To think friends should not let their child win all the time

[Hey12345]

We spend weekend evenings often with a couple who we have been friends with for years. We have a son who is 7 and they have one who is 6. Their son likes to play car racing games on xbox and sometimes wants us or our son to play along against him. It he is losing the game, or not in first place, half way he will stop and restart the game, this happens until we lose interest in playing and will make an excuse and let him play the game on his own.

But also, when we play board games, simple board games that doesn’t require any strategy or anything, he always asks his parents if he won and his mum always says yes. Which I suppose is fine if it’s one of them who won and can give him the win, but sometimes it’s our son who wins so I think it’s unfair to do so then. Sometimes we (adults) will play a kareoke game competing against each other, and usually our sons just play their own games, but recently their son has been sitting watching us play, occasionally singing a few random words and at the end when the scores come up he will ask if he won, and his Mum will say yes! Again, I do disagree with is, especially if it wasn’t his Mum who won because surely he needs to learn that you need to at least participate in the game to win?!

I understand you need to let children win to boost their confidence, I’ve been through it myself with DS, however I do this by discreetly letting them win a few games by not playing as well as I would normally (board games / mario kart etc.). And I remember DS being such a sore loser at I around 4 years old, so we tried to encourage positive losing, as in us losing and saying “oh well that’s fine, lets play again, I still had fun….” Etc. because obviously you worry about them losing in school and then kicking up a fuss.

aibu to find this annoying? It’s making me to not want to spend time together if it involves children and games!

If I was playing a game with DS2 (5) I would let him win if he was playing against me/dh but make him play fairly against another similar age DC.

If I was playing with DS1 (9) I would play properly (and he would beat me half the time).

I'm late 50s ( for context) and growing up, we always played board games ( 6 of us in total). I only ever remember it being fun.
I was a primary school teacher for 25 years. One year I had a year 5 class and as part of a maths fun day, I decided that we'd play board games.
I thought it was going to be fun. I could not have been more wrong. The cheating, the losing disgracefully and ensuing tantrums, left me speechless. It was absolute bedlam.
I had to spend some time teaching them the ground rules.
This was circa 2005.

@BadgernTheGarden he's the only child.

But that's not the OP's problem.

@AndMilesToGo No it's not my problem, thankfully, but I never made out that it was, just asking if I'm being unreasonable to disagree with it and finding it annoying.

Really???!!

@MoreMaths first time he did it we were a bit shocked, so it was him, my DS and my DH that were all playing Mario Kart. DH and DS was just like "oh why did you do that bla bla blah" and so they restarted, he did it again just before the end, my DS just kind of put the controller down and went to play with DD instead, I'm sure DH played once more then he then just put the controller down and just chatted with his friend (the dad). And I've noticed him hitting his controller on the table when he's finished a game solo and lost.

This is clearly their parenting philosophy and a conversation with you isn’t going to change it.
I would advise taking a massive step back from whole family gatherings. See your friend 1 on 1 if you want, but protect your kids and save yourself the trouble of thinking you can stop the car crash happening in front of you.

When I was a child, my nan played insanely competitive scrabble with me. She was impossible to beat but we played for years. One day when I was about 15, I finally won. It was the biggest victory because I knew it was a genuine one. We would also play games of luck like Ludo which either of us could easily win.

I’ve never let my kids win if it’s a game of luck but I’ve gone easy with them at times on skill based games when they were very little. I’ve always made sure they were able to cope with losing as well as winning- I can’t stand a sore loser.

they are doing their son no favours. I would say next time though if your son wins - well done Josh, you won. What shall we play now? the parents can lie to their kid if they like but it’s not fair for them to make out your kid lost when he won.

I’m an 11+ tutor. I know of two students whose parents told them they passed this year when they failed by miles. They’re going to be sent to private school thinking they sailed through the exam. I agree with you.

Yes I read it. Why is this any of OP’s business? Or anyone else’s? If OP doesn’t like it she can pull away from the friendship.

Yes. Really. It is entirely possible to watch someone parenting on a way you disagree with, and not draw all sorts of conclusions about the road to ruin the kid is on, and how they are doing it all wrong. It’s absolutely fine to be concerned about the effect on your child, but to be annoyed because you played a game against a six year old and their parent told him they had won the game? That’s some fragile ego.

Dont think this is any sort of big deal. It doesnt the mean the children is going to be a sore loser later in life.

If they were just telling their child he had won, that's one thing. But what gives them the right to take away the OP's DS's win from him and tell their child he won instead?

It’s not fragile if your child won a game and an adult lies to another child that they won when they didn’t.

OP doesn’t have a fragile ego. She’s not gutted that she won and didn’t get the recognition. She’s surprised by a controversial way of parenting and wants to know if others feel the same. Which, as it turns out, many do. It’s odd that you’ve read all her posts and come to the bizarre conclusion that she has a fragile ego.

It’s not fair on the child. You’re not preparing them for the real world. It’s one thing letting them win against you but manipulating the game so your kid triumphs over a peer is bloody weird and potentially damaging.

Life's full of disappointments and things not going your way and losing at games teaches you that as a kid and also how to interact with others when it happens.

I would respond in the moment with something like “Sam, if you want to win, you’ll need to sing”. Or “not this time, Ben won this round. We can’t win them all!”.

His mum can lie all she wants but that doesn’t mean you have to go along with it. If you do it all jokingly, hopefully she will reflect a little.

It’s really hard when people’s parenting styles differ. If she’s a good friend though, and you feel she won’t take kindly to any of the above, maybe just correct the times she’s letting your son think he’s lost. It’s maybe not work it otherwise, it’s them who will have to live with him.

I think it would be fine to ask them about it. Approach it neutrally and curiously.

Whether it is going to cause the lad problems down the line I would park firmly as none of your business. They are the parents, their issue. But when it starts to affect your own child's experience I'm not surprised your instinct is to pull away. If he never gets to win because this other child is always winning, your friends if they are decent people should be able to muster up and ounce of insight that that might be really quite challenging and stop the games being fun, week in week out, for your son. Your son can't choose to stay home if he doesn't fancy coming, he has no power here and how you respond to this makes a difference to him.

Thanks @Watchoutfortheslowaraf

I’ve never played any kind of game against him so my ego was never harmed 😂I just found it annoying how he had to win every game, against my DS and ok so I did mention he was told he won the kareoke games that the adults were playing, but in that case he wasn’t even singing so I don’t understand why his Mum said he’d won the singing game when he wasn’t even singing!

Well l totally disagree - that kid will grow up entitled and that's fine if its parents want to do that but they are doing him no favours and as pp said it won't make him popular.

I disagree with the way my friend raises her child but it doesn't affect me one bit so l leave her to it - been told all her life how cute and beautiful she is been fiven her own way all the time, child is getting older now, miserable as sin with hardly any friends. Very sad but parents are to blame.

I think it’s obvious that the dps are being a bit daft, but winning/losing games is an area that ds struggled with as an autistic dc and I just want to point out that it isn’t always a case of just parenting sensibly.

The outcomes aren’t as linear and karmic either. He hated taking part in win/lose scenarios and took on roles like referees, umpire or game organiser. Younger dc used to flock to him in his later years in primary because he’d invent imaginative games for them. In secondary school, when there are visiting class groups, he organises activities for the dc who don’t enjoy sports. He’s runs a games club at lunchtime, and at weekends he DMs a role play group which is cooperative gaming with no win/lose (and that’s something you could suggest to your friend if you decide to broach the topic).

I’d also say that his ability to dig in and solve knotty problems far outranks his peers and that’s a direct result of not being able to lose easily. Like your friend’s ds, he would restart video games over and over.

I know I’ll get flak for bringing autism into the discussion but ds isn’t obviously autistic and it’s not something we shared widely because people change how they interact with him. If they pick up on it, they blame my parenting instead which is fine either way me.

If I could have fixed this when he was younger, I would have, but it wasn’t straightforward. I knew it would have social consequences and it worried me. I just didn’t anticipate that they might be positive.

It’s also very possible that what you’re looking at is his dm’s public strategy to avoid meltdowns.

You sound like you handled it perfectly x

"Butt-hurt"....🤔🙄

Anyway, read the posts from @sarahandquack they are very interesting and very insightful.

I don't think I've ever let my child win
Does that make me a meanie 😆

Yes it's wrong what they're doing.
And I think if it was my child who had won, I'd certainly be saying that my child won that game