Banning loud children from restaurants, airplanes

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OMG I can't believe I'm reading this here. Children scream and make lots of noise. It's what they do. They're children. Rather than banning children for being children, how about banning intolerant people. I am very surprised that people who have to deal with discrimination because of their conditions would themselves be so quick to support discrimination against others.

Not all babies are loud and there is no reason independent adults should have to tolerate a loud baby that isn't theirs, and people shouldn't be forced to tolerate every single thing we would go mad from the effort. If a baby old enough to eat at a restaurant can't keep quiet in a place of business there is no reason for it to be there.

How about telling your damn kid to shut the f**k up?

Can we ban noisy teenagers from places too while we're at it?

I do hope you don't actually say things like that to parents near their children, because that's a very good way to get taken outside and turned into a fine meat paste. People get very touchy about that sort of thing.

Why? If kids are being annoying, they should be told so (perhaps not in those harsh words, I admit), so they learn it's unacceptable.

I had an arguement with my husband about this and he said "What about babies, they cry and make noise" and I told him "You're supposed to take them to the front of the restrauant, that's what my mother told me when I was 17."

Heck when I have mine, I sure won't be eating out alone with it. I would hate to leave my food and have the waiter think I left without paying. I don't eat out much anyway so it won't be an issue for me. And I am not paying for any babysitter so I can wait till he is older and can understand the meaning of being quiet.

Heck as children, my brothers and I didn't make lot of noise in a restaurant. We weren't allowed to. If we did, we get told to quiet down and lower our voices.

I have a feeling my husband is one of those people who think children are allowed to be rude and obnoxious because they're kids. Well I won't allow that and he can fight with me about it all he wants when I tell them to be quiet or bring our baby to the front of the restuarant. I'll wear ear plugs too.

Last edited by League_Girl on 12 Sep 2010, 1:44 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Being that rude to a parent of a noisy child a) isn't going to get the child to quieten down b) isn't going to teach them to quieten down and c) is likely to end up starting a fight, which is even less quiet and more disruptive than a noisy child in the first place.

How about if I were to just say to a parent, "do you think you could tell your child to be quieter please, he/she is disturbing everyone else"? That seems perfectly acceptable to me, but my mum said even being that polite about such an issue is socially unacceptable for some pathetically stupid reason. What's your stance?

That's a wonderful idea as well.

People are going to take it as rude no matter what. Also, odds are that the parent in question is fully aware that their child is disturbing people, and giving them stick about it isn't going to help. Depends on the situation. Sometimes people will let a child run riot and simply not care. They will take offense that you have dared to mention that their little angel is a pain in the ass. Other people are just victims of the timing of children, who are not tiny robots who follow every command unswervingly.

TBH, if the parent is letting their kids disturb everyone else, they deserve to get stick about it.

Yeah, and that's the problem in this thread. Seems to be an overwhelming belief that ALL parents are "letting" their children do wtf they like all the time. Some parents are rubbish, and do allow their children to run riot. Not all of them, by a long shot. Also, if a child does decide to suddenly do something disruptive (and that may not be by their choice) its not so very simply to silence them instantaneously. Also, some children that are being "loud" are not actually misbehaving. They may just be vocalising happiness or contentment. Punish them for being happy and you'll screw them up.

I've worked in a few bars and restaurants over the years, and though I've never had to deal with the crying infant specific problem, I've certainly dealt with my share of unreasonable people trying to start something physical after being asked politely to stop a rude behavior. I know this isn't an option where you live, but in my case if all else failed, leaning over their table to talk to them quietly in such a way that the butt of the revolver in my shoulder holster showed *just* a little bit had an amazingly calming effect on these individuals. In fact, they tended to depart post haste, often leaving a nice tip even...

Where I worked, the greatest problem we had with parents not controlling their children was pikey mothers letting their children try and steal cigarettes from behind the bar. The adults were by FAR the worst behaved over any child in the place. Often they acted more like children than their children did, whilst their poor children sat quietly and stoically tolerating their idiot parents excesses.

That sounds annoying as hell, I forgot that you'd been behind the stick before, that can be a great gig or a pretty rough one depending on the spot. For me, all the really stupid problems actually happened when I worked at a delivery restaurant, people would do stuff like call the cops because they tried to scam free food from us and we wouldn't give it to them.