Breeders vs. DINKs: let's get ready to rumble!

I agree with Joe that we don't really have enough information about that particular anecdote. I could see it going either way.

I definitely agree that a parent needs to be careful -- that's been my point throughout. (Re-reading... yep, "I don't see it as a kid or parenting thing, I see it as a bad parenting thing. Unless it's a specifically kid-friendly place, I expect my kid to more or less behave," and "Occasionally she would "fuss" -- or cry, even -- and I'd quickly deal with the situation")

Joe's self-admittedly a bit facetious response though was that a new parent should remain in purdah -- I disagree. If I had every reason to expect that she would behave well in public, and in fact she did most of the time, I think it was fine for me to take her to a coffee shop in the middle of winter. She was way too young to get anything out of Chuck E. Cheese's, and *I* can't stand the place.

I chose places that tended to have lots of other moms and kids -- if not specifically FOR kids -- and was always ready to deal with a situation that came up, from a nursing room break (and I often chose places that had nursing rooms) to just plain leaving.

But purdah? No.

0 Replies

sozobe wrote:

In fact, there are a lot of potential disruptions in the world. People talking loudly on cell phones. Odiferous farts. Some people are just really ugly. Some people have even been known to have bad seafood and upchuck all over the place.

All of these potentialities should be erased by not allowing someone who might possibly constitute a disruption to set foot in public, right? Although that public may be quite drastically reduced if such a law was implemented...

Oh yeah, right. Just try to keep the ugly people at home. They won't stay there! Believe me, I've tried! And I found out they're really touchy about being called "ugly" too.

sozobe wrote:

Joe's self-admittedly a bit facetious response though was that a new parent should remain in purdah -- I disagree. If I had every reason to expect that she would behave well in public, and in fact she did most of the time, I think it was fine for me to take her to a coffee shop in the middle of winter.

In truth, I never have any problems with kids, I just have problems with their parents. I understand that kids will act like kids, and that they can't be expected to police their own behavior (that's what juvenile detention facilities are for). I absolutely adore responsible parents who know what's appropriate behavior and inappropriate behavior for their children and who act with consideration toward others, and I have no doubt that you are one of those parents, soz.

I hearken back to when I was a child (back in the caveman days -- hey, you damn kids, stay offa' my lawn!), and I can assure you that my parents would not have tolerated the kind of behavior from their offspring that I routinely see today in others' children. But then my folks also didn't think that the world owed them something just for having kids.

I'll share a family anecdote: when I would visit my brother and sister-in-law, we and their two young children would always go to the same restaurant. My brother would explain that "it's the only restaurant that will still let us in." Apparently, the kids would run around and create all sorts of havoc: my brother and s-in-s's response wasn't to discipline the kids, but to go from one restaurant to another until they found one that would tolerate their ill-mannered spawn. Rolling Eyes

0 Replies

Oh dear. Yeah, I can't stand parents who plain won't parent for two reasons -- 'cause they plain bother me, and 'cause they give us all a bad name.

Thanks for the compliment. I absolutely adore people who debate well and graciously. :-)

0 Replies

sozobe wrote:

But purdah? No.

Sozobe, it sounds like you are describing a self-imposed purdah... going to places where kids & moms congregate. Leaving if your child wasn't up to the moment.

There is a lot of difference between what you've described and parents taking their infants to an expensive white linen dinner. Go there for lunch if you have to with your mom or girlfriends or husband so that you've got someone to help... but going out to a fancy dinner with tiny infants? That's what babysitters are for. I loved, however, taking my children to restaurants as soon as they could manage it. My son, at three, was an absolute gentleman, if known far and wide as one who would invariably choose the most expensive item on the menu. One of his first big dinners... he was three... he ordered steak AND lobster. He was dressed to the nines and sat between his grandpa and an adoring aunt and uncle. Children like that are a delight. Children as banshees... not so much.

All it takes is common sense. In movie theaters showing other than children's films, in fancy restaurants, especially in the evening, at the ballet except for Nutcracker Matinee performances... expect that other people are not going to be pleased if your baby disrupts their own good
and expensive time. That was my self-imposed purdah... I'd never take my kids to any of those at any age unless I was assured that I could comfortably keep them happy enough that everyone else around us enjoyed themselves, too.

0 Replies

Hmm, I meant like stay-at-home purdah. Don't-go-ANYWHERE purdah. The article that started this was talking about coffeeshops, not expensive white linen dinners.

Steak and lobster, heh!

Totally agree about common sense.

0 Replies

I once worked in a store, and while standing behind the counter one day, was startled as a young man, of about 12 years of age, dressed in pressed black slacks, shined black shoes and a pressed white shirt, rushed up and held open the door. He was followed by four young gentleman, stair steps to him, who appeared to be about 10, 8, 6 and 4, and they were all dressed as was he. They lined up as though they were the members of a cadet corps, no talking or joking, all very serious business. The four-year old figited a little, and earned looks of reproach from the brothers (for so i assumed them to be) nearest him, and he straightened up with a sigh--the closest to insubordination i saw.

Then a diminutive women entered, who i assumed was their mother. She was not as tall as the 12 year old, but she marched in with perfect posture, her head erect and an air of command. She quickly identified the appropriate aisle, and beckoned the smallest boy. Finding the shoes that she considered appropriate, and assuring their fit, she sent him with his two shoe boxes to go stand in line and wait, and then beckoned the next largest boy. This continued until all the boys had each gotten a pair of brown "dress" shoes and a pair of "sneakers." She then set the older boy to taking orders for McDonalds (their treat for the day, as she explained it to them), with the warning that he was not to exceed twelve dollars. Then she came to the counter and settled with me. Having paid the bill, and with each boy's shoe boxes bagged, they came one at a time to pick up their respective bags, and then waited in line while the eldest boy held the door for their mother, and waited while his brothers, in size order, preceeded him out the door. At that point, he thanked me quietly and politely, and left himself.

Few Sergeants Major could have expected such discipline from their regiments. I strongly suspect that those boys are now grown, and doing well in the world. Joe's remark, "I hearken back to when I was a child (back in the caveman days -- hey, you damn kids, stay offa' my lawn!), and I can assure you that my parents would not have tolerated the kind of behavior from their offspring that I routinely see today in others' children."--brought this to mind for me. The most impressive example of successful parenting i'd ever seen.

0 Replies

Haha... funny to put steak and lobster & common sense together. <remembering look of his father>

Even in a coffeeshop, I think that if a child is truly screaming and can't be comforted within a very short amount of time, one's self-imposed purdah ought to quickly commence. I understand the problems... leaving a steaming espresso drink, trying to pay, handling the other children... but that is the price we pay for our joy as parents. Timing and pre-planning are what makes these things go smoothly.

0 Replies

joefromchicago wrote:

But many neighborhood mothers took umbrage at the implied criticism of how they handle their children.

Maybe they should take umbrage, some mothers need to have their child rearing skills criticized. Like when they think their screaming, running, standing on their chair child should just be embraced by a room full of people trying to have a quiet meal and relax without high pitched screeching of "NO! NO! I DON'T WANT THAT NO! NO!

No one has ever come up to me in a cafe or restaurant requesting I start making more scheeching noises and generally be more obnoxious

Menus at Zumbro Cafe in Minneapolis say: "We love children, especially when they're tucked into chairs and behaving," which Barbara Daenzer said she read as an invitation to cease her weekly breakfast visits when her son was born.

Perhaps that's exactly how she should have read it. Perhaps that message was meant exactly for her

Teachers and writers seeking afternoon refuge were drowned out not just by children running amok but also by oblivious cell phone chatterers.

Note "seeking afternoon refuge"

Children were climbing the cafe's poles. A couple were blithely reading the newspaper while their daughter lay on the floor blocking the line for coffee. When the family whose children were running across the room to flail themselves against the display cases left after his admonishment, McCauley recalled, the restaurant erupted in applause.

Funny, we all recognize these people, but no one IS ACTUALLY one of them. "oh, I'm not like that with my kids" Well, someone is honey, and it's looking like you.

"The looks I would get when I went in there made me so nervous that I would try to buy the food as fast as I could and get out," said Laura Brauer, 40, who has stopped visiting Taste with her two kids.

Children who are behaving seldom get "looks" Wonder what her 2 darlings were up to. Perhaps it is a good thing she no longer goes there.

"I think that the mothers who allow their kids to run around and scream, that's wrong, but kids scream and there is nothing you can do about it.

Excuse me?

What are we supposed to do, not enjoy ourselves at a cafe?"

Er, yes. Come back with your children when they can behave themselves so that ALL the people in the cafe can enjoy themselves, not just you. You chose to have a child, along with that comes great responsibility, part of that being potentially having to forgo a latte.

Kim Cavitt recalled having coffee and a cookie one afternoon with her boisterous 2-year-old when "someone came over and said you just need to keep her quiet or you need to leave."

"We left, and we haven't been back since," Cavitt said. "You go to a coffee shop or a bakery for a rest, to relax, and that you would have to worry the whole time about your child doing something that children do -- really what they're saying is they don't welcome children, they want the child to behave like an adult."

[/B]No, but I do expect them to behave like polite children. Even adult behave differently at home and in public

Why suffer such scorn, the mothers said, when clerks at the Swedish Bakery, a neighborhood institution, offer children -- calm or crying -- free cookies? Why confront such criticism when the recently opened Sweet Occasions, a five-minute walk down Clark Street, designed the bathroom aisle to accommodate double strollers and offers a child-size ice cream cone for $1.50?

Have fun, sounds like the place you should be

McCauley said he would rather go out of business than back down. He likens this one small step toward good manners to his personal effort to decrease pollution by only hiring employees who live close enough to walk to work.

"I can't change the situation in Iraq; I can't change the situation in New Orleans," he said. "But I can change this little corner of the world."

Bravo!

This isn't a matter of having zero children, or 10 children. It's about children behaving like human beings.

If you let your child scream and run and be obnoxious at home, that's fine. BUT....yes, I'm actually going to say it......If they can't behave, don't expose innocent bystanders to the fallout of your "choice" to have kids.

_________________________________________________________

Looks like I've found my new favorite restaurant.

0 Replies

I'm late weighing in but here's my take.

The author is bitter and defensive. He makes a valiant effort to hide it but this single line sort of gives it away.

Quote:

We breeders agree: It's probably best that some people don't have children.

Meaning, you non-breeders shouldn't have kids anyway for whatever reason -- inferior genes, lack of intestinal fortitude, terminal snarkiness, whatever.

That said, I think that some people have the unrealistic expectation that because they chose not to have children that they are entitled to an existence where they never have to encounter them. Some walk around with the childless chip on their shoulder waiting to pounce on the first high-pitched sound they hear to scold parents about being in public with their children. Ok, that was a bit of an exaggeration, but I've seen both extremes. I've seen people who bring their kids (not well behaved) to places or situations that they just can't handle yet, or who expect to fit a mall-sized cadillac of a stroller inside a small and cozy cafe. I've seen people who are just annoyed (and refuse to keep it to themselves) that there happen to be children in public (on a train and in a grocery store). But more often than not I see parents out with relatively well-behaved kids and who cope with stressed kids by removing them and themselves from the situation -- when possible. What else can you expect?

I would also add that mothers, especially new ones, feel the pressure when in public with their young children and that is bound to cloud their judgment. A scowl is likely to either make them feel like complete **** or make them defensive and oppositional.

0 Replies

Piffka wrote:

There is a lot of difference between what you've described and parents taking their infants to an expensive white linen dinner. Go there for lunch if you have to with your mom or girlfriends or husband so that you've got someone to help... but going out to a fancy dinner with tiny infants? That's what babysitters are for.

Please bring back the regular use of babysitters.
Please please please.

I understand that some people need to do extra bonding because they're at work all day - but then - please stay home with your child, or go someplace appropriate for children, or wait til the child is appropriate for the place, or something.

But sometimes, leave the child/children with a babysitter, and go out without them.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

PDA's/babies/children - they're not appropriate everywhere.

0 Replies

Well, here's the story behind the story. I won't post the whole thing (it's pretty long), but I can't resist copying this part:

Kim Cavitt appeared in Wilgoren's story as a neighborhood mother who "recalled having coffee and a cookie one afternoon with her boisterous 2-year-old when 'someone came over and said you just need to keep her quiet or you need to leave.'" McCauley read that as Cavitt claiming she'd been kicked out -- which he was sure hadn't happened, his sign being no more than a "very gentle reminder" that no one who worked for him would ever enforce so brutally. Cavitt and McCauley wound up on Fox News together. "I said, 'Ma'am, I don't think that happened,'" McCauley told me. "And she was very dogmatic and she said, 'Are you calling me a liar?' on national TV." Later that day Cavitt showed up at A Taste of Heaven, which she was otherwise boycotting, to pursue the discussion. "That was very awkward," said McCauley. I reached Cavitt at home. [b]It was hard to hear her over the two-year-old screaming in the background[/b], but she set the record straight...
Priceless!

0 Replies

Very good points Free Duck.

If a baby is crying on an airplane or in a grocery store where a parent has no choice leaving the situation with the child, there's no issue there.

Actually I don't see this as a breeder vs. a DINKs, it's a awareness of the environment you're in.

People who bitch about kids because they don't like them period are just jerks.

Even most people who don't like kids realize you can't keep a child quiet for extended boring hours like on a trip.

Me personally, I don't care one way or the another about children.

It's really not polarized that breeders think they are entitled to subject everyone to their children, any more than DINK's feel entitled to having constant fulfillment of their needs.

Those who are at those two extremes are hopeless.

It's the realization by DINK's that if they want some quiet they better not go to Chuck E. Cheese, and for breeders to realize their 5 year old won't enjoy the opera.

It's not the babies, it's the kids. The one's that sit there banging away without a care in the world, in a place were that's not appropriate.

I was in a library last week, and was amazed that I heard a little kid yelling and bashing into things and generally making a commotion.
I would tend to think a library when it's not story time is a place where pretty much all of mankind would acknowledge is a place where we put on our manners.

Oh! And I was at a mass last sunday - hadn't been in a few years, but suddenly the sacrement of the mass took into account the need for a small boy to converse loudly with no one in particular, and the parent saw no need to take the hellion outside.

This was a place of prayerful meditation, no a hoe-down.

Maybe it's me, but the word cafe connotes a place of relaxation and quiet conversation between friends and lovers, not a place to bring the kids.

I was half joking before when I said that we all know parents who let their kids run wild, but of course none of us are those people.

Where do those people come from then? Are they shipped in for the day?

0 Replies

I'm sort of inbetween on all this, in that I think well behaved children often enhance a scene; no, not at all restaurants, etc. We brought my niece to many kinds of restaurants fairly early, but not to the very expensive ones until she was perhaps eight. It's hard to remember, might have been a tad earlier. She was a bit of a "throwback" in that she wasn't raised to be the center of attention during adult discussions (while she did get some attention, and was brought into conversations when it fit).

In LA we had plenty of restaurants that had interesting gourmet food but weren't very formal or out of sight expensive. So she transitioned from "Hurry Curry" to Hal's to being able to hold her own talking with the waiter about what to order in a place like Ca'Brea.

On the other hand, I will be near out of my mind if parents don't rein in children who run around screaming. That reminds me of an occasion when I invited everybody and families over from the last laboratory I worked at. I was still finding sticky surfaces a few days later..

Man alive, I wanted to serve roast Kid..

0 Replies

I guess I should mention I don't remember my niece ever crying in a restaurant, but I wasn't around her much until she was about two..

0 Replies

Setanta wrote:

I once worked in a store, and while standing behind the counter one day, was startled as a young man, of about 12 years of age, dressed in pressed black slacks, shined black shoes and a pressed white shirt, rushed up and held open the door. He was followed by four young gentleman, stair steps to him, who appeared to be about 10, 8, 6 and 4, and they were all dressed as was he. They lined up as though they were the members of a cadet corps, no talking or joking, all very serious business. The four-year old figited a little, and earned looks of reproach from the brothers (for so i assumed them to be) nearest him, and he straightened up with a sigh--the closest to insubordination i saw...

What a cool story, Setanta. I love the images. Brings to mind something someone once told me... the only way to have a large family is to have a lot of kids... meaning that her older kids were extraordinarily helpers for the younger ones.

0 Replies

We do not have kids, and none are planned. That being said, we love sitting near well-behaved children. Heck, well-behaved anyone is great! And we're well aware that some parents have their hands full, or are in the middle of something and cannot take the child out or quiet him or her down instantly. That's fine, that's life.

What I don't like is the running and the screaming, the banging and the throwing of things, and the parents who do nada about it. Not even a "No!" Nothing. I mean, really, how do children learn anything about getting along in the world unless, at times, they get a touch of negative reinforcement along with all of the positive reinforcement that I'm sure they get. Surely it will not traumatize a child for life to tell him or her to sit down during a meal.

What I am mainly burned up about are families on long trips or other times when there is a lot of time that has to pass that is less than fun for a child, and the parent brings absolutely nothing with which to entertain, educate or amuse their child. And I mean, nothing. No books, no cards, no toys, no games, no video games, no music, not even a favorite blanket or doll. Nothing. And the child is expected to -- what, exactly? Figure out that being quiet is a good idea? Well, sure it is, but I don't expect a two-year-old or a five-year-old to get that. Heck, I barely expect an eight-year-old to get that after a certain length of time. Yet here are these thoroughly unprepared parents and their bored children (BTW the train I am talking about is one where you buy your tickets in advance, this is not exactly an unexpected trip). I feel sorry for their children. For, truth be told, the kids will play in some way, somehow. And, dollars to donuts, it will be inappropriate or dangerous or perhaps both. I do not want to see a child sustain a head injury because he's been hanging upside-down on a train seat and has fallen to the floor. Nor do I wish to see a child left on a platform because he's been running up and down the aisles and the train has stopped in New Haven but his family is going to Providence.

0 Replies

Come on!, kids are great! Throw a little honey BBQ sauce on 'em, toss 'em onto hot coals for a few hours and get the party rolling. :p

0 Replies

Boomboxes turned high and Cell Phones turned on and unmannerly kids in adult space are all manifestations of the blurring between public and private space.

Mama announces, "I'm relaxing so you'll have to put up with my screaming kid." Mama's rights trump everyone else's rights?

Jespah is correct about parents who invade public space unprepared to parent, either physically or emotionally. Granted, you can't take a cranky baby and exit the airplane, but you can take a cranky baby--or out-of-bounds toddler--leave a restaurant or a movie or any other place where Your Child is spoiling an experience other people are paying for.

Parents who are sincerely interested in child raising and in having well-behaved children travel with books, toys, clean artistic materials, and the expectation that they will have to be actively involved in amusing their children.

In No Exit situations, I've offered harried parents half hours of peace, so that they can go to the bathroom or eat their airline dinner or get their composure refurbished. Parenting isn't easy--but parenting can't be ignored just because Mama needs to chill out.

0 Replies

Oh, now here is a topic that speaks to my world! I'm come in on the working end of the deal-- I'm a waitress at a little cafe. It absolutely astounds me, how outnumbered the decent parents are by the ones who just don't even bother to try.

I think restaurants are at the center of the maelstrom-- it's the type of place that brings out the fussy in kids, because they don't want any of the food, they don't want to sit still, and combined with that, the parents want to have a relaxing meal out like they did when the munchkins weren't on the scene.

We have a piano, hand drums, a didjeridoo and other assorted instruments in our lounge area, because on certain evenings local musicians are welcome to play. Guess if kids like to mess with these? Guess how often parents allow kids, in the middle of busy lunchtimes when the decibels are already high from all the conversations, to pound away at piano and drums? I really can't imagine what these people are thinking other than, "Hey, the brat's out of my hair for a second, and I'm used to tuning out godawful dins, so I can ignore the pounding on the piano." I am really not exaggerating, these parents allow outright POUNDING on the piano keys and say not a word. It happens at least every couple of weeks.

So where do these people come from? And what am I, as a worker in the service industry, allowed to say that isn't an outrageous attack on the heroic act of parenting?

0 Replies

Can your boss present the parents with a bill for the cost of piano tuning?

0 Replies

Breeders vs. DINKs: let's get ready to rumble!

Related Topics

Quick Links

My Account

able2know