling, yelling and name-calling does not change the behavior. Discussions about the rights of others and respect for other's property, followed by a upshot the child must acquit out, are the preferred ways of dealing with theft in the family unit.
For young children, a consequence might be that they go to their room with the door open for 15 minutes, at the stop of which time you come in and talk with them about stealing. Focus on the child realizing he was wrong, instead of just saying he is sorry. As kids go older, other consequences come into play, like paying rent for the stolen property, paying back the stolen money, and loss of social privileges. Tell them you're taking away their privileges because yous're not sure they can be trusted outside of the house. Don't forget that if someone is dangerous or untrustworthy in the house, there should exist real concern near what kind of trouble they might get into outside of the business firm where in that location is even less structure.
Volume and frequency of the stealing are also important to address. If a pre-adolescent or boyish steals a large amount of money, which is measured compared to what the family has, the police should be called and yous should be starting the legal procedure. This is designed to hold that child legally responsible, not only family-responsible. The assumption hither is that you lot've tried all you tin can inside the family and it'due south non working, and that now the police have to get involved. Stealing is a crime. These acts should be looked at every bit criminal acts more than as mental health problems. While mental health problems may be involved, adults who have mental wellness bug are punished for stealing just similar adults without mental wellness problems. Prisons and correctional institutions are full of people with mental health problems who too stole. They're not in jail for mental health problems, they're in jail for stealing.
If at that place'due south a high frequency of theft, or stealing for no apparent reason or the hoarding of nutrient, that can indicate deeper psychological forces at play. These kids demand to be assessed to run across if there's a therapeutic response to their behavior. But make no bones almost information technology, they also demand to be held accountable in the dwelling house as well as exterior of the home for their antisocial behavior.
Although stealing may exist a symptom of a larger problem, it is still stealing. The lesson about not stealing has to be reinforced and the child has to be held accountable. We can't make excuses about antisocial and harmful beliefs even when it occurs in the dwelling house. Remember, you're trying to produce a person who can function safely and productively in adult society. Excusing stealing will not produce that person. Sometimes parents minimize this behavior and it comes dorsum to hurt them afterward.
Related content: Kids Stealing from Parents: What You Demand to Know
When Your Trust is Betrayed: How to allow Your Child Earn it Dorsum
The sense of betrayal that parents feel after their child has stolen from them is very real and should exist addressed openly. If it'due south a younger child, certainly the emotion should exist screened out of it, and your child should be taught about trust. The manner you'd explain trust to a younger child is by saying, "Stealing is hurtful and if somebody trusts y'all, it'south important non to injure them." Explicate that trust is actually a word nosotros use for depending upon other people to do sure things or to non do certain things. The stronger that our belief is that they won't hurt usa, the deeper the sense of violation is. As kids get older and become teens, I think that their loyalties and allegiances are torn between the values of their peer group and the values of their family. Very ofttimes there's a contradiction between the two. This contradiction needs to be tolerated by parents to a certain degree because the teenager'southward developmental office is to become an individual. And i of the ways that teens do that is by pushing their parents away and by rebelling against family unit norms and values. A sure corporeality of rebelliousness should exist tolerated. Notwithstanding, a teenager stealing from parents is not an act of rebelliousness. Information technology's a violation of trust and it's the commission of a footling offense in an arena where the teen doesn't feel at that place volition exist severe consequences.
If there are several acts of stealing, they should exist dealt with sternly in the family unit, using the behavioral concepts that I mentioned earlier. If at that place is major stealing of money and other valuables, the parents should consider involving the law and pressing charges. Although this seems harsh, the principles behind it are easy to empathize. If a teen is stealing from you considering he perceives you lot every bit beingness weak and if family consequences aren't helping with that, the family unit needs to seek exterior help in order to strengthen itself. Secondly, and this is very important, if kids go away with stealing valuables from home, they're going to develop a value organisation which allows for stealing any time the person tin justify it. When I have gone to youth detention centers to talk to the teens I was working with about the crimes that got them at that place, they invariably had a justification for information technology. That type of justification, or what we call an "excuse organization," is developed and reinforced at dwelling house. In short, teens develop a way of thinking to justify their teenage beliefs. They develop an alibi for everything. In one case that alibi system becomes criminalized, you'll see an increase in the amount of antisocial behavior such as stealing, drug use, and sometimes assailment. Parents who insulate kids from the consequences of their behavior are merely extending, supporting and reinforcing the bad judgments that pb to those behaviors.
The mode trust is won back: for younger kids, they should exist told what to do in society for the family to feel similar they trust them once more. "Don't take your blood brother'south things so I can trust you to be upstairs alone. If you steal something from your older blood brother, you can't go upstairs unsupervised." Brand the kid uncomfortable. Consequences make them uncomfortable. You can lead a horse to h2o, but you can't make them drink—merely you can make them thirsty. Consequences are designed to make the child thirsty.
In addition, positive statements about trust should be made frequently with younger kids. "When you handle it that way, I know I tin trust you lot." Model the values you want your younger kids to take and identify them. Brand statements similar, "It's good when you tell me the truth. I know I can trust you downstairs with the TV. I know I can trust you lot to become into my bedchamber." The more than we say statements like that, that you come across what your child is doing, or you hear what they're saying, the more real it makes them experience. With older kids who steal, it's important to say, "You lot've lost my trust, and therefore you can't go upstairs alone. I don't think I'g going to be able to trust you around money once more. So I'1000 going to close my bedroom door and you can't go in anymore." There are parents who put locks on their doors, and I think kids should pay for those locks. Just always give them a ways to earn that trust dorsum, either in that conversation or a subsequent one.
Is Your Child Stealing Chronically?
If a kid steals chronically, earning a parent'south trust back is the least of his problems. Considering he'south already developing an alibi system that says it's OK to injure the people you beloved. There are plenty of parents who don't trust their kids around their money and valuables. In today's society, parents are second class citizens and in that location's nearly a societal expectation that their kids will corruption them and that they should accept it, and that'due south just crazy. That expectation is expressed in justifications like, "All kids steal, all kids lie, kids sometimes lose their atmosphere." But certainly all kids don't lie or steal to the aforementioned degree, nor do all kids verbally abuse their parents and interruption things in the abode. And when they do, they need to be held strictly answerable.
Right and Wrong: There is a Divergence
I truly empathize with what parents are up against these days. The concept of correct and incorrect has taken a real beating in our recent history. It'south been replaced by the concepts of "consumerism" and "possessiveness." Therefore, when you tell kids it is wrong to steal, they have limited formal moral and ethical training to use as a reference point, and whatever moral and upstanding training they have is easily drowned out by the media, which screams at them constantly. And in that location'due south too much excuse-making for kids' behavior. Adults say "Information technology's only a stage he's going through." Or he has ADD. Or his father is an alcoholic. And they keep making those excuses until the child is in serious trouble. Things like developmental stages or mental health diagnoses or family influences have to exist dealt with as separate issues from the stealing or aggression. Exercise these issues need to be addressed? Of grade they exercise. Are they significant? Absolutely. Should they exist immune to justify stealing or aggression? Never. No matter what parents you lot have, no matter what mental health diagnosis, no matter what phase you're in, it's wrong to steal because it hurts others.
That has to be black and white to everybody.
Source: https://www.empoweringparents.com/article/child-stealing-can-advice-parents-kids-stealing-shoplifting/
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