shorter, cuter, more honest people

I disagree for a couple of reasons, But before I say that I want to voice my support for more porous boundaries and more child friendly locations in the US. One of my fav. places in Berlin is a coffee shop that is designed to entertain children and cater to their needs as well as the needs of adults. Additionally, my friend’s children are always welcome at parties we throw, and if we are going to do things not conducive to having children present we wait until the kids are asleep in the back room before doing those things.

Children however should not be allowed in some private-public places. just as teens are not allowed in inappropriate night clubs and nor should children. I feel that it is perfectly acceptable to create areas which cater to adult activity in particular. It is good to have places where adults can act and converse in ways which are appropriate for public, but not for children. (to this I do not mean simply the ability to curse, but to have more explicit language or simply have a space free of the stress of children)

Childfree places also allow a space of potential safety for adults with PTSD who may not be able to handle sudden loud noises comfortably, or folk with physical issues such as the inability to handle high pitched noises.

I also think that places which service the general public should not discriminate against children, nor should anyone using that place whether or not a child is having a momentary tantrum.

Finally, l while I make sure that my home can handle children and that my parties are comfortable as possible of children and parents, I do not presume to insist that other people open their private homes and parties to kids. The politics of not being sober in an adult setting with children present can be uncomfortable and binding–esp. if sexual banter is involved.

I’m having some trouble deciding how I feel about this. On one hand, I really understand what you’re saying, how children are just small people, they’re not wild animals and they should have the same right to these spaces as adults do. That expectations of children’s behavior are really expectations of mothers “controlling” their children.

But on the other hand, my experience as a restaurant manager really make me feel like there’s some missing part of the puzzle. Children certainly are permitted in my restaurant. It’s a casual atmosphere, there are activities for children, etc. But when a mother comes in with three children who instantly drive out all our other customers with their noise and behavior, how am I supposed to feel about that? Some children were very well-behaved, and don’t create this problem. But when a group of children is shrieking, running up and down the aisles, running into other customers, drawing on the tables and causing complaints, where does this fall?

Do you as an adult have a social obligation to be respectful of other people in the establishment (assuming they are respectful of you in return)? Do your children have that same obligation? If they fall short of the behavior exhibited by everyone else, is it their fault? Is it yours as a mother? What is a child-friendly, but business-conscious, restaurant manager to do?

I’m not disagreeing with you– I’m just trying to reconcile the very good points you make with my personal (non-mother) experience on the subject.

Before my comment gets out of moderation, I wish you peace and strength to get through the comments, Maia. It looks like the conversation is going to revolve around unruly children in restaurants (yet) again, rather than “how can spaces be more accommodating to everyone”.

I think most reasonable people know approximately where the thin gray line is here. On one side of it is the right of any individual (including children AND their parent/caregiver) to enjoy themselves as is appropriate to the time/location/purpose of that event. On the other hand is the responsibility of the caregiver to realize when their charge has crossed the line and needs to be removed from the situation/calmed/etc.

My husband and I were at the outdoor seating of a brewery’s pub-style restaurant (obviously a relatively casual experience). Our then-18-month-old was being his usual good-natured self, got a little fussy, but was easily distracted. The child at the table next to us, however, proved an important point about teaching appropriate behavior.

He was, at a guess, between 2 and 3 years old. He was with his mother and what I assume were grandparents. They were obviously waiting for someone, which we later determined was the boy’s father. Before he arrived the boy twice threw something, first a crayon then a coin, which hit my husband. Shortly after, he threw a butter knife at his mother. She responded all three times by merely telling him no, then smiling. She sent mixed messages about his behavior. After the father arrived, he threw something that again hit my husband before demanding to get up and walk around. He was then very much in the way of the servers, their table being across form the outside waiters’ station. He eventually took a glass from the station and (I know because I had a good view) very purposely threw it to the ground where it shattered.

It is one thing to be unapologetic for a fussy newborn who is quickly soothed or a toddler’s slightly louder existence, but there is a point at which you truly infringe on the rights of others to enjoy themselves/do their job/etc. and, I say this as a parent, you need to be attuned to that.

The issue I take with kids in public spaces is when parents think that because their kids are allowed to be there, they can behave in any way that they want. If children are just little people, then they need to behave in the way people are expected to behave.

I absolutely do NOT appreciate parents who let their kids run, literally run, around the library in which I work, yelling, knocking books over, whatever. Just because you have kids doesn’t mean I have to like the way they behave, and it doesn’t mean I have to not complain about them.

No, sorry. There are spaces that should be adults-only, and here’s why:

If you have an expectation of behavior in an establishment, you need to make sure that the people in that establishment are capable of adhering to that behavior. If I go out to a nice restaurant and begin to talk loudly and disruptively (which isn’t hard for me), I may be asked to quiet down by the waitstaff (which has happened). But the point is, as mortified and chagrined as I am, I check myself. If I don’t, I may be asked to leave the establishment. I have the cognitive skills to know that if I don’t want an incredibly embarrassing situation, I need to adjust my tone/behavior.

You can’t do that with kids. A waitron is not going to address a diner’s child and tell them to stop loudly whining about how they want french fries, or stop yanking on the tablecloth. They can address the parents and HOPE that the parents can exert some sort of influence on the child to get the child to behave, and that’s only if they feel comfortable “telling someone else how to raise their child.” But there’s no guarantee that even if the parents DO try to get the kid to behave, that the kid will behave, and in the meantime while this grand experiment of behavior is playing out, the rest of the patrons have to deal, even if this is the nice meal he’d saved up for so that that he could propose, even if this was the first time a woman who has spent the last two years going to nothing but Applebee’s and TGI Fridays because of the kids was able to get out and go someplace nice and grown-up.

You can’t throw a child out of a restaurant without also throwing out the parents. Because of this, parents are expected to act as the security detail in this instance, and if you’ve taken your child to a space that is inappropriate, then you’ve already given people reason enough to believe that you will not exercise good judgment when it comes time to respect the space.

True story: for my birthday a few years back, a bunch of friends took me out to a restaurant/bar that we’d heard good things about. This place was hardly a quiet establishment, and we were seated at a table right next to the open kitchen. Now, I’m not a quiet person normally, and if you get a few drinks in me and enough background nose to try to overcome, I can easily lose track of how fucking loud I am. So I was really mortified when a waitress came over and asked me to quiet down. But meanwhile, at the table next to me, there was a two year old chattering at the top of her lungs, literally jumping up and down in her high chair, which then toppled over, resulting in a shrieking and screaming. Maybe the waitress asked the parents/girl to calm the fuck down before things went ass-over-end, maybe not. But I can promise you, the second I was talked to, I quieted down.

We create a number of spaces that that child-only expectations: playgrounds, gymborees, etc. These spaces are built so that children can have space to run around and act like kids with relative safety: generally we enforce things like “no unleashed dogs in the playground” or “no creepy men hanging around in the front lobby of the gymboree.” Adults should be afforded the same consideration. When I go to a bar (and I mean a bar, not a bar/restaurant), I do NOT want to see children there. I want to be able to drop the F-bomb with impunity. I want to be able to make crude sex jokes with my friends. I want to have a little staggering room without worrying about tripping over a toddler. I want to talk to my friends like adults, and not have to entertain a 2-year-old who wants to tell me about how funny the last Shrek movie was. When I go to a $30-40/plate restaurant, I don’t want to have some jerk loudly trash-talking the furrin-sounding menu, but I also don’t want to have to deal with a child trying to monopolize his parent’s conversation at the top of his lungs. When I go to see an R-rated movie, I don’t want to hear someone behind me talking on their cellphone, but I also don’t want to hear a toddler start screaming the second the aliens start exploding everything.

The list of adults-only spaces should be limited, but it should be respected. And even though you and your child have every right to be in a cafe, I am not required to smile and throw warm healing light your way the second your child starts shrieking. I did not sign on to raise your child–and I don’t see that I have some solemn duty to suffer your child’s bad behavior because your comfort and happiness is somehow more important than mine.

I think your exactly right. Nearly all of the worthwhile activists meetings I’ve been attended have had one thing in common – kids. In communities where children are treated like community members, this has never been “a problem.” The problem is with adults who insist on being separated from what life is about and what makes like worthwhile.

Airplanes – that’s a tough one, and the airlines do very little to make it easier.
There’s nowhere for a small child to put their feet, except on their own seat or on the seat in front; not really comfortable to dangle one’s legs for three hours.
If there’s a play area in the airport, it’s generally just one, inconvenient for most of the gates, and doesn’t allow for the sort of vigorous running and play that a child may need after being on a flight.
There may be preboarding for younger children, but there’s no getting off the plane early at the other end.
If this was right after we’d gotten back from vacation, I’d have a longer list – I have often wished that airlines would offer family flights where a greater degree of lively behavior on the part of children is allowed for (and why don’t they realize that handing out, for instance, stickers to children at about an hour into the flight would forestall a lot of the objectionable behavior? Anything of that sort is much more exciting to my children that whatever they may have brought along in their bags. Maybe a stash of children’s books on the plane?). Nobody wants their children to be annoying, but after seven hours of flying/waiting for flights/being stuck on the ground, annoyance happens.
Restaurants – it would be rather nice if they had the equivalent of an old-fashioned cinema’s crying room, for those whose kids are having trouble being quiet. Somewhere to go that doesn’t equal leaving the restaurant, should there be trouble.
Difficult to balance the rights and needs of all patrons, but it might be useful to look at the sort of practices that set children up to fail at being non-annoying.

I don’t think temporary physical discomfort is a good reason to exclude kids from a space. Sometimes it’s irritating, sometimes it’s painful (oh god, headache plus sudden baby scream – I am prone to this because malls both give me headaches and contain babies who I presume are also getting headaches from being in malls. Airplanes can suck for the same reason, but I hate everyone on airplanes including the pilot), but I actually don’t see it as a reason to exclude kids from a space. Damage to people or property is different; breaking things or hurting someone should be grounds for ejection, but not all kids hurt people or break things and not all non-kids don’t, so I still don’t see legitimacy for a ban. Otherwise I don’t believe in the right to a totally discomfort-free existence (which is not the same as saying some kinds of discomfort, e.g., those as a result of discrimination and prejudice, are okay). This is personal and clearly not a universal opinion, but in these conversations I see a lot of variations on a theme of “This is really aggravating/annoying/uncomfortable, and it should be absolutely prevented from happening.” I sympathize with the first part and I’ve been there, but I think the second part requires some consideration of how this is achieved. A kid making noise is not oppression. Sometimes it’s just life.

Since when have privileged groups (here, adults) ever enjoyed receiving the message, “You aren’t allowed to say and do everything that strikes your fancy”?

Because that is the essential “problem” with bringing kids into what are considered (in the U.S.) “adult” spaces–all of a sudden, adults suddenly start feeling like we have to be on guard about not cussing, not talking so crudely about other people, not drinking until we pass out, etc. Either to protect the kids, or because we don’t trust kids to keep the shit we do a secret. (I, personally, would trust a five-year-old farther than I would any of the girls in my high school graduating class–but that’s me).

The essence of privilege, be it male privilege, white privilege, or adult privilege, is to be allowed to do what you want. Having kids around puts that into jeopardy for grown-ups.

I second La Lubu in wishing you intestinal fortitude to put up with the comment thread, Maia. Thanks for this post.

If I have ever been critical of children, it has been for a few notable reasons. One, that I remember how certain kids can be cruel to each other at any age, and with memory that comes many painful recollections of being teased and picked on when I was a kid. Two, I am reminded of all the things about parenthood/ fatherhood that scare me, and I am filled full of fear and anxiety, contemplating if I’ll ever be ready to have a child of my own someday. Three, I am quicker to notice the bratty kids and not the well-behaved one, which reinforces my notion of not wanting to have them.

You may have noticed that these are purely my own issues, and I own up to them. They reveal more about me than about any child who might cross my path. These days, children make me anxious, but only because I think thoughts like, “Wouldn’t it be nice to have a kid someday?” which is quickly followed by, “No, no, no, no! Not ready yet.”

Right on Maia!

I don’t have kids but I have always worked with them and honestly I don’t understand all these restaurant comments. Since when does your desire to have a quiet meal (which isn’t even synonymous with barring children from restaurants- I find loud/obnoxious adults 10000 times more disruptive than any tantrum a kid can throw) trump a child’s right to exist in the public sphere? Trump their parent’s right to that public sphere?

As as for airplanes, no one’s comfortable on an airplane, least of all many young children. Have I gotten annoyed by a kid kicking my seat? Yes. Have I gotten annoyed by an adult behind me thrusting their knees into my back or reclining into my lap? Double yes. Point being- yeah, I was annoyed. But it doesn’t mean I don’t think kids or obnoxious adults should be barred from airplanes.

Stellans- Um, “hostage” situation? Seriously? You may not like being around kids, but you aren’t being coerced. You’re just being a part of society. And part of that society includes kids.

Regarding bars in the US, I think it depends on the bar. You’ve got your chill folksy bar, your dive bar, your brew pub, your college student hangout, your jazz club, your chill bar underneath a bookstore (my favorite!), etc. Some of these are good for kids of various ages, and some aren’t. And when I say good, I mostly mean pleasant and safe for the child.

It isn’t just about the comfort of adults, it’s about the safety of the child as well.

Children have no place in bars because drunken adults are a danger to them. I would no more let a child be in a bar where an adult might fall on them due to drunkness than I would let one play with matches/an iron/any other dangerous object.

Most of the places where I live have a curfew, children and families are positively encouraged before a certain time, after a certain time they have to leave. This is because after that time the bar restaurant is filled with late night drinkers, people watching footie matches which can result in violence, it’s generally packed, noisy and discomforting for children.

After a certain time children should be home and settling down for the night, a pub at eight O’ clock at night with a football match on and all the adults screaming is not a pleasant place for any child to be and it isn’t a safe place for them to be either.

Same goes for late night showings at the cinema, your child does not want to watch the midnight showing of gorefest 6, they want to be in bed and nobody else there wants to be subjected to their misery either.

The fact is there are simply places and times which are not conducive to children, some are dangerous for the child and others, some are uncomfortable for the child and others.

As a parent it is your job to recognise when a venue is inappropriate for your child, want to go somewhere where your child won’t be comfortable or safe? Get a babysitter or don’t go.

It is also your job to recognise when your child is ready to major outings such as restaurants, if your child is not capable of behaving for the length of time needed for eating out in a nice restaurant? Don’t take him or her. The kid won’t thank you for the strain of trying to behave, other diners won’t thank you if your kid loses it and the restaurant certainly won’t thank you if your kid runs around and injures themself or others.

The fact is when you become a parent you also need to accept that it comes with certain restrictions on what you can do for at least a few years, not just because of other people but because you have to think about your child’s welfare and comfort first and foremost.

Whenever I see a parent dragging a miserable tired child around a loud crowded pub? I know that parent cares more about drinking than they do about the safety and comfort of that poor child. Whenever I see a parent eating in a fine restaurant while their kid runs riot? I know that parent cares more about what they want than they do about the safety and comfort of anyone else including their own child. Whenever I see a child get hurt because their parent was enjoying sipping wine with friends to much to leave despite the fact that their kid was clearly over wrought and needed time away from that place? I know that kid’s safety and comfort takes second place to what that parent wants.

Basically it’s not about discriminating against children, it’s about the fact that parents need to put the safety and comfort of their children first and realise that the kids needs are more important than a parent’s wants.

Thank you for this post! I AM in the US and I get freaking sick and tired of getting crap for wanting to take my kids with me. My sons are 2 1/2 and 14 months and my older child has autism, so he’s extra-unruly sometimes. How are they supposed to learn how to behave around others if they don’t get to be in public?

I believe that most people’s criticism about kids in public comes from 3 things: 1) there is some misguided belief that adults have a right to deny children access to public spaces, and 2) children are being insufficiently guided in positive ways as to how to interact in public spaces, and 3) everyone seems to forget that young children have bad days too, and children express their anger and frustration in sometimes loud and obnoxious ways. I personally would like to tell those adults who think it’s appropriate to yell at people that they should not be in public. I do not do so. Maybe I will now! :-)

i simply dont believe that my mamahood means that i must be shunted away from the rest of society.

That’s exactly the sort of thing a feminist might say… :)

I think my discomfort stems from the ambiguity of where responsibility lies should a child be behaving inappropriately for a particular setting.

If an adult were behaving disruptively or inappropriately in my business, I would ask them to stop or ask them to leave. If a child is causing that same disruption, I can’t expect them to know any better– they are learning, after all. Many parents are upset by strangers, even in a helpful or constructive way, trying to calm children or redirect disruptive behavior. Should I address the parent, ask them to address the behavior? Should I ask the child to stop, realizing that the parent may think I’m overstepping my boundaries? I don’t know how to handle this.

I can address an adult that causes disruption in my business. I feel powerless to address children. I think this is a lot of the reason behind many adults’ anxiety towards children in these spaces.

Thanks for your post. I found it very thought-provoking and it will probably make me think more about how I react to children in public spaces.

Lately, as I meet and hang out with people who have children or younger tag-along relatives, I’ve started to think more about how I should or shouldn’t act around these children or relatives who aren’t my own. (I am 28, with no children and no maternal instinct.) One of my friends has a nine year old son who hangs out around us every now and then. Because of her instructions, we are more circumspect in talking about things, don’t curse as much, and don’t do anything illegal/illicit. That friend has said that she isn’t always comfortable with another friend’s 16 y/o cousin hanging with us, as she wouldn’t allow her 16 y/o to hang, without her, with people 5-10+ years older than him, though his parents know where he is and we don’t allow him to drink with us. On the other hand, we are very open around him and just as crude and crass as we would be without him there. I sometimes feel as my friend does about but, as his parents seem ok with this situation, I don’t think I should change my behavior. Am I wrong? I have altered how I act around younger children. toned stuff down, even when their parents didn’t act like I needed to. Should I have followed their cues?

This all probably makes me sound pretty stupid, but I don’t have much experience with children, am an only child & grandchild, and have never wanted children, so I don’t have experience with this sort of thing. Growing up, I was usually the youngest person in most places with mixed-ages and the behavior of the older people around me varied greatly.

But again, thanks for this post.

I like kids. I like my 3 year old sister, I like my friends’ 2 year old and one month old daughters, I like my 5 year old and 1 year old cousins. I know them well, I show them respect as people, I take an interest in their upbringing, and I often help out when the parents need a break.
Similarly, I have a lot of respect for parents, as I’ve seen how difficult it can be to raise a child.

However, this is what confuses me:
a lot of times, a little bit of attention from an outsider will change the mood quickly. doing so in a way that does not overstep the mama’s boundaries and voila! you are the hero of the moment. and everyone is happier and less stressed. see, really, its that easy.
In the past, when I’ve encountered an upset child in public, I’ve been all ‘Awww, what’s wrong?’ or similar (to the child) and the parent(s) have just shot me a dirty look. On one occasion I was told to mind my own business by a very rude man of about my age.
So, actually, childless people can’t win: we’re vilified if we try to help, and we’re vilified if we don’t.

Thank you for this post!
I think it’s really a no-brainer that the politics around children and the spaces they’re allowed to inhabit are inextricably feminist issues, with hugely important intersections with culture/class/race/etc.
Childcare was and is considered primarily women’s work in many cultural contexts. It may be unpaid labour done by a housewife in the home, away from the public. It may be vastly underpaid labour done by migrant workers from the global south, with the same sort of invisibility assigned to both child and caregiver. Daycare workers, usually women, are typically minimum wage and do this labour in a space not usually visible to the public. Also, keep in mind that for wealthy families of western cultural tradition, we’re not that far removed from a time where children were even consigned to quarters removed from the main spaces in a house where the adults would entertain guests. (hey, that probably is still the case with some families, I dunno.)

I think that categorizing children as unfit for public spaces also necessarily involves consigning their caregivers to that same category, which then has some dire consequences about how we’re supposed to be able to function in society, AND negatively affects being able to raise well-adjusted children.

“Would it kill you to press the shift key? I feel like this was written BY a child.”

Whoa. What. Just WHAT?

What an utterly asshole thing to say.

“when you create little reservations for children, you are really creating little reservations for mothers”

BINGO

And the fact that children=mother(=FEMALE) is the social reality is demonstrated by many of these comments saying, “I don’t dislike children, but _parents_ who blahblahblah….”

Children will always be linked to females, even those of us who don’t reproduce, because we’re the sex which is presumed to be ABLE to reproduce and the only born-sex which can. Even if somebody doesn’t agree that children are an oppressed class, hate on children and the result is that you’re hating on women.

“But…why are you posting for Feministe if you are not a feminist? Just curious.”

Seconded. And it’s hard for me to lend a lot of credibility to someone who says, “I’m not a feminist, but …”

I think that one of the issues here is that there doesn’t seem to be any sort of general rule that can comfortably apply to any sort of majority. Banning kids from the ICU? Certain restaurants? All the time? I don’t think that works. And it certainly disproportionally affects single parents and working class parents.

And then there’s whether or not we should hold children or their parents/guardians responsible for bad/annoying behavior. I can’t tell whether or not a loud kid on the train is loud because h/er parents are irresponsible, or because s/he is just loud and her parents aren’t encouraging this behavior. And it’s really not worth my time to figure it out.

That being said, I don’t have children, and I don’t want children. And I don’t appreciate hearing that as a non-mother feminist, I must want to live my life without any kids within earshot, or that I have to suck it up and never be annoyed when children misbehave. In my last apartment, there were a lot of families with kids all over the complex. Several of these kids would play together in the streets, making it stressful to drive. And a tantrum-prone (when I was on vacation, tantrums occurred 4-5 times a day) toddler lived above me, and his parents would let him cry in their room at night. I know this because their room was above mine, and sometimes I couldn’t sleep because the kid was crying.

Children are not animals; you can’t ban them from apartments because they make noise or run in the streets (and you shouldn’t ban them). Children are not loud TVs or people thinking it’s okay to vacuum at midnight–you can’t just turn them off. But I don’t appreciate being told that we should collectively just put up with obnoxious kid behaviors because someone else has made the decision to have kids.

Would it kill you to press the shift key? I feel like this was written BY a child.

What the everloving fuck? Seriously?

Usually a lurker, but jumping into the fray!

I’m with Triflosa – what if your friend wanted to hang out just with *you*? When parents are with their children, their attention is going to be divided. You’re essentially not the same person you are when you’re alone. No matter how badass you think your three year old is, they aren’t self-sufficient enough to be left on their own while you hang out with the grown ups.

Adult-only spaces have been made that way because there are just enough asshole parents out there that don’t adequately parent their children that the easiest thing for the establishment to do is say “no” across the line to all kids. Everyone thinks their child is awesome, and many don’t recognize when their child is not being awesome.

I admit I’m coming at this from the childree side. I don’t inherently hate little kids, but I’m on edge when they’re around because I’ve had enough bad experiences to make me wary.

There is a trend I am noticing, and that is to equate “bars” with “all public spaces.” I can count on one hand the number of places people consider child inappropriate or necessarily childfree.
- some bars (maybe half?)
- fancy restaurants
- establishments linked with sex or sex work
- live theatre (but not usually dinner theatre)
- night clubs

The number of child-friendly places vastly outnumbers the child-unfriendly. Shops, dining establishments of all kinds, museums, just about every outdoor space imaginable, movie theatres (provided they meet the age rating, and even then), etc. There are clubs that welcome children, and I don’t mind parents bringing children on airplanes (I have earplugs, and I don’t expect children to never travel).

On the “forbidden” list, I can only think of one, maybe two, that legally bar children entirely. One can still take children to a fancy restaurant, but it absolutely won’t be appreciated if the child acts out. And as the parent, the parent should realize the likelihood of that happening and exercise their better judgement instead of thinking, “well I want to so I will.” Some children can handle that kind of environment in a socially acceptable way, some cannot.

If parents respected their children enough to put the comfort of the child over the parent’s wants? Nobody would ask for child free spaces because children wouldn’t turn up in bars, at late night showings of gory movies and we’d only see comfortable, happy and well adjusted children in posh restuarants. I like this a lot, and it’s quite in line with my way of thinking.

Angela is spot-on.

The problem is with adults who insist on being separated from what life is about and what makes like worthwhile.

Who are you, j_in_tuwani, to say that children are what life is about for me? Or that they make life worthwhile for anyone else? Honestly.

A shorter rant: If your time is ruined because you can’t stop being judgemental of a child’s parents/mother, that’s your problem, not theirs.

“I’m with Triflosa – what if your friend wanted to hang out just with *you*? When parents are with their children, their attention is going to be divided. You’re essentially not the same person you are when you’re alone. ”

Yes, this is true. However, if you honestly care about your friend you’ll recognize that your friend is a parent and honor that their kids are a part of their life. Becoming a parent does change everything. I’ve personally had to give up a great deal of my social life after becoming a parent. Either you care enough of about your friend to accept their children, or you don’t. I really do think it’s as simple as that.

Children don’t find bars, pubs, fancy restuarants to be interesting, they find them boring. Leave the kids at home for both their safety and comfort.

I think you mean *you* found those things boring when *you* were a child. I loved going out with my mom, when I was little. Being left at home–or worse, being relegated to playing with my younger cousins–was always disappointing. I much preferred hanging out with the grown-ups, where I’d sit quietly and listen. I found their discussions fascinating. Heck, I’m in my 40s and still would rather sit and listen to my older relatives talk than to hang out with my cousins.

And though I’m child-free, I really don’t understand the animosity toward children who occupy public spaces. With few exceptions, they have as much right to those spaces as adults do. We’re the grown-ups, so we should maybe act like it instead of getting bent out of shape because a small person is behaving like a small person. That’s what small people *do*. They aren’t perfect, and even the best of them will have bad days. They’re allowed to.

“furthermore, i am really disturbed by the use of ‘appropriate’ and ‘well behaved’ because i start to wonder…who is determining what is appropriate…who is defining well behaved? if appropriate and well behaved means ‘adult like’ that is oppressive. ”

Umm… yes? Isn’t that what the whole raising kids thing is about?
You teach them to read, to eat with silverware, to not spit on the floor in the hopes that at the end of it all you have a happy, well adjusted adult who will be a benefit to the world in some way. The bar for proper behavior for children is and should be pretty low; they are just learning. Kids are oppressed in a lot of ways but teaching them how to function in a society they will be living in isn’t one of them.

Maia said:
furthermore, i am really disturbed by the use of ‘appropriate’ and ‘well behaved’ because i start to wonder…who is determining what is appropriate…who is defining well behaved? if appropriate and well behaved means ‘adult like’ that is oppressive. children are an oppressed class of people.

Please read Michael’s point from the very first comment. This should explain what these concepts mean. These things do not oppress anyone:

of course I’m not saying that all societal norms are good things that should be followed at all times and all costs, but many of the norms that children violate in public are relatively non-contentious, at least in my experience: walking and speaking quietly while indoors, being polite to others, being careful with things that don’t belong to them, and so on and so forth.

I have to agree with Babs. I’m seeing a lot of comments basically expressing that the US is a child-unfriendly place. I respect everyone has different experiences, but in my experience children are generally welcomed everywhere. Of course there are some establishments where children are actually barred from entering, mainly (as already mentioned) bars and nightclubs.

Children are not small people they are growing people. They are different than adults they are not small adults. To understand the needs and abilities of a child you have to first recognize that. I would never assume my 6 year old could sit quietly through a 12 course meal at a posh restaurant or an hour long classical music concert b/c she is a 6 year old not a small adult. I also recognize as a 6 year old she would prefer to run around places and often doesn’t notice where she is going. It is not my job to control my child but it is my job to set limits, teach her how to behave and act in a community of people that consist of more than just her and I, it is my job to teach her self love as well (although she is 6 she hardly needs help in that) and also self confidence. It is not for me to rely on people to smile indulgently as my child runs all over the place knocking things over or has a meltdown or is the only child in a room full of loud inebriated people. A little understanding from people for the first two, yes, b/c so many of us have been there, done that, bought the t-shirt.

But at the same time it is my job as a parent to explain to my daughter that it is dangerous in some circumstances to run around willy nilly and to try to prevent it from happening. It is my responsibility as a parent to recognize the signs of pre-meltdown and try to stop it by either feeding her or making sure she’s getting enough sleep or just by knowing when to call it a day. It is also my responsibility as a parent to recognize that it’s not cute or charming or “cool alternative lifestyle” to keep a 3 year old up until dawn in a club while I’m drinking. Sorry you completely lost me there. It’s my job to recognize I’m a parent, not a friend. That parenting is planned obsolescence. If I’ve done it right I will have a friend in the end a friend who recognizes she is part of a greater whole in the community that she lives and who is self-sufficient.

Everyone who is anti-children in public spaces will forever be able to come up with the “here, this is TOTALLY inappropriate argument”. I think it’s probably better not to engage in the specifics of This Situation versus That Situation.

I think the best comments I’ve seen thus far are, paraphrased:

How is a kid supposed to learn how to behave like an adult if they aren’t ever supposed to be in adult situations?

And of course, the business about kids and their mamas and how the mamas will find it harder to go to certain places because of the desire to keep the kids out.

To those who want to talk about the bad kids, the ones who hurt other people or ruin things, maybe you should consider that for every single one of those you’ve seen, you didn’t notice three or six or ten other good kids who didn’t make a fuss and didn’t become the target of your attention. And do consider that I would often like to go places without having to have Grown Person X or Y there who will make my enjoyment of the place less, but I don’t get to choose that. That isn’t how being in public works.

(Examples of Grown Person X include: the loud drunk guy who is hitting on every girl in sight, the loud drunk girl who is having a GREAAAAAT time, the guy who is smoking right outside the door so the smoke keeps coming into the smoke-free bar, the guy who hits my chair every time he stands up because he can’t be bothered to police the edges of his own body and not cause damage to other people.)

Why is it that asking for *patience* (which is what I believe mai’a asked for up there in her post) the same exact thing as asking a childless by choice *F*eminist to mother all the small children around her when she never wanted to be a mother?

Do we really think that asking for a patience at the most and a few funny faces if you’re feeling charitable is the same thing as *mothering*? Really? The two minutes it would take just to offer a sympathetic smile, or even to just *not glare*–that is what is considered mothering these days by teh feminists?

My question, why can’t it be an act of feminist solidarity? Why can’t it be helping another (sister in solidarity) woman out? deactivating the overt hostility that especially mothers of color are subject to when their kids are having bad days?

Because if you think that your “right” to not have to listen to a screaming toddler isn’t a fiercly aggressively defended right, you’d be wrong. I have had non-white friends that have had white people, white MEN get up in their faces screaming at them for not “controlling” their children. I had one friend whose child was grabbed by the arm and forced to sit down, and we all should know about the white guy who slapped the little girl in the walmart line by now. Do we think that little white boys are being slapped by grown men? Do we think that white fathers are getting screamed at in public spaces because of the way their kids are acting?

I myself have had my son physically manhandled by an older white woman, and have had him yelled at by a *F*eminist because he was a little kid who wasn’t moving through a line fast enough.–I *regularly* am told not to bring my kids to feminist *organizing* spaces and am repeatedly told the reason why is because “we don’t want to be disturbed” and “this isn’t the place” and “it’s inappropriate” and and and and and—child by choice non-mothers dont want to have to parent my child.

ANd so there is no grassroots response at all to grown men slapping little girls in the face or grown white men screaming at black women in their faces, making it physically unsafe for them to be in a public sphere–because the *real* problem is screaming children at sex parlours.

Also, for those people who say they just aren’t kid people and didn’t sign up to raise my kid – hey, that’s great. I don’t think anyone is asking you to raise their child. I think it’s unreasonable of you to think that because of your personal preference, my kid shouldn’t exist in public places until he’s old enough to act like you think he should.

If I wasn’t having kids, if everyone around you wasn’t having kids, there’d be no society left. Kids are a very important part of keeping the world going.

a lot of commenters seem concerned about children appropriately learning and internalizing social norms. children are always learning, and they’re a lot more observant than adults sometimes think – but nobody seems concerned that children will be learning about this disdain, disgust, and dislike that the majority of commenters in this thread seem to have for children as a whole. when a child in a public space gets dirty looks and exasperation and other social signs that basically add up to “we don’t like you and don’t want you here,” that child will notice. that child will learn, and that child will internalize.

is that really what we want our children to learn – they have no right to take up space, to exist, to explore? that their needs and interests are always and automatically less than that of an adult? these seem like damaging and destructive messages to impart – and messages that run counter to a lot of the talk about cultivating and valuing girls and teaching them to respect and value themselves that i see here and in other feminist circles.

the use of ‘appropriate’ and ‘well behaved’ because i start to wonder…who is determining what is appropriate…who is defining well behaved?

It’s, like so much of this discussion, situational. It’s appropriate at a sporting event to shout, dance, do the wave and talk as loudly as you like. Everyone is free to act this way, children and adults. I’ve never been to a quiet hockey game and I don’t really think I would want to.
This same behavior is inappropriate at a school dance recital, even though the latter will have profoundly more children and be more child-oriented.
The way a person can behave at Applebee’s is very different from Le Bernardin. Normal behavior at the former will get you asked to leave at the latter (which also has a dress code). This goes for adults as well as children.

You take your cues from society around you and what is considered acceptable for the location, and that changes, regardless of how old you are. It doesn’t mean “acting like a little adult.” It means that quiet spaces are quiet spaces, and people in them should be expected to behave thusly. Children are fully capable of being quiet (which does not mean they have to be silent), it’s not beyond expectation for them to behave appropriately for the situation. If they are too young to understand what the proper behavior is, then it’s up to the parents to determine how to handle the situation. They can choose not to go, to bring quiet distractions, to limit the amount of quiet time or to break it up so the kid has some play/loud/running time. Whatever the method, while in the museum, quiet is still the rule.

And what would be the point of all the “we take children out to teach them how to behave” talk if one didn’t acknowledge that yes, there are rules concerning what is appropriate behavior.

Dawn,
That’s really not been my experience. Sure, a few kids will be bored. They’re individuals, after all. But mostly they’re happy to be in adult company as long as the adults in question aren’t hostile toward them. And believe me, kids know when they aren’t liked.

Emily,

They learn in other spaces first. For example meals at home are practise for behaving in a restaurant. Somehow I don’t think though that kids need to learn about drinking until they barf and cussing though.

It’s called preparation. How do you think kids learned before after all fifty years ago, most kids were left at home until they were old enough and prepared enough to help with shopping and other chores.

Actually it’s getting so we notice that ones that do behave because they’re rarer than ever. I always smile at and praise good parents because I see so many bad parents.

You know some places do throw out loud and disruptive individuals.

I think part of the problem in US society is the relationship of strangers to children. I have often felt awkward about dealing with disruptive children who are not my own. I want to help, and I know that, as maia says, the friendly intervention of a stranger is often incredibly helpful. But in US society, it is just not really allowed. On the occasions I have done it, it has worked out really well.

As an example, when I was pregnant, I was waiting for an ultrasound in a non-doctor office place where you go to get ultrasounds. A young girl, maybe 3 or 4 was there with two adults. When one went in for her appointment, the child was left with the other and started wailing and trying to follow the mother (?) into the back. They had brought toys and activities. The girl would have none of it. Now I was a visibly pregnant lady (not usually seen as dangerous to children), who grew up seeing her mother (a child psychiatrist) engage with children in similar situations. And I felt nervous and unsure about “overstepping my bounds” and interacting with this child. However, once I did so, she became much more “manageable” and spent most of the time until her family returned quietly watching me color in her coloring book.

Here in the US, we have been taught not to intervene. I don’t know exactly where it comes from. Is it part of the “stranger danger” meme? It is something about our individualistic culture? I don’t know, but there are significant internalized barriers to just interacting normally with children who are unknown to us.

@Dawn–

you seem to be assuming that everyone has the luxury to leave children at home, or if they don’t, then they should. well, not everyone can, or does.

bpf: Why is it that asking for *patience* (which is what I believe mai’a asked for up there in her post) the same exact thing as asking a childless by choice *F*eminist to mother all the small children around her when she never wanted to be a mother?

OP:but dont get me wrong. kids will be kids. at times that means tears, loud noises, knocking things over, etc. and when that happens the worst things to do is start sending out negative energy, glaring at the mama and child, yelling, sour faces, etc. much more helpful is to take a deep breath, send warm energy toward the mama and kid, give a sympathetic smile, and maybe even start talking with the kid to distract her from whatever has her upset at the moment. a lot of times, a little bit of attention from an outsider will change the mood quickly. doing so in a way that does not overstep the mama’s boundaries and voila! you are the hero of the moment. and everyone is happier and less stressed. see, really, its that easy.

I went to a wedding one time where people weren’t allowed to bring kids. It didn’t affect me personally, since I don’t have kids, but I thought that was hugely arrogant of the bride & groom to ask

People’s weddings, where they pay thousands upon thousands to feed and entertain their loved ones, are their own business. If they don’t want children there disrupting the private event, that is a choice that should absolutely be respected.

While children were welcome at my wedding, most parents opted not to bring them–many stating that they didn’t want to be disrupted themselves. It’s not just the bride and groom who may not want the kids there.

There are some places where there is an expectation of silence, such as libraries, funeral homes and chapels. The sounds of children squealing loudly, screaming or wailing, violate this expectation and make it impossible to study or pray. The very purpose for which the space was created is, therefore, defeated when a very loud child – or anyone else – is allowed to disturb everyone there without being stopped or disciplined.

Obviously, public spaces such as family restaurants, airplanes and supermarkets are spaces where there is no expectation of silence. Therefore, one must accommodate or tolerate. I also have extreme difficulty with loud noises, especially high-pitched ones. This is due to something called Sensory Integration Disorder. It was torture for a long time, until I got an MP3 and played it loudly enough to drown out the noise of children. I found earplugs are not always effective enough and do not block out the sound of babies crying.

Overall, I cannot agree that mother should not be expected to “control” their children. Yes, they should. It’s called “raising your kids”. My mother certainly controlled us. When I was young and a baby started wailing in church, the mother always took the baby outside. In the case of toddlers and older children having tantrums, the mother or father always scolded the child and left with him or her. European kids are much better behaved than the ones in North America. European parents are most certainly doing something right.

I sense that only a few commenters are getting Maia’s critique of US culture. But we in the US do have an extremely, weirdly segregated culture in many many ways: racial segregation is still very real; socioeconomic class segregation in our living spaces is extremely real; and we have all this age-segregation: e.g., “children’s menus” which are often filled with really hideous stuff, and are simply weird to our culture (and ones that we’ve strongly influenced).

These are the questions this raises: Why do we in the US do this to children (and we=corporations and parents and adult strangers all seemingly acting separately but often in concert)? Are we framing children, even in “family friendly” spaces as “other”? If so, how does this shape how/whether we see them as fully part of the social order?

I would also like to better understand where Maia’s resistance to the word “feminist” is coming from, as I sometimes share it–when I sense that it’s overwhelmingly being taken to mean “career /privilege advancement for white women at the expense of others.” (That’s not what feminism means to me–for me, feminism means a basic resistance to the oppression of women and girls, and people who are perceived as women/girls, of all colors and orientations, and the trivialization and deprecation of the roles and attributes commonly associated with women and/or femininity. I see this oppression as having negative impact on the humanity of all people, male, female and transgender, and being strongly intertwined with racism, class markers, xenophobia, and homophobia.)

This post would seem to suggest that we’re coming from a similar place with regards to resisting oppression and dehumanization; I am just curious to understand, better, how/whether she, as a social justice advocate, sees gender as an entangled part of oppressive structures.

“I feel the same about my parent friends on Facebook. I’m friends with *you* and while I recognize your new baby is a huge part of your life (that I am in fact interested in), if you can talk about *nothing* other than your child, you’ll be hidden from my feed, or even de-friended.”"

Then maybe you really shouldn’t be calling yourself that person’s friend, because, frankly, clearly you aren’t.

“furthermore, i am really disturbed by the use of ‘appropriate’ and ‘well behaved’ because i start to wonder…who is determining what is appropriate…who is defining well behaved? if appropriate and well behaved means ‘adult like’ that is oppressive. ”

I certainly never meant that to mean “adult like”. I think an adult can be inappropriate in the same way a child can, and that “appropriate” changes from place to place. If you scream in a playground or a gym, that is fine. If you scream in a quiet coffee shop, that is not fine. Child or adult.

I’m not arguing that anybody, child or adult, doesn’t have a right to dictate their own behavior. I’m just asserting the right of the business owner, or the employees, to decide what the environment they run will be like. It does piss me off when adults are held to different standards– if somebody kicked out a family with a crying child but let an obnoxious adult overpower the atmosphere, I’d be angry about that, too.

@mightydoll: I have frequently gotten dirty looks from parents when I constructively try to help behavior. I don’t know, maybe you and I have had different experiences in this way. I think some parents tend to think that because I look young, I must have no experience and have no idea what I’m talking about. (despite years of experience nannying, working in the childcare industry, and being around younger relatives– I’m pretty good with kids, despite not being a mother.)

Additionally, in the service industry, I’ve found that if this “helping” is accepted by the parents, it can quickly devolve into “oh good, the staff is watching my children for me.”

I really don’t want to sound like I’m arguing against children in public spaces, I’m really, really not. And I realize that I’m holding one or two personal experiences of “inappropriate” children above hundreds of “reasonable” child experiences. I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about how to handle these situations, I really have.

@Dawn some more: Indeed! Things were much better for women and children 50 years ago. We should use that model of child rearing and mothers should just keep their spawn at home!

As long as we’re going back in time, 200 years ago, there was no sense of childhood at all, really, and with the exception of the upper classes, kids were everywhere adults were.

I just want to say I’m a USian, and I love and agree with this post. I’m not a mother, and I am a feminist. And I love. This. Post. (Please mock my punctuation, including the inappropriate use of these parentheses now)

I completely second what maia said in a comment: is children’s status as an oppressed class of people really a question?? We need this post in the US *because* this post generated such heated debate (and so many personal stories about how that one time some kid spilled something on me/cried/ran around at a restaurant). Boohoo! Whoops, got more frustrated than I meant to.

What about maia’s point that when we exclude children, we’re also excluding primary caregiver’s, most frequently, mothers?

What about the point that many others are making, that children aren’t in the way of the movement, they are the movement. Love this!

My day job is working to end sexual violence, and more and more every day I am convinced that it’s the kids, duh, who are so important to this work. To teach us about it, to learn healthy ways of thinking about themselves and others and choices and their bodies, as they grow up into grown people.

And what about the fact that children are a really vulnerable population? A population vulnerable to violence, sexual violence, and bullying. Children are frequently ignored or presumed to be lying when they tell us about the violence they experience. There are difficulties around children’s bodies and control: when is it ok to pick up a child against her/his will? How do we help children learn to know who can touch them and how and when?

How don’t we see children as an oppressed class of people?

And I love when one of my favorite friends who is a mama talks to me about her daughter. When her daughter throws a tantrum, she lets her have some time in it, because when you grow up, you are no longer allowed to throw a great big tantrum when something really unfair happens to you. And there are times I would love to throw a great big tantrum.

Kids are beautiful, and including kids and their mamas adds so much richness to us, to different situations, to conversations, to social settings.

The funny thing is, I don’t want to be a mama. It’s not my calling. But, loving kids is part of my calling, and loving their mamas too. Supporting mamas and children, and being aware of their inclusion/lack of inclusion.

Ugh, “some tyke in a restaurant bothered me” is so not a convincing enough reason to disallow someone into spaces.

feminist love,
Jen

recently, i was hanging out at a bar, when a friend called and invited me to come hang out for a few drinks and chill time as the sun came up. cool. then, i heard a bit of whispers in the background and the question posed to me: is aza with you?

Does it bother you that your friends don’t like hanging out with your daughter?

@ Ellie: I’m not claiming it never happens to anyone, but I think it happens rather less than these threads seem to suggest. Or perhaps where I live (Toronto) is different from wherever you live. Who knows? I do believe, though, that if we wish to change the way children are treated and the resultant way children act (because, really, kids live what is modelled to them), we have to BE the change we want to see. Parents who might be prone to giving you dirty looks are likely so used to having people judge them harshly, that the first thought is that you are judging them, when you ask a child for different behaviour. The more we treat children like a part of society, rather than a societal burden, the less frequently this will happen.

In terms of parents assuming babysitting: That’s a toughie, however my experience has largely been that asking a child to behave differently seems to step up the parents’ involvement, rather than step it down. Of course, it helps to be friendly and pleasant and engage the child, rather than dictatorial. – Getting down to their level, looking them in the eye and smiling really goes a long way towards how the child feels (and is apt to behave afterwards) and how the parent feels.

That is a completely seperate issue, nobody should have the right to assault or threaten another human being.

How is it a completely separate issue? There’s no connection at all to “my right to not be subjected to etc etc etc” and a man up in a woman’s face screaming at her to get her children under control? Really?

The thing about conversations like this is that they are so uninformed by race and even gender, it’s laughable. Who do we think is going to be considered “appropriate”? do we think that the little black girl mouthing off to her mother will be looked at the same way as the little white boy sassing to his dad? Do we think that the mother talking to her child in spanish will be viewed and treated the same way as the white mother talking to her child? Some people consider a mother speaking to her child in spanish *child abuse*. Spanish speaking mothers have had their child taken away from them for speaking spanish.

Also–I hope all the people who are sure they know best what is an appropriate place for children to be and that children aren’t oppressed peoples–I wonder what the response has been from these same people to children, to even *babies*, to even US citizens who are children–being held in prisons indefinitely because their parents are undocumented. Or children (the vast majority of them children of color, and more of them *girls of color*) being arrested at schools for “acting out.” or, “having a tantrum.”

are mothers of color just naturally bad parents? do we raise kids that think it’s ok to act out? Or are there other deciding factors here in what is “appropriate behavior” that will be applied differently to all children?

@mightydoll

Parents who might be prone to giving you dirty looks are likely so used to having people judge them harshly, that the first thought is that you are judging them, when you ask a child for different behaviour.

This is indeed a very fair point. People hold hostilities towards children because of a couple bad examples, and parents can potentially hold hostilities towards me because of a couple of bad examples of strangers stepping in. I can’t really expect parents to universally accept my help until the general public universally accepts their children.

Wait, you’re saying that we can’t talk about children being oppressed because child slavery exists? Don’t look now, but we can’t talk about date rape because of the kinds of systematic rape-as-a-weapon that occurs in the Congo and South Africa.

Let’s not play oppression bingo.

however the normal expectations of children and parents do not count as oppression

this right here is the problem. what is “normal”? is there such a thing? Black girls are arrested at school for “acting out” (i.e. having a tantrum)–white boys are called “imps” and “flirts.” Black mothers have a historical pressure put on them by an apartheid regime to “control their kids”–does “normal expectations” apply to them? Latina mothers are accosted and getting their children taken away from them for speaking spanish–is this normal? Is it normal to expect that all children will speak english and only english and if they don’t they are being abused?

Parents bringing their children to pubs or restaurants is really the parents’ decision. As someone else said, children grow into adults. Keeping them at home doesn’t really help them learn how to socialize. But parents not disciplining their kids, that’s a big problem. Just as I’m not happy when an adult yells or shouts next to me, I’m not happy when a child does it endlessly while the parents are not doing anything to correct this behavior. We were in an airport a few weeks ago, and after one of these children had been yelling for some 15 minutes, my mom simply went to the child and started a conversation. In most cases, a child yells when nobody pays attention to him. I’m no expert on kids, but I think today’s undisciplined children are tomorrow’s disturbed teenagers and adults. I grew up going to all the places my parents went: to parties, to restaurants, to all public places. Sometimes people cursed, sometimes people drank: this did not turn me into an alcoholic and I do not start and end my sentences with “fuck”.

I am an elementary school teacher. I love teaching children. However, when I am not working, I do look for places with fewer-no children to relax. Grown-ups need grown-up time in the outside world sometimes.

While I do agree with not segregating mothers with children in the general public, I do not believe it is right for parents to take their ill-behaved children into places where adults go to relax (R-rated movies, expensive restaurants, etc.). This is common sense.

As a teacher I study how parenting is reflected in children. Sometimes, it seems that people get together and, out of lack of forethought, decide that they need a child to fill their lives and solve their problems. Children become a sort of glorified garden gnome–a part of material culture by which parents can comply with a heteronormative narrative. Children, like cell phones, become a right to have in “quiet” spaces like the cinema, theater, and upscale dining establishments.

I am not calling for a ban on children in these places, but parents, please remember that your child WILL ruin the experience and further embed this prejudice against ALL mothers and children in the minds of all adults in a place if your child is obnoxious.

@Dawn:
Personally a disruptive kid is a disruptive kid, their race doesn’t matter to me, their gender doesn’t matter to me, nor does their parent’s race or gender.

Easier said than done.

omg, Maia. I just to voice my support for you. I am not a parent but as a person, i am appalled at the vitriol in this thread. I wish I could have posted before this thread degenerated into what about me, my space, my comfort, my rights. It’s just another disappointing iteration of the focus on individualist issues to the exclusion of an analysis of systematic oppressions. padayon.

@Dawn and um, no, what would be your suggestion then? Weddings are family affairs and oftentimes, every single person you would normally ask to babysit your child (your parents, siblings, cousins, close friends) might be going to the same wedding as you. So even with months of planning, it could be that you simply can’t get a sitter for your kid. That’s where the arrogance comes in. It’s different than not wanting a particular person at your birthday party, because you’re not wanting a particular type of person there, and that is loaded with judgement. I know that plenty of parents opt to leave their kids at home, but at least that is the parents’ choice; and not all parents have that luxury.

I used to work at a coffee shop and I was often baffled by some of my coworkers getting mad because of some toddler that was crying loudly. It’s a coffee shop. Families are welcome. And kids that young cry. They scream sometimes. Most parents handle it just fine; they can’t just flip an “off” switch, they have to be patient, and as workers at the coffee shop, we owe it to our customers to be patient too.

There are many good points made above, and many extreme views. Nobody is 100% right. There are some generalities that have a common theme on which I’d like to remark, however.

1. It is expectant upon the parents to eventually teach the child acceptable social behavior to function in public as a member of society. How that is defined can be by your social group, your nationality, possibly even your ethnicity or religion, when you grew up there’s a ton of variables. In America, I think there are some general expectations that children eventually learn what is acceptable when it comes to matching your noise and activity level to the type of space you’re in. Some parents, for whatever reason, do not give consistent instruction in this, or the kids are having a bad day. This upsets other people in those spaces, and people who are upset are often quick to judge. There’s give and take on both sides. I have seen people get bitchy very fast, and I’ve seen parents who basically ignore everything their kids do in public with no discipline at all. I’ve also seen it go the other way.

2. No two people are going to agree 100% on how to raise a child. In America, we may claim “it takes a village to raise a child”, but we don’t do it. Not only do we stress individualism incessantly, we have also heightened awareness of the danger to children from certain strangers to the point where we don’t want our kids to interact with strangers much at all. I think there is a point where it becomes hard to trust another adult because you aren’t trusting their motives with your child, and that gets generalized. My mom would have been thrilled if someone was kind enough to make origami animals on a plane for me. Unfortunately, airlines long ago cut out having the “activity kits” and colorforms they used to hand out. You’re lucky to get a meal on a flight these days. We’ve also become accustomed to a fear that if we publicly discipline our kids (and I’m not talking spanking, I’m talking even just a stern talking too), that some random stranger will think it’s child abuse and call CPS on us.

3. I can only offer my own experience, but I have witnessed the similar experiences of friends to say that I am aware this method works. You set boundaries. Crossing those boundaries has consequences. My mom will tell you to this day about the 3 times when I was little and misbehaved in a restaurant when she then paid for the half-eaten meal and we left. I learned extremely quickly that if I didn’t behave in public, I didn’t get to *go*. It made me aware that being overly loud and refusing to stay in my chair was what meant I didn’t finish my dinner there at the restaurant or get to see the rest of the movie. It instilled in me that I was responsible for my own behavior, and that some things were acceptable in certain places and not in others. Yes, Mom wasted money. Yes, it cut short her time out. She never once expected a waitress or usher or anyone else who was working to watch me. It wasn’t their job.

4. This is a little non sequitur, but I think there’s a big difference in the definitions of “bar” in this comment thread. I grew up in Denver, CO and now live in Seattle, WA. Bar, to me, means a place where people of legal drinking age go to drink and meet people and maybe dance. “Bars” don’t normally serve cooked food. They may have snacks or something for happy hour, but if it has a kitchen, it’s no longer a bar. If they don’t serve cooked food, they can’t legally allow anyone under the drinking age in the establishment. I’m terribly curious as to where commentors on here are taking children into bars in the USA legally. It’s why we don’t call a bar a pub here in the US, at least not anywhere I’ve lived. Pubs have meals. (and usually darned good ones.) Even now in Seattle, a pub has dinners, and minors can eat there. But a minor can’t go in a bar.

There are some places where there is an expectation of silence, such as libraries, funeral homes and chapels. The sounds of children squealing loudly, screaming or wailing, violate this expectation and make it impossible to study or pray. The very purpose for which the space was created is, therefore, defeated when a very loud child – or anyone else – is allowed to disturb everyone there without being stopped or disciplined.

@Dominique Libraries are no longer considered places where quiet is expected or enforced. Rather than deal with their own kids and their behavior, many parents will drop their kids off at the library and leave. . .I guess along with a library employee, I’m expected to be a baby-sitter, too.

But don’t, God-forbid, try to keep the kids safe. I had an incident where an unattended toddler almost pulled an encyclopedia on herself. I pulled her out of the way. She was startled, and began to cry. Her mother (who was surfing the Internet) yelled at me, and complained to my boss.

So I guess the real issue here isn’t kids in public spaces — it’s the parents of these kids expecting someone else to take care of the kids THEY decided to have.

I don’t think that, outside of certain outliers (places that are deafeningly noisy and/or smoky, places that are of an “adult” kind of adult nature), places should really be designated “adult-only.” But a lot of places are organized not around ages but certain kinds of behavior. There are places where things are quiet (some restaurants, libraries), places where things are loud and swear-y (other restaurants, bars, action movies), and places where things and noisy and fun (still other restaurants, parks, kids’ movies). And bringing one type of behavior into another type of place makes things unpleasant for everyone.

If I wandered onto a playground or into a Chuck E. Cheese, cracked a beer, and started swearing and telling bawdy stories, I’d be dragged out by my hair, because that behavior isn’t appropriate in that place. In a karaoke bar, I’d probably be okay, but not at Chuck E. Cheese. And not at my favorite restaurant, either.

Kids absolutely need to be included in what would otherwise be “adult” places, because that’s the only way to learn how to behave in “adult” places. I recently had dinner at a coat-and-tie restaurant next to a family with the most adorable two children–neither of them over ten, both of them in little coats and little ties, and both of them polite and quiet and behaving perfectly for the setting. They’d obviously had a lot of instruction in what’s expected for that kind of environment, and so their presence was no more of a disturbance than that of any of the adults there. And if their reward for sitting quietly during dinner involved shedding the coats and hitting the Playplace at McDonald’s afterward, I hope they rocked out, because that’s what’s expected for that kind of environment.

I don’t do well with noise and crowds, and so I try to stick to places where those things are discouraged–from kids and adults. I try to do my shopping during off-peak hours, and if it’s chaotic when I get there, I grit my teeth and bear it. If I’m at the park and there are small children running around shrieking their heads off, I’m all for it–parks are a great place for running and shrieking. But the places I seek out–certain bars, certain restaurants, certain movies–are the ones where sitting quietly is the accepted norm, and I don’t think I’m out of line to ask kids and adults to respect that norm.

@Dawn: If they can’t afford to hire a babysitter? They probably can’t afford to go out to a nice restaurant or drinking.

your privilege is showing. you clearly do not respect the autonomy of other people. baby sitters can be expensive. and sometimes adults just want to include their children in the “going out” experience. also, i was commenting on you mentioning going to the store, which is excessively classist of you to suggest that children should be left home if they can’t help with shopping. yeah, fucking say that to the mom who has to get her errands done with her kids, when a baby sitter may not be available or realistic. baby sitters are simply not an option to some parents, and shopping is a fucking necessity.

@Dawn: are you seriously suggesting that you are abused (oppressed?) by unruly children, while in the same argument arguing that children aren’t considered an underclass? Wow.

Some people really and truly experience pain on hearing loud, high-pitched noises. It’s not just annoying to hear a child screaming, it is physically painful. In a situation where I cannot leave (for example, a plane trip), it is definitely comparable to abuse.

@Babs: “Why is “being quiet” the same as “wearing a certain type of clothing” or “breastfeeding?” [...] The rules children are generally expected to follow are universal rules, and ones that all people can follow with some minor adjustments.”

Well, first off, you seem to be thinking of “children” as “individuals over the age of 7.” What about infants? Toddlers? No, these people cannot keep themselves quiet, and it’s unreasonable to expect them to do so.

But even if we were talking only about “universal” rules which they could follow, they are often enforced disparately. My experience has always been that a family with a single raucous child is more likely to be asked to leave a restaurant than a table full of loud, offensive men of the same race; a woman with a child hiding in the racks of clothes is more likely to be asked to leave a department store than two women of the same race who deliberately drop clothing on the floor or scream at employees; a child, or a woman with children, is more likely to be asked or pressured to give up his or her seat on crowded public transit than one or more adults.

So, maybe these are “universal” rules, but some of us are more equal than others.

Restaurants that do not accommodate disabilities are (or should be) in violation of the law. There is no law to be able to enjoy your dinner without having to endure seeing a child in the world.

I choose to have a child, yes. And if I didn’t, and every other parent didn’t, the world would stop existing. Children are important to keep society going. So, you’re welcome.

And if I didn’t, and every other parent didn’t, the world would stop existing.

I think you’ll find the world would keep existing and probably be better off in the long run.

@ACG: Actually, a lot of Chuck E. Cheese restaurants do serve beer. I’ve seen a bunch of news articles about drunken parents getting into brawls there when their kids got into an argument about whose turn it was for a game.

Could people (yes S, I mean you) stop equating disabled adults with children.

Mai’a – “people who are best suited to decide what is best and most appropriate for their kids, are the parents/caregivers of the kid. everyone else who isnt part of that primary relationship, is just giving their opinion on someone else’s life choices.”

That’s the thing though, it was a personal choice on the part of the parents to have those children, to bring them into the world. In doing so they effectively agree to a ‘parent contract’ to care for that child, raise them to be productive citizens, and protect them from harm. You can’t say “Help a parent out by engaging with an upset kid” from one side of your mouth, while effectively saying “Don’t you DARE even look at her, I’m the parent, I’m in charge” from the other.

OK, you might be a ‘cool’ parent who takes your child into mixed spaces to help her learn how to interact with people, but there are other parents who have chosen to have children, but not to honour their ‘parent contract’. Not every parent behaves like you, your experience is yours alone, it is not universal.

Some parents take their children to venues and immediately switch into ‘not my problem’ mode, or ‘everything my kid does is cute and hilarious’ mode. If I’m in a restaurant I don’t want my hair pulled, I don’t want my wheels fiddled with, and if someone takes food off my plate then that’s it – my meal is finished with. When these things happen I don’t want to hear “Oh s/he’s only a little kid!”. Those children aren’t having the kind of positive interactions and learning experiences that all children should be getting to prepare them for life, they’re getting the message that they can do whatever the hell they want and get away with it.

So because that’s their parents’ ‘life choice’ I should automatically respect that? I’m absolutely going to judge people who encourage their children to behave badly and disrespect the rights of other people, not because I hate kids, but because those kids have no chance of figuring out anything of value on their own, and because their behaviour earns them glares and whispered insults when it should be their parents who are the target of people’s rage. I’m going to judge people who do that to their children.

Like someone else said above, impregnating someone, or pushing someone out of your body, does not automatically confer on a person the common sense, instinct and dedication necessary to take a child from babyhood to adulthood. It does not always induce a sense of responsibility, or a realisation that they’ve made a life choice that will involve making permanent or temporary changes in their lifestyle. I wish it did. I wish I’d never had to speak to a child who’d drunk petrol, been burned at a drunken raucous barbecue, been locked in a car overnight, or was contemplating suicide. Those are the flip-sides of the kid being encouraged to play up in public/private spaces, or to act as if the world is theirs, and theirs alone, or of being born to people who just don’t care what happens to them. There are too many parents who revel in the ‘fun’ aspects of parenting, and leave the rest to chance. It’s always the children who suffer the most, and the defensive crowd who insist ‘mother knows best’ are deluding themselves if they think that everyone who has ever had a child has done so for the same reasons they have, has the same motivations, and the same desire to gift a new person into the world.

I love children, but they’re not a right, they’re a responsibility, they need love, guidance and education and sadly they don’t always get it. If it was a perfect world, and kids were only ever born to those who wanted and loved them, who were dedicated and selfless, then there would be no need for the enforcement of ‘adult only’ spaces. Until then…

The safe, child-friendly environment of Chuck E. Cheese: http://online.wsj.com/article/NA_WSJ_PUB:SB122878081364889613.html

In Brookfield, Wis., no restaurant has triggered more calls to the police department since last year than Chuck E. Cheese’s.

Officers have been called to break up 12 fights, some of them physical, at the child-oriented pizza parlor since January 2007. The biggest melee broke out in April, when an uninvited adult disrupted a child’s birthday party. Seven officers arrived and found as many as 40 people knocking over chairs and yelling in front of the restaurant’s music stage, where a robotic singing chicken and the chain’s namesake mouse perform.

@Sei

When we as a society actually stop producing new human beings I’ll consider this. (Hell, when we extend the lifespan considerably longer than it is now, producing a much larger balance of elderly people, I’ll consider this.) But one person having one child is not doing me a personal favor.

While there is no obligation to continue the human race, Ellie, if you ever plan to retire, or even get sick in your old age, today’s children WILL, at some point, become indispensable to you.

Emily – “I choose to have a child, yes. And if I didn’t, and every other parent didn’t, the world would stop existing. Children are important to keep society going”

But children in bars aren’t necessary to keep society going, children running around restaurants aren’t either. That’s the difference.

Because you’re here, on this site, in the first place I assume that you realised that after making your choice to have children your life would have to change, that you couldn’t live exactly as you did pre-kids. Here’s the thing – not everybody is that clued up. I was in my last job for just under three years, and I can guarantee you that at least once a day I would get calls from new parents asking “When will Baby sleep through the night? She’s a week old and I’m tired of getting up” or “When can I switch from milk to food? I’m sick of preparing all the bottles, it’s been a whole month.” I had to refer at least one child a day to the poison control service after they’d been given air freshener or cigarettes to play with, or had been given half a sleeping tablet in their milk because they were crying. Sleeping Tablet Mummy was a Lit. Professor btw. These things transcend class and income lines.

So while you clearly have your wits about you and realise that you can’t get ripped to the tits on Jager and Aftershock every night while you’re pregnant/a parent, that you won’t automatically get weekend lie-ins and Sunday brunch in bed followed by lazy sex and a night at the theatre, too many parents just aren’t that clued up. They resent the changes they have to make, their kids suffer, and society suffers with them.

Well, first off, you seem to be thinking of “children” as “individuals over the age of 7.” What about infants? Toddlers? No, these people cannot keep themselves quiet, and it’s unreasonable to expect them to do so.
I would be more generous and say 5 an up, but perhaps that’s a cultural thing. And even younger children can be included in quiet places with some accommodation. It’s unreasonable to expect them to be quiet forever, but it’s not unreasonable for them to come, and if they begin to make a lot of noise, for the parent to step outside with them until they quiet down. Some places make this easy, more should.
There’s nothing wrong with stepping outside for a few minutes, and if the individual really can’t keep quiet (and that could be anyone from an infant to a whiny teenager to a drunk spouse), then it’s time to re-evaluate the situation and maybe go home and pick a different venue the next time (less noise for the infant, less beer for the spouse).
And I’ve still seen toddles in the library using indoor voices. They’re never there as long as the other kids, but they still get to participate in the space in the limited capacity they are able to. As they learn, they will be able to stay there longer.

<i.But even if we were talking only about “universal” rules which they could follow, they are often enforced disparately. My experience as always been that a family with a single raucous child is more likely to be asked to leave a restaurant than a table full of loud, offensive men of the same race; a woman with a child hiding in the racks of clothes is more likely to be asked to leave a department store than two women of the same race who deliberately drop clothing on the floor or scream at employees; a child, or a woman with children, is more likely to be asked or pressured to give up his or her seat on crowded public transit than one or more adults.

So, maybe these are “universal” rules, but some of us are more equal than others.

That is a cultural problem. The root is not “please be quiet,” but the disparity in enforcement. I would hope that people would be evenhanded, and my experiences have differed from yours. Mostly people give up their seats on the transport around here, particularly so families can sit together, and people are particularly keen to help women with strollers. I’ve seen people on cell phones kicked out of restaurants more often than people with unruly children. Even nice restaurants (but then I really don’t see a lot of unruly children).
The problem here is not to expect the rules to change, but to try and get people to change their attitudes. I would hope that children would get some leeway in certain spheres where they cannot perfectly follow the rules. It’s a learning experience, they should be introduced to new situations and then taught how to behave. I would also hope parents would understand that just because you can take a child somewhere, that doesn’t mean it’s a good idea, and if they do, they probably can’t enjoy it the same way they would without a kid.

There should be give and take from both sides.

@mightydoll
I’m not suggesting that we get rid of children, or that I will never have a need for people younger than myself. I’m only frustrated with the attitude exhibited in Emily WK’s comment.

That kind of rhetoric could also suggest that I am doing them a favor by existing & growing old, providing their children with employment opportunities in the future.

bfp: “but this condemnation has real consequences on mothers of color especially and all mothers in general”

Putting it up just to re-emphasize. I wish people would make the effort to see beyond their individual issues of “my comfort, my ideas of what’s appropriate” etc to consider how their actions and attitudes shore up an atmosphere that is already hostile to mothers and children of color. I don’t think that’s a lot to expect from people who purport to be feminists and social justice allies.

bfp, I agree with you completely that how “appropriate behavior” and “appropriate parenting” is defined is often racist and used against non-white parents and their children. So does that mean that it is impossible to identify parents who are letting their kids run wild? Is it impossible to set the most basic standards because they will always be applied in an unfair manner? Is that what you are saying? (This is not some sort of gotcha question.)

S – your ableism is showing. You’re not alone in that on this site, I refuse to debate issues relating to disability here because the all-around fail is too much to take.

TAB-privilege is too difficult for me to address because:

a) it’s not my job to be Gimp101 and list the ways in which comparing PWD to kids is offensive and reductive (would you have used an analogy comparing kids to PoC or GLBT? If not, why not? After all both groups are frequently told their ‘behaviour’ is inappropriate or ’showy’)

b) it always ends in one of two ways. PWD either get the “nasty, lazy mean crip” label, because people don’t like being called on TAB privilege (or any other kind). Or, I’m told “When I say ‘everyone’ then obviously you’re exempt because of X.Y. and Z, silly. I didn’t mean you!” as if I’m somehow not regarded as a contributing member of society.

“I feel the same about my parent friends on Facebook. I’m friends with *you* and while I recognize your new baby is a huge part of your life (that I am in fact interested in), if you can talk about *nothing* other than your child, you’ll be hidden from my feed, or even de-friended.”
Agreed. And it’s not anti-kid…I feel the same about someone’s favorite TV show, bellydance class, sci-fi habit, NASCAR/shoe shopping obsession, what have you. If that’s all you can talk about, then we might not be having many conversations. Same goes for significant others; I like most of my friends’ s.o.’s but sometimes I just want to hang out and shoot the BS with my friend and relate in *our* way, without kids and partners around. If I really REALLY dislike your s.o. (or vice versa), then we probably won’t see each other that often except for those times when we can get away on our own. Yes, children can’t help being children, but we do choose our lives, including s.o.’s and children, to some extent. I’ll try to accommodate your choices but expect some accommodation in return…I think the exact terms of that (and how they really REALLY differ from person to person and among cultures) is what we’re arguing about here.

“So I guess the real issue here isn’t kids in public spaces — it’s the parents of these kids expecting someone else to take care of the kids THEY decided to have.”
This is the part that gets to me. I’m fine with people having kids and bringing them along in public spaces and events of everyday life, but then expecting everyone else to either put up with their kids when they behave badly (and it does depend on the age of the child and whether the parent(s) are making an attempt to teach the child how to behave in public) or make public spaces into kid spaces. Not every place is appropriate for kids and that is a matter of both culture, judgement, and personal opinion. Some places are for adults and adult behavior, but it’s the grey areas that are a point of contention. If your 10-year is whining and kicking the back of my seat all the way from NYC to Seattle, I’m gonna be upset. An overtired toddler fussing in the mall I probably won’t care too much about. A 5-year old dancing and singing in the space between tables in a restaurant, I will not think of as “cute” or “precious” even if everyone around me does. I probably won’t intervene, but I will finish my dinner quickly, leave, and think twice about whether or not I want to go there again, depending on the judgment call of “isolated incident” or “this place is catering to a different crowd now.” That’s my call to make based on my own preferences and comfort level/boundaries. Others may disagree, have opinions about my opinions, but I generally find people/places to fill my days with the right balance, as do we all.

My point is that adult spaces are boring, there are places kids would rather be and they should be in those places.

You know what? You don’t get to decide that. That’s up to grown-assed PARENTS to decide for their children, not random strangers. The only thing you get to do is to decide whether or not *you* will act like an adult when in the presence of children. Some of whom will inevitably misbehave–because they are kids and that’s what kids occasionally do. It isn’t the end of the world. I promise.

Dawn, I know why the hospital has the rule. People find children annoying and disruptive. We’ve established that fact already. Like, a million years ago. But the entire fucking point of this post and my point also is that those rules cause parents (again, =moms) and children a lot of problems too.

I think in the majority of the cases, people just need to get over themselves and accept children as they are. But beyond the assholes, how can these conflicts be minimized? How can we all share the space better, without barring people’s existence?

Fact is inequality according to race doesn’t just happen to one group. There are plenty of non-white countries where being of the wrong skin colour means social pariahship. You want tough, try being a member of a minority in a country where life isn’t even that great for the privileged majority.

aaaaaaaaaand…I’m done. have a great day.

Sei – UScentrism alert! “Then maybe society should realize that parents need more support than they’re getting, and should offer to occasionally watch the children for free so that Mommy can sleep for more than two hours at a time, or should provide paid maternity leave so that Mommy doesn’t cry from exhaustion from having to wash the bottles out after eight hours of work and getting less than 20 hours of sleep over a two week period.”

Maybe your society has fucked up there, but mine has mandatory paid maternity/paternity/adoption leave, mandatory flexible/family-friendly working arrangements for parents/guardians, it has free/reduced cost childcare, families are given extra money in the form of monthly family credit payments and weekly child allowance payments to cover the cot of the ‘burden’ of having kids.

Kristen – my point is that although the Feminista mommies may have taught their children to navigate the world and interact with other people, treat every experience as a learning event, and care about the welfare of their children – not everyone is like that. Kids don’t belong on busy streets because not all of them have been taught that traffic=danger. Kids have this wonderful sense of immortality, that’s why they can’t live on their own, because hot things and sharp things appear to pose no threat, animals and vehicles are shiny fun distractions, they think other people are always good, and loving, and want to be around them. Children who are neglected, who aren’t monitored or given help to navigate our very scary world (by the very people who signed up for the job) fall foul of the world. They run screaming into traffic, they climb up store shelving, they bump into people carrying hot or sharp things in restaurants, when a ‘nice man’ offers them something nice they take his hand and follow him.

Sadly, nobody knows by looking at a parent whether they’re smart, dedicated Feministas or drunken neglect-o-moms who haven’t taught their children that engaging with the world needs some caution and restraint. That’s why some places have to ban kids outright.

I used to go to a great pub almost every day, in the city I lived in for a while. It was somewhere I could get something cheap to eat, and use the WiFi to do some studying away from the squat I lived in.

It was child-friendly, served food for them, provided toys and crayons, safe places to play, and a great relaxing environment for everyone. Then the incidents started happening – kids not being watched by their parents who were too busy getting their drink on. A little boy gashed his arm really badly on some glass, his mother slapped him for crying like a ‘poof’, then started hurling abuse at the bar staff. A little girl was left behind in the pub by accident, the father stormed in ten minutes later and called the barman (who was comforting the sobbing kid) a “fucking paedo bastard”, grabbed her little girl and stormed out. Parents turned up at opening time (11am) and stayed until Kiddy Kick-out at 9pm, while their children got more grumpy, more uncomfortable, and more upset.

The pub decided to introduce a 3-drink/3-hour maximum, to a storm of criticism and protest from mothers who ‘knew best’.

So the management took the decision to ban anyone under 14.

That’s why there are ‘guaranteed adult-only’ spaces. Because you just cannot tell in advance.

Paraxeni — because it’s the restaurant’s call. If I am running an establishment that is quiet and romantic, having a child loudly proclaiming their opinions on the decor, playing with the candles on the table, blowing bubbles in their milk, whining about how they want to go to McDonald’s, etc ruins the mood I have worked hard to create and that other people came to the restaurant to enjoy.

No one here is declaring that no child ever should be allowed into a restaurant nicer than an Applebees. In fact, 99% of restaurants out there have expressed that children are welcome by providing children’s menus, high-chairs and booster seats, and facilities for things like diaper-changing. But just as foolish as it would be to declare that children shouldn’t be allowed in a PlayZone, it’s obnoxious to declare that children MUST be welcome in all establishments. Some people, EVEN PARENTS, really do want a retreat from children–a romantic evening out together where they can have the sort of conversations they had before everything turned into Spongebob.

I understand and appreciate the message of this post. Children should be recognized as a part of the community, allowed to be in public space and should be treated as people not as property (the way some of my friends were treated when they were growing up). There are many spaces that could be more accommodating for children – someone mentioned above that they attend a gym that has family restrooms as well as “men with children” and “women with children” changing rooms. This seems like a very good idea, for the comfort of both families with children and those without. I’m sure there are many more important accommodations that could be made in public spaces – including things like more availability for subsidized family housing on college campuses, and support for parents attending college (free daycare on campus, for example, as well as professors extending greater flexibility when parenting makes adhering to their expectations more difficult for parents than non-parents).

However, I think it’s kind of dismissive to say to childfree adults who have crazy parties, “you must party harder than I do” as if wanting to party is ridiculous. I’m 21 and childfree, and I spend *most* of my time in settings that are inappropriate for children. I doubt I will party as hard when I am 40 and/or have children (although of course that doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with 40 year olds continue to party). I will not have children for a long time because of this – I know that having them will place restrictions on what my leisure time looks like.

Of course, I might still want to go to crazy parties from time to time – that’s where babysitters and grandparents come in. If I can’t afford or can’t find babysitters, well, I guess I’ll have to miss the party. Sometimes you have to make sacrifices for your children, and sometimes that means changing the way you socialize with friends, since not all adult social settings are appropriate for children. Again, that’s why I won’t have children until I’ve gotten the wild-and-crazy years out of my system and until I’m financially stable (not to imply that there’s anything wrong with parents who struggle financially – I think free childcare should be a basic service in most work environments, for example – but given that having children is a choice, I don’t think it’s unreasonable for parents to have to choose between paying for a sitter or not partying).

This applies even more to bringing children to friends’ parties. For example, I would be very upset if children were brought to a party of mine where cigarette smoking is permitted indoors, because I would not allow said indoor smoking to continue if a child was present, and I shouldn’t have to change the rules in *my* living space because a guest brings a child along without asking me first. The adults who own the living space get to set the rules, and other adults who choose to enter that space accept those rules or don’t attend. Children don’t have the same ability to come and go freely, so their parents must exercise discretion when deciding whether or not to bring them to an event at another adult’s house/apartment/whatever.

My right to make my own decisions about how to live my life may in some cases come into conflict with providing appropriately nurturing and safe environments for children. So how do we navigate the conflict between my rights and the child’s right to be in public space? By creating adult-only environments so that the rowdy college students can go to the club without worrying about kids and so parents don’t worry that their kid is going to see someone snorting coke in the bathroom at a family restaurant (behavior I *have* seen in some clubs).

My point is, there are some spaces that are adult-only, and those of us who choose to “party hard” also often choose not to have children (yet) precisely because our lifestyle is not at all conducive to nurturing the young and vulnerable. I think we have a right to make this choice. Sometimes this results in a conflict of interests between those with children and those without. So how do we navigate that, when we’re talking about something like on-campus housing – parents and children have a right to subsidized housing just like other students, but perhaps the family housing should be kept separate from the main undergraduate living area. Because, really, do you want your 3-year-old around my frat friends while they’re doing beer bongs? I don’t think so. And they don’t want your kids around either. So I think it’s important to discuss the exceptions to the rule that “children should be included in society.” Some parts of society are not good for young people who have not yet developed adult coping skills. We crazy adults shouldn’t be shunned on the basis that we “ought to think of the children” – rather, it should be acknowledged that children are different from adults, and do not belong in all adult settings.

I think there’s a massive difference between having to ask a child (or other patron) to leave because they are behaving inappropriately for the space, and stating that children shouldn’t be “allowed” certain places, or that they should be held to what amounts to higher standards than adults (children are often expected to be *less* disruptive than adults are, to get treated like they aren’t a problem, in my experience). I believe this post is about the latter, rather than the former. Noone is suggesting that children are oppressed when they are asked to leave because of inappropriate behaviour, we are suggesting that presupposing that children will be a problem, that parents (mothers) will be a problem and premptively banning them or treating them like dirt IS.

An aside about 50 years ago, to Dawn. In fact, if you DO want to go back to how things were 50 years ago, you’d better get ready to speak to kids directly about their behaviour, be tolerant of them, and even accept that parents can’t watch them all the time. It USED to be normal to drop the kids off at the library or the park while you ran your errands, or even had a luncheon date with a friend, to leave a kid in the toy section, on a patch of grass or lock them out of the house to run around the neighbourhood a few hours and expect that your community would keep an eye on them. It is, ironically, folks who insist that they shouldn’t ever have to engage children, who cause an environment where a mother has no choice but to bring her child everywhere she goes, hence necessitating the occassional noisy child where you’d rather not see/hear them.

@mightydoll

Some parents unfortunately think it is oppression if they’re told to leave because their out of control child has just set a patron’s hair on fire or something equally dire.

We don’t just say kids shouldn’t be in certain places out of worry of disruption, it’s also because some places are just plain not safe for children. It’s their safety we’re worried about as well as the enjoyment of adults.

My grandmother would probably love to hear that, but then she actually knows how to parent and could trust her kids to go to the library without her and without them disrupting the library or wrecking anything.

The point is parents used to be parents, they weren’t their kids best friend or anything like that, they were parents and they did their jobs.

I just want to express my love for bfp. Love love love.

Dawn: oh right, kids and parents have totally changed over the last 50 years. Kids these days are less respectful, parents use less discipline…etc, etc, etc.

Since we’ve been hearing this refrain since the beginning of the written word, I’m surprised we don’t just all live in trees and throw feces at one another.

@mightydoll,

Actually there has been a lot of change, I remember when I was a kid and I honestly have noticed a major difference where I live. Ever since the fad for being a friend to your kid not a parent, it’s like subsequent generations have forgotten how to actually parent.

I have 5 kids & I disagree with you. There are places that kids do not belong. Why would any responsible person put a child at risk by taking them to a bar? You even said “she is normally one of the quieter people in a room full of inebriated souls”, why would you risk your daughter’s safety by deliberately surrounding her by drunk people? I do not understand that way of thinking.

I work in a restaurant/bar, and have seen some wonderfully behaved children, and some terribly behaved ones. The point I find worth looking at though is taking kids into bars.

I think a good rule of thumb would be kids are ok in places like that before happy hour. If you want to take your kid in for a burger before people get off work, go for it. The drinkers are going to be a lot fewer, and more subdued, and anyone else there is mainly eating lunch. I’ve seen people swing by with their kids for that reason and it usually goes smoothly.

But, the drinking definitely picks up after work hours, 4 or 5o’clock. That’s when people are coming in specifically to drink. People want to be able to relax. People get loud, which upsets kids. People yell, people swear, people get raunchy. You also just have people sometimes act like total jerks, which really isn’t something you want kids around. The staff is already taxed making sure everyone gets their food, their drinks, monitoring if anyone’s too intoxicated, being a buffer b/w customers. There’s a lot of maintenance in keeping all the wheels on the cart. We can’t be watching your kid and the bar customers too.

@alynn “What I’d actually like to complain about…(and this has been echoed up thread) is that I don’t feel I have the permission to interact with kids in public. I feel the fear of the stranger is so strong that when a child I don’t know is fussy, I’m barely allowed to make a strange face at him/her, much less play or speak to them.”

I know what you mean…it’s even worse for a 40 year old man, unless I’m with my wife, I feel I can’t smile at a child without coming off like a paedophile.

Personally I would say yes, a man over 30 who’s single should be allowed to go to the zoo on his own…but I admit I would find it a bit suspicious, so I wouldn’t do it for fear of how others would view me…

You know….we don’t look at Phyllis Schlafly and say, “Hey, there’s a woman who believes women should stay at home and be subservient to their husbands. She goes around the country telling other women to stay at home and be subservient to their husbands. Gosh, what a shitty thing to do. We must judge all women on the basis of Phyllis Schlafly and prevent them from speaking out in public or leaving the kitchen. Because it’s in their best interest.”

So WHY are we all rushing to police children and parents on the occasional bad behavior of the “bad” ones?

Oh, right. Because that’s what it means to be a member of an oppressed class: you don’t get to be an individual; you’re judged by your similarity to the ‘worst’ of your kind.

Parents DO use less discipline, whether that’s good or bad. You would never have heard about anti-spanking laws 50 years ago.

But things HAVE changed in the last few generations, at least they have in the U.S. The Baby Boomers were the first generation to be aggressively marketed to as children, and it has gotten more aggressive with every passing decade. And I think that children are absorbing that message in a very consumptive way. Kids equate non-consumption with boredom. When they don’t have attention, they ask for snacks, they point to some crap piece of plastic they want. Studies have measured this phenomenon (the number of “snacks” per day of your average child, etc) They want to be given something, or else they will throw a tantrum. I have observed this behavior in countless settings and regions.

Dawn,

I think we all hear that some children have made it difficult or impossible for you to fully participate in public life. At the same time, children have a right as humans to also participate in public life. We absolutely need to find better ways to help you particpate, but that CANNOT be at the expense of other human beings right to enter the public sphere.

Paraxeni,

Why not just refuse that parent service? Why not just eject those who have clearly crossed the line? Why is a class wide ban the appropriate response to the bad behavior of a few individuals?

@maia:

wow. it seems so simple and basic. if you are a human being in this world, you have some basic obligations that come with your humanity. one of them is that you are responsible, as is everyone else, to look out for one another, including children.

I’m sorry, but I just can’t go for this. I’ll accept my responsibility to look out for a child to the extent that I’m expected to look out for anyone else. If a kid is about to run into the street, I’m on it. If a kid is choking or about to eat something dangerous, I’m on it. If someone scoops up a kid and makes a run for it, I’m there. But I can’t be held responsible for anyone else’s emotional state. I’m not good with kids, I don’t really know how to interact with them well, they generally don’t respond well to me–I have enough trouble dealing with my own mental state, much less someone else’s. If a basic tenet of my humanity is the ability to calm a child in distress, we’re in trouble.

You can’t just say, “By agreeing to live in the world, people agree to interact with children.” I didn’t agree to live here–I was born here, completely without consultation. And I don’t feel the onus is on me to remove myself from the world if interacting with kids isn’t my cup of tea.

I’m not and have never been anti-kids, or anti-kids in public. I’m actually very much pro-kids in public in the interest of teaching them how to grow up to be good, solid adults. But I can’t get behind this recurring idea that because I’m a human being, because I go out in public, because I eventually will retire and rely on tomorrow’s workforce, I have some particular obligation to the kids around me. If you bring your child into my presence with the assumption that I’ll step up and take responsibility for his care on a moment’s notice, you’re going to be disappointed.

And that’s what gets to me. I’m terribly sympathetic to a parent with a squalling child, I’m terribly sympathetic to the fractious toddler whose parents have made him sit too long at a restaurant, and I’m terribly sympathetic to a parent doing the hard work of teaching a child how to behave appropriately in public. But when a parent expects me to just plug my ears and get over it because making funny faces at another person’s kid is part of the social contract? That sympathy is out the window.

@college girl I’d like to commend you for your comment. Your arguments are mature and sound, and I wish more people your age would come to the conclusion that you have.

As for me? I won’t be having kids anytime soon, because I enjoy the freedom I have too much. I don’t have to WORRY about keeping my kids behaving appropriately in a public venue. If you want to have kids, that’s your call, but I, personally, am not in a place in my life to want to deal with any of that right now. And that’s my right, just as much as it’s your right to have kids if you want to.

Where I live (not the US), child protection is vastly underfunded and failing children, the care system for children is still produces very poor outcomes for children, refugee children are imprisioned, Young Offender’s institutions have a sky high suicide rate, play spaces are being sold off nearly everywhere and it is still legal to hit your child.

Is anyone seriously going to say that children are not an oppressed class when we treat them like this on a state level?

If they have been screaming for over ten minutes

Holy crap — 10 minutes?!

Try 2. If your kid isn’t calming down after 2 minutes (at most), you should take the kid outside and comfort/correct them there. We were eating out with friends and their 2-year-old girl last weekend and she fell and hit her head and started crying and after about 30 seconds of being held by mom she had subsided to a whimper.

@Dawn: Try shopping in a wheelchair sometime, it’s a nightmare trying to get around a store when half the store is flooded with parents who felt the need to bring their kids into a stroller the size of a small car along with about five other kids tagging after them and screaming their heads off.

while i empathize with you on your mobility, and understand that yes, children can be a hindrance to your mobility in a store, it’s still important that you acknowledge that shopping is a necessity, and for some families it is necessary to bring children into the store. i have been run over by a woman pushing a stroller (that thing could have been a tank) but i’m not going to tell ALL mothers to leave their children at home. it’s not realistic. just as you would find it condescending and no doubt frustrating to hear someone tell you to stay at home because you use a wheelchair, it’s similarly condescending and frustrating to a mother who has no other option other than to bring her children while she buys food for the week.

I’m childfree (NOT “childless”, TYVM) and a feminist, and I don’t like kids. I don’t think they’re “cute” at all; babies especially repulse me. There are exceptions, of course, but on the whole I find kids obnoxious and uninteresting and avoid them whenever I can, the same way I would avoid hanging around loudmouth guys whose only topics of discussion are football and beer. It’s why I stay away from “child-friendly” spaces like Chuck E. Cheese and amusement parks. Children are an inescapable fact of life, but so are spiders and I don’t have to put myself around those either.

I think I can speak for a good many CFers when I say that the problem isn’t that kids exist. The problem, more often than not, is the parent(s) who decides that because Widdle Pweshus is the center of THEIR universe, he has to be the center of EVERYONE ELSE’S universe. Not everyone finds your child as perfect and fascinating and wondrous as you do; we don’t think her shrieks of boredom are on a par with Verdi’s operas, we don’t see his destruction of other people’s property as “curiosity”, we don’t want to hear them asking loudly, “WHAT ARE THEY DOING? WHAT’S THAT? WHO’S HE?” at the ballet or providing running color commentary during the movie while you sit by and do nothing. It’s not putting an undue burden on parents to ask that they teach their kids early on how to behave like responsible human beings and to respect the rights of others; unfortunately, there are far too many parents who seem to believe that THEIR child (and by extension, they themselves) should be exempt from society’s most basic rules because s/he is the most specialest, wonderfulest creation EVER, and they should be equally exalted for having given life to this pinnacle of human evolution.

Here’s a little story from my own experience: I took my elderly mother to a buffet restaurant a while back. It was lunchtime, so the place was busy and the tables crowded. In the midst of all this, a young boy and his sister decided to play tag around my table, nearly slamming into several people carrying heavily laden trays. He stopped directly behind my chair and let out a SCREECH that felt like someone had detonated a bomb in my ear. I’m sensitive to loud noises, and this was particularly painful; he was lucky I didn’t smack him across the room on sheer reflex. Instead he got the Glare of Laser Death, as did his mother, who sat at the next table looking bored and making no attempt to rein in her spawn. Mom only shrugged and said laconically, “He’s only three.” That was it. No “I’m sorry,” no “Sit down, kids,” nothing, and the kids continued to run wild. And I’m supposed to give a “sympathetic smile” and “warm healing energy” to THAT? Um, no.

Personally, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with “adults only” spaces; after all, there are plenty of spaces reserved for kids and families. We see nothing wrong with giving kids their own adult-restricted places to socialize, so why shouldn’t adults be extended the same courtesy?

And for those of you complaining about children not being allowed in hospitals, here’s something you might not have considered in your righteous anger: Children, especially small children, are notorious for being carriers of illness. A hospital is filled with people whose immune systems aren’t working at full power; even something as generally innocuous as a cold can be deadly. Your kid doesn’t even have to go near the patients – all that’s needed is for someone to be around your sneezing, sniffling child in the waiting room. To say that your child being welcomed everywhere outweighs the health and life of ill patients is arrogance in the extreme.

@ Dawn

I taught those little hellons. :)

And actually, if you do read about Japanese culture, in general, childhood is one of “freedom” whereas adulthood is of “restrictions.” Conversely, in America, children have “rules” whereas when you are an “adult”, you have the “freedom” to do what you want. This is all in general of course.

“I think I can speak for a good many CFers
when I say that the problem isn ’t that kids
exist. The problem, more often than not, is
the parent(s) who decides that because
Widdle Pweshus is the center of THEIR
universe, he has to be the center of
EVERYONE ELSE ’S universe.”

Oh no…don’t suck the rest of into this little hate rant. Some CF people like children just fine, we just don’t want to raise them ourselves.

… aaaand, late to the party, Icewyche shits all over everything. I’m going for a margarita.

Holy crap — 10 minutes?!

Try 2. If your kid isn’t calming down after 2 minutes (at most), you should take the kid outside and comfort/correct them there. We were eating out with friends and their 2-year-old girl last weekend and she fell and hit her head and started crying and after about 30 seconds of being held by mom she had subsided to a whimper.

Nah, I think ten is ok. That encompasses the half-hearted whinge, then subsiding, then starting again, then subsiding, etc. It’s normally if they’re being denied something they want. I think it’s acceptable to be told ‘no, you can’t have another ice cream/your sister’s ice cream/MY ice cream’ and then have a short protest, and then learn that this is not the right reaction, whilst still sat at the table. This is the sort of situation in which other bodies in the space need to learn to appreciate that this is happening. Of course, it might not be happening, which leads to the ouroborous that I mentioned above.

Kids don’t need to be whisked outside at the first sign of any sort of noise or disruption, or the outside space will lose any aspect of calm one-to-one time.

Personally I would say yes, a man over 30 who’s single should be allowed to go to the zoo on his own…but I admit I would find it a bit suspicious, so I wouldn’t do it for fear of how others would view me…

Reminds me of the line from “Thou Shalt Always Kill”, by Dan LeSac vs. Scroobius Pip:

“Thou shalt not think that any male over the age of 30 who plays with a child that is not their own is a pedophile. Some people are just nice.”

@ C/L – LOL! Indeed, it’s much harder to teach children not to throw fits in public or treat people with disrespect when adults are doing it all around them.

I once had a woman complain, loudly and with some fairly strong language about my choice to read aloud to my kids on the bus (Harry Potter, if you’re curious) for the entire bus trip. She was far more disruptive than I, (and far more disruptive than my kids have ever been in a public space – if you factor in the fact that she wasn’t removed swiftly from the space). After she exited the bus, several other passengers expressed their sympathy and, addressing the kids, pointed out that that was very bad behaviour for a great big woman like her. (great big as in adult, not as in physical size)

I admit that I haven’t read this thread (200+ comments?! don’t have time!), but just wanted to thank maia for this post. I can’t stand the anti-child (and more generally ageist) attitudes you find in US culture, which really strikes me as a form of humanity-loathing and actually self-loathing.

In Chinese culture, not only are there always babies and children around, there are also always elderly people around. I grew up in multi-generational households. This is how cultural wisdom gets passed on and accumulates: family and inter-generational community. I find it bizarre and unhealthy that so many US adults want to keep the very young and the very old out of sight. It’s as though they seek to disconnect themselves from the reality of life’s journey via isolation, hyper-individualism, and denial. It’s a sick, violent, fragmented culture.

But the thing is, kids don’t always act exactly like people want them to, because they are kids. They don’t have what people are describing as the “appropriate” social tools to act like adults. They are kids.

If you are can’t stand the fact that kids like to run around, that they can be loud, that they cry, you aren’t just talking about the parents. You are talking about kids.

What you want is for parents to curb that kid behavior and make them more acceptable to you and whatever it is you feel is “correct” in the situation. FFS, two parents of the same child can’t always agree on “correct” behavior so how is it that we are supposed to know what every person in the restaurant thinks is correct?

Sometimes, running a child down in a store or yelling at them or shushing them or whatever behavior it is you expect the parent to do, just inflames the situation, makes the child react in a way that doesn’t make anything better, and will just lead to more running and more screaming. Parents know their children. Just because to you it looks like they aren’t doing anything or aren’t doing enough or are oblivious to their children, doesn’t mean that that is what is happening.

Of course, all of us parents are only concerned about ourselves and our children and can’t see anything or anyone beyond that. At least that is the vibe that people are giving off in this forum.

But what you don’t seem to get is that we HEAR you, right now in this forum and the comments you make in public. We SEE you and your physical reactions when we get on the plane, sit down at the restaurant. Your policing, the stuff that you are saying now, it works. Even if it my child is a complete angel (and he is NOT), I see how people react to other children. I notice it. It’s embedded in my mind, I can feel it in my skin.

I will think about these comments the next time I am in public with my child, as I fuss and obsess endlessly over whether or not he is acting correctly (I guess that is my lot in life because I chose to have children and I need to suck it up). But will you attempt at all to change the way that you react to a child who isn’t acting “appropriately” or will just roll your eyes and complain about that lax parent who only cares about themselves and is ruining your meal?

I just CAN’T believe that that policing of my parenting and my kid’s behavior is coming so forcefully from such a group. I just can’t.

“It’s interesting how bars and strip clubs become proxies for “everywhere else”. I frankly have never seen a little kid in a dive bar. I’m sure they turn up sometimes, but at least in Large Midwestern City, they’re not around often. So I think this “but what about my drinking time?” is a bit of a canard.”

Never was brought to a strip club, but I was taken into bars a couple times. During the daytime, no problems, since they were mostly quiet and empty and no one said a thing, usually had a Pepsi. But being brought into a bar on the weekend, after dark, when it’s filled with noisy, drunk people was scary and uncomfortable as a small child, even though no one was mean to me.

So I think asking parents to consider whether a place is really actually comfortable for your child, and whether they even want to be there, is not so bad. If children are an oppressed group, then part of that oppression is taking them into uncomfortable places for them, against their will. (Not talking about say a doctor’s office) but a very formal restaurant (where EVERYONE is usually on more uptight behavior) and expecting them to conform to that behavior is a little unfair. It’s an act of unfairness perpetuated by the *parent* though, not the non-parent/guardians in the place.

Most of the parents saying children are oppressed still think it’s ok to force their non-essential choices on them. It’s hard because children legally can’t be left alone. They legally have to be educated. So if a child is being bullied or terrorized by their teacher (I had a teacher throw a freakin’ chair at me in 1st grade. Nothing was done.) what can the parent even do? Switch schools, which often has negative consequences like having to drive very far, lose friends, etc. Homeschool, where a parent will have to stay home… or hire someone, if they have money. Private school is expensive.

If a child does not want to be dragged to a gov. office and sit bored for 4 hours while their parent fills out forms, they have no choice. If Mom can’t afford a babysitter, that’s her only choice.

We can’t really change that-young children can’t be safely left alone for too long. Myself, I find them more troubling than some jerk sneering at a kid who dares to come into a library.

Don’t take your kids into areas where the social expectation is higher than they can currently meet. Don’t leave them helpless and bored for hours-make sure you bring books or toys even if you don’t think you’ll be gone long. Respect their educational desires the best you can. Respect their dietary choices if you can (it’s not easy trying to be a vegetarian when you’re 11 and can’t cook) Don’t take them to unnecessary places where *THEY* will be uncomfortable (no, you shouldn’t give up fun because you’re a parent, but you don’t have a right to make a little kid sick and scared) .

“find it bizarre and unhealthy that so many US adults want to keep the very young and the very old out of sight. It’s as though they seek to disconnect themselves from the reality of life’s journey via isolation, hyper-individualism, and denial. It’s a sick, violent, fragmented culture.”

If you are not of a culture (I take it you identify with Chinese culture?) then please don’t call it “sick, violent, and fragmented”. That’s not cool. Different is not always bad, it just brings different negatives and positives. More family-emphasizing cultures have downsides because of that aspect, just like with anything.

and to clarify, I do think children are an oppressed class, but it’s foolish to tackle the subject by only talking to/about non-parents. Parents are the ones that control children’s lives, a key part of keep kid’s safe and protecting their rights as much as possible is realizing that, and making sure parents’ control over their children’s non-essential activities are lessened.

Blast it all to hell…one of my responses got eaten by my blackberry…Okay, again but shorter and I apologize if it somehow made it to moderation…I’m assuming my blackberry ate it because of the error message.

Mightydoll,

I’m also firmly of the belief that the only way to reverse the trend of paranoia and the subsequent detachment between the generations is to challenge it.

Easier said than done. When we first moved to DC, M and I took our dog to play in one of the baseball fields near our house. We play catch, the dog runs…there’s usually a picnic involved…all good fun. Well, this particular afternoon a couple of the “bench” kids came over to see the dog from their little league practice that was going on in the next field over. They petted our dog and asked M about some of the pitches he was throwing. So I went to sit in the shade and M showed them some pitching stuff and threw the ball around for them to hit. They were hanging out with us having some carrot sticks (which I know, I forgot, no feeding children they may have food allergies I don’t know about) for maybe half an hour when someone called the Police. Seriously. Sirens and all. Because childless man + public park + cute dog + willingness to play catch in this area equals child molester.

I think a large part of the problem is that, in our culture, most people grow up associating mostly with either their immediate family, or other children in their immediate age cohort. There’s limited socialization with children who are significantly younger or older, and many parents have never had any significant experience with children at all before they had theirs. As a result, people end up with completely unrealistic ideas of how children can be expected to behave. For every bystander who fumes about how inappropriate it was that that rude parent was letting their toddler _giggle_ in _public_, there’s a parent who thinks it’s perfectly appropriate for their toddler to pull on random strangers’ hair, and how dare some oppressive bystander say otherwise! Then you get the really sad cases, like parents who think a week old baby is misbehaving when they cry.

The other major problem is the “stranger danger” meme that’s already been mentioned above. By conditioning people to believe that the only reason any stranger might _possibly_ express any sort of interest or concern in your child is that they’re planning nefarious deeds, parents are encouraged to be suspicious, and bystanders are encouraged not to get involved. The bystanders who might genuinely want to help won’t, but those who are inclined to harangue the “bad parents” in their midst will feel no such restraint.

“Nowhere in these 200+ comments do I see anyone who has posited “but they’re just kids and they should go everywhere” talk about the responsibility of the parents or the child. Instead a good deal of the comments just come across entitled.”

This is ALL that people have talked about. It is ALL about the irresponsibility of parents to teach their children the right behavior and how that ruins the public space for people.

And here’s my point. You think that in order me and mine to go into public I need to tell my toddler how to act before we go somewhere, have him fold his hands while in public, be quiet, sit still at the table until I tell him otherwise.

Obviously that worked for your parents, that is something important to your community, and is behavior that you think is appropriate. Fine. But I can guarantee you that you did NOT always do those things. And at some point you did something that pissed people in public off and, so, probably pissed off your parents. Because sometimes, kids act like kids.

I’m also just trying to get the point across that because a parent doesn’t look like they are doing anything or isn’t acting in the way you expect them to in response to their kid’s behavior, it doesn’t mean that they aren’t, at that moment, both parenting and totally aware of their child.

To return to the original post for a moment, I’m baffled as to why a friend merely asking if your daughter was going to come along offends you. Maybe she just wanted to know what sort of night to be prepared for. If she planned on doing some activity that she knows your child wouldn’t enjoy, maybe she just wanted to know if she needed to change up those plans. I have confidence that you took offense for some real reason – perhaps you had a past experience with this friend that indicated they had something against children. But you haven’t explained that to us here, and so your story makes you sound like you’re suffering from some entitlement issues. Please be aware that I’m not assuming that you are, but I think the way this story was told, with some apparently missing links, might account for the negative response we’re seeing here. I also want to be careful to note that I’m not making a “tone” argument here. I love a militant tone in feminist writing, and I think anyone should be able to take any tone they want. But I do think there is some missing info that would have made the object of your criticism a little clearer.

Now that I’ve seen the straw-man strip-club mentioned several times, I remembered that I do know of one actual child in an actual strip club. In the sixties and seventies, my mother’s cousin owned a strip club, and his son (then in elementary and middle school) would come to the club after school to help with sweeping and washing dishes and stuff like that. I would assume that kids working in places like that used to be much more common than it is now. I know that I’ve seen photos of bars from the Prohibition era where the kids mopping up in the background don’t look much older than 10.

Lasciel, I was born in New York and have as much of a right to talk about US culture as you do, though I’m guessing you will always see me as a foreigner.

Seriously, what is with this “US is anti-child” meme? No, the U.S. is not perfect, but some of the generalizations in this thread are offensive!

They are also tolerant and empathetic to other developmentally appropriate behavior

But if you don’t know the child, who are you to judge what behavior is developmentally appropriate for her?

I don’t see why this is not a HUGE, GLARING issue for disability rights advocates. Clearly the policing of parents and children is much, much stricter and falls more often not just when the parents have disabilities (which DR groups pick up on) but also when it’s the child who has a disability!

It saddens me to see people who identify as disabled or allies thereof instead rushing to say, “But here’s how kids [meaning: one hypothetical kid who behaves "badly," but children are an oppressed class and do not have the privilege of being seen as individuals] spoil the space for adults with disabillities.”

@ Amphigorey,

You don’t have a right to whites-only spaces.

Is that inflammatory?

A local indie cinema has a BYOB (Bring your own baby) screening one or two times a month. (http://www.hydeparkpicturehouse.co.uk/events.php#event36)
What are your thoughts on this? Is this the kind of thing parents want?

@salix: How about “you don’t have a right to a woman’s only space.”? I think a fair number of people here _would_ find that notion inflammatory.

Salix, I do have the right to childfree spaces.

Even Disney acknowledges that – there is a restaurant at Walt Disney World that does not allow children under ten years old. The restaurant is Victoria and Albert’s, and yes, I think that was a lovely idea on Disney’s part. Children under ten don’t belong there.

Comparing children as a class to race, gender, ability, etc., is disingenuous. They are different from adults, and no, they shouldn’t have as many rights as adults have. They can’t drive and they can’t vote and they can’t make their own medical decisions because they are not adults.

When people talk about the comparison between parents and people with disabilities, I think it’s worthwhile to remember that these are not always mutually exclusive groups. “Parents” is not a homogenous term, and many of us with children are also living with any number of challenges, which can include ability issues.

For example, way above, Dawn compared her genuine need of a wheelchair to parents’ use of “oversized” strollers. She (like many others out there) saw the strollers as an example of a parent taking up more than her share of space*. But the larger strollers, with their manoeverability, suspension, and adjustability, are a godsend for parents with ability issues. They also usually have a basket underneath to stash your shopping in. Little, foldable strollers can be so hard to push (While you’re bent over, carrying everything in a backpack) that many parents find them painful to use.

Anyway, any challenges you may face are probably also faced by some parents. Disability? Sensitivity? Poverty? Stress? Not liking the sound of screaming children? Parents have to deal with this, too. Almost all of us are trying to be good parents, but it seems like anything less than an ideal parent, with ideal children, is going to be censured in public.

* I’m pretty sure that condemning “women taking up too much space” is a feminist issue. And that includes whinging about big strollers.

@Salix: You don’t have a right to whites-only spaces.

Are we really comparing childfree status to race here? Seriously?

Nah Kai, I don’t see you as a foreigner. But if you see mainstream American culture as largely destructive, I wouldn’t blame you if you disassociated yourself from it.

I just don’t think it’s correct to dismiss an entire culture or way of life as bad because some of the problems it has. Individualism has it’s upsides, it has it’s downsides. In general, eople in the city seem to be colder, less friendly and less concerned about other people a lot of the time, where in the rural parts around here most people are friendly, more helpful and more concerned with other people. You get both sides of the coin though. For all the city-rudeness, you get the *right* to be rude, you’ll likely never see the person again if you just had a bad day and snapped at someone, everyone won’t be talking about it. In the countryside people are nicer but everyone knows your business as well. How you treat other people will color every bit of your life, and if you don’t go with the flow to some extent, you will likely have a terrible time.

You can’t just say urban life it terrible, sick, and heartless. Or that rural life is always stifling, oppressive, conformist and wearying.

@Mike- Myself, I’ve never understood the Women’s-Only Spaces thing. (would welcome a link on it if anyone has one handy) all I’ve heard about it is people excluding trans people from them for various reasons.

@Amphigorey – you don’t have a “right” to childfree spaces in the public sphere in the U.S. You may have the privilege to patronize private places that choose to enforce age limitations (and it is at present a business owner’s right to do so in most instances in the US, and in some places even their responsibility) and you can certainly choose to prohibit children in your own home, but Disney providing a (young) child free dining opportunity is not a “right” that they are acknowledging, but a marketing ploy for their guests.

The converse of that is that I don’t have a “right” to a child friendly environment for my children either. The right that we both have is to choose what businesses we patronize so as to meet our desires most effectively.

I would *like* to see more places try to accomodate children more effectively. I would *like* U.S. culture to adapt to the idea that not everyone wants to have kids and to be more accepting of that idea. I would also like guaranteed paid parental leave for 6 mos or more, more easily accessible and flexible child care, more options for alternative work environments where my need/desire to be actively involved in my kids’ lives would not unduly burden those people who chose not to have children, a unicorn and a pony.

Alas, in the current United States, I’m probably most likely to get the pony.

@Certain Commenters: please, please, stop “helping.”

@others: Can you cut it out with the “You all hate children” meme?

Something that’s come up, mostly tangentially, in this thread, that the last OMG Kids thread didn’t really touch on, IIRC: the class and race issues going the other way. It’s absolutely true that rules and societal standards around children end up having a disproportionate impact on WOC and working-class women, but…

…I think the people arguing for their child’s right to yell and knock things over – or, if you’re going to tell me that no one’s saying that, the people arguing that to “take a deep breath, send warm energy toward the mama and kid, give a sympathetic smile, and maybe even start talking with the kid” is a “basic obligation[...] that come[s] with your humanity” when a child is yelling and knocking things over – those people are ignoring the class and racial implications of what they’re saying.

Because you’re saying that that should be the reaction of the other patrons in the restaurant or the store, but you’re forgetting the people who work in the establishment – the people who can’t choose to leave and who will suffer economic consequences for not dealing with the situation – and who, depending on the location and type of the place, are more likely to be working-class WOC.

And I’m not comfortable with the tacit insistence that WOC must always be parenting others’ children for them.

Holy crap..the assertion that you don’t have a right to public spaces free of other people is getting push back? Wow. Okay, I think this thread has descended to depths that are beyond reasonable discussion in my view.

@Katherine: “not a feminist” does not mean “against women’s advancement.” See “womanist,” for example. More to the point, though, that statement is a reflection of what actually happens, and saying “your position sucks because it would be unnecessary in my fantasy world” isn’t too helpful.

Katherine,

Stop and re-read from a place free of anger. Acknowledging the reality that the obligation to “parent” falls disproportionately on women is most certainly feminist. When we add more responsibilities/requirements to parenting we almost always burden women not men.

“you do not have a right to child free spaces. ”

This sentence, standing there alone, was absolutely awesome.
Thank you very much for it. The rest of the post was also wonderful, but the beginning… it left me gasping for air.
Thanks from the other shore of the mediterranean sea.

Icewyche,

I don’t care what gender you identify as…hating a class of people for any reason is disgusting. I hate people who leer, not men. I dislike TAB people who refuse to surrender their seats to those who need them, not all TAB people. I am irritated by people who wear perfume, not all people. Behaviors you can hate…you can deplore when I child screams…but hating a class of people, regardless of whether that class is age, race, gender, hair color, eye color, country of origin, lactose intolerance, handedness, etc, is inexcusable.

@Icewyche,

[how would you like being around really annoying people]

Running and screaming = a behavior. I have no problem with anyone saying they don’t like being around running and screaming people – even if those behaviors correlate a bit more with being a child.

Being a kid? Not a behavior.

in the midst of your scrambling to disassociate yourself from “those evil evil child-haters oh noes!”, you failed to actually read my earlier post. I said that for most CFers, it wasn’t the CHILD that was the problem, it was the PARENT(S) – specifically, the parent who refuses to actually parent

I won’t speak for Kristen J and Shelley, but you’re still dead wrong here, because that’s a thing that people get annoyed at. Childfree means without children or plans to have them. It does not mean your views on parents, children, or social politics.

I see what you’re saying, Rebecca, but I think that’s a bit of a stretch in that it’s not responding to what people have requested.

I haven’t seen anyone say that strangers need to *parent* their children for them. Smiling at a distressed child is not parenting. Nor is talking to a child, or refraining from glaring at the kid’s parents when the kid is crying about some ridiculous thing that kids cry about.

Last month I encountered an injured elderly man with Alzheimers wandering my street. When I stopped to assist him, I wasn’t taking on the job of his caregiver. I wasn’t thinking, “Goddammit! People expect me to do *everything* around here!” I was just being a decent human being because that is not too much to ask.

Or this: When I’m at work and a patient’s family member gets upset and cries because they’re loved one has just been diagnosed with some awful terminal illness, I try to comfort them. I’m a frackin med tech. It is not my job to comfort distressed family members, but I do it because it’s just the nice thing to do.

I interpreted the post as a reminder that, hey, kids are people, too, and deserve the same human compassion we should show to everyone else. Not, hey, watch my baby for a minute. (Though, I admit I have thought that before.)

Thank you for sharing your thoughts with us, and there is a lot worth thinking about here. I think we keep too many things hidden from children in our society, and we need to work on that. However, I do have to disagree with you on several points. In the US, parents often demand that the people around them adjust themselves because their child is in the room. I can gather from your post that you don’t do this and are understanding that others shouldn’t have to change their behavior for your child (except for the “positive energy” thing, but I’ll get back to that), but I’ve seen many parents tell other adults to watch their language, or to not speak so loudly because the baby is sleeping, or even ask that gay couples should express love for each other in front of their child.

I think at least one other commenter also mentioned that maybe there are some mamas in that bar who want a night out to be amongst other adults after a long day of caring for children. Oh, but wait, not wanting to be surrounded by the darlings 24 hours a day means you hate babies! And what kind of monster hates babies! (At least, that’s what I’ve learned from some of the comments following your blog). I see nothing wrong with wanting to show your daughter the world, but you have no right to tell me to send positive vibes your way if I don’t feel like it. And yes, I have tried this in the past. I smiled and waved at a little girl in a store because her mother was talking to someone and wasn’t paying attention to the tantrum she was throwing, the woman accused me of threatening to kidnap and molest her child by smiling at her. Not every mother feels the same way about positive waves as you do, unfortunately, and it can cause huge problems.

Maia:

As the father of a 5-year-old daughter, allow me to articulate a few things:

1) Your 3-year-old daughter may be a person, but she is first and foremost, a child. She has a lot of fundamental development to go through, and her place in society is as your ward. You are responsible for her, because she cannot be 100% responsible for herself.

2) While there should be no blanket ban on children in public, save where their presence would expose them to grave danger, it should also not be assumed that children belong everywhere. You may take a child to a restaurant or a museum or a movie, but you cannot expect them to remain interested, if they are interested at all, in the activities you would have them partake of. You must be more selective of what situations you place your children in.

3) Your take on feminism is incorrect. Feminism, as I define it, is a movement toward enforcing the equality of men and women, to where women may do whatever they please, however they please, by their own right, and not due to the direction of men. This has precious little to do with the subject of children in public, and using feminists as your foil to score easy points is spurious and unnecessary.

4) No one is suggesting that your children should be banned from public. We were all children once; we all know how inconvenient it can be to be a child in an adult world. We are asking you to be more cognizant of your environment, so that we might all enjoy the benefits of enlightened human society, without creating friction which is clearly not required.

I’d like the U.S. in general to be more friendly and accepting of the fact that women have to gestate and all genders have to parent at varying levels of involvement the next generation. In return, I’d like the people who are actively parenting people whose training on “how to act in public” might be a little wobbly yet to restrict their outings as much as possible to areas suitable for training flights, so to speak. This is not a forever thing. By the time my kids were five they were okay in even fancy restaurants if we planned properly. (But then, I am not okay in a fancy restaurant if I am tired and my blood sugar has crashed. I tend to weeping fits.) And really, as my life does not include a lot of bars and fancy restaurants, it worked out that I could take them places with mostly good results by the time they were three.

But we ate family meals, so the idea that you sit at the table and you don’t throw food and you engage in polite conversation wasn’t some new concept that only came in at a restaurant. And we were not so well off we could just buy whatever we wanted, so no one got to buy what wasn’t on the grocery list. (They would whine with Grandma, but not with me; Grandma was responsive to whines for toys and candy. Kids can suss this stuff out.) Did we have occasional crash-and-burns? Yep. But we had them at McDonald’s, not at somewhere nicer.

It’s amazing how far you can get with remembering everyone needs enough food and sleep, and a few toy cars and some crayons and paper in your purse. It’s only fair; I carry a novel, myself, and now my older boy carries his gameboy for such moments, the younger his novel. I’m not sure why this seems to a lot of parents to be an amazing feat of parenting, though.

I agree with the commenter who said this is about entitlement. Everyone who has a chip on their shoulder somehow finds a way to blame feminisim. Why does the OP assume that people’s annoyance has anything to do with feminism? Why not just common social courtesy. You don’t have to hate children or want them to be banished forever to recognize they are some places they belong and some they dont. You may not think others have a right to child free spaces but you don’t have a right to subject people to your children either.

I am upset at the idea that the ICU area of a hospital should be forced to bend the rules for a woman to bring her child (regardless of how well behaved) who might potentially be carrying germs that could infect the health of those staying there. There is a good reason children are kept out of most ICUs. If your immune system is depressed, young children are prime sources of infection. Adults can usually be trusted to wash their hands and not touch a lot of stuff. Kids not so much. Please do not say that this policy is a problem. I’m sorry you had a long drive, but you couldn’t called the hospital and asked before hand. Some will allow under 12, some will allow only over. But they didn’t make the rule against YOU, specifically.

Sirkowski,

Thank you for reminding me that I am often wrong when I think threads couldn’t get any lower.

[The comment being responded to has been deleted ~mod]

@M – Actually, yes, I do have the right to take my children anywhere where they are not forbidden by law or by the rules of a private establishment, which means that other people may be “subjected” to my children. What constitutes “subjection” clearly varies from person to person and situation to situation. I choose to, say, remove my 11 week old from situations where we are all uncomfortable with her crying, and I accept the responsibility for making choices about what activities to partake in with my children so as to minimize discomfort for *everyone*, but you do not get to decide what those choices are or what is and is not appropriate for *my* kids or what they are capable of handling or anyone elses.

Sara, the problem wasn’t with the ICU not admitting kids. It was with the waiting room not admitting kids under a certain age and not being willing to be flexible about it when faced with a kid who wasn’t causing trouble or making a scene in any way.

I don’t see anywhere that anyone suggested that the ICU should admit children.

I’m probably repeating points from previous comments, but I thought this required saying:

The truth is that there are child-free spaces. These are spaces where the exposure is dangerous for the child. Let’s enumerate some of them.

* spaces where the child could be physically harmed – examples: construction areas, homes where objects that are harmful are left about and where it is unreasonable for the child to stay away from them etc
* spaces where the child could be emotionally harmed – examples: places with abusive or scary language such as night clubs, anywhere around large numbers of inebriated people, anywhere where people will be emotionally abusive to a child etc
* spaces where the child could be developmentally harmed – examples: anywhere where the child is exposed to age-inappropriate sexual references etc
* any private dwelling where the child is not residence and the owner wishes the home to be child-free. Now, you don’t have to like that person, but you do need to respect their wishes. Last time I checked, each person is allowed to decide who enters their home

Children are not adults. Some spaces are not appropriate for them. To ignore such facts is to endanger the child’s emotional or physical well-being.

Damn, I was really hoping to get to this before the comment thread exploded, but I looked down at the bottom of the post and…300 comments. Wooo lordy! Since meaningful conversation probably jumped the rails around comment 10, I will simply say:
FUCK YES
Children. Are People. Have the right to public space. Lovely post. Good luck with the comments. Much love.

P.S. Aza sounds rad.