Leading on from the 8yr old tantrum thread...

fluffnutter

balletshoes wrote: »

in public places, its both, isn't it?

So how far do you go? Perhaps it's my life choice to sing very, very loudly in public at all times. I'd soon get people asking me to leave restaurants (rightly so).

I'm pretty ambivalent about this, tbh. I like kids, they cry, it's what they do. It doesn't usually bother me, but it might depend on where I was and what mood I was in.

But what does bother me is the expectation that some parents seem to have that everyone is going to make allowances for their precious children at all times. And, frankly, if I'm having a bad day, or want to have a meeting or an intimate dinner and I've got to listen to someone's squawking baby because they've decided that their right to enjoy their meal's more important than mine then I'll get cross.

It's about courtesy and not imposing the consequences of your choices on other people. This isn't aimed at you personally btw, balletshoes, yours is a valid point and I'm just using your post as a springboard to elaborate on my earlier comment.

If my baby cries in a restaurant, I would leave.

Mojisola

I was amazed by the number of people on the previous thread who thought the whole world should put up with any kind of behaviour from children.

I chose to have my children and accepted that my life was going to change as a result. If we were in a public place and one of the children was crying non-stop, I wouldn't just think that the rest of world should put up with it!

If the techniques usually used to calm the child don't work, then it's up to the parents to take him/her somewhere else. If that meant that one parent ate and then they swopped places, so be it. Just one more example of how life is different post-baby.

If parents want to be sure they can have an undisturbed meal, get a baby sitter.

balletshoes

fluffnutter wrote: »

So how far do you go? Perhaps it's my life choice to sing very, very loudly in public at all times. I'd soon get people asking me to leave restaurants (rightly so).

I'd be bemused and probably amused if I were in the same restaurant as you and you started singing at the top of your voice .

I do think it depends on what kind of restaurant/what kind of ambience you're in, with a screaming baby.

Lunar_Eclipse

victory wrote: »

In a restaurant the other day, absolute choker it was, had to wait as it was 45 mins to get a table,

Is it fair for the rest of us?

I don't think it's fair on anyone in the restaurant, especially the baby!

If the baby had been mine and I couldn't calm them by feeding, changing or cuddling, we'd have left the restaurant. I wouldn't even let it get to the howling stage, especially because with the exception of a couple of bouts of colic, I'm not sure either of mine ever howled. (They sure can now!)

In your situation, depending on how distracting the noise was, I would either have mentioned its effect to the waiter, or left. I'd be more than happy to pacify a baby so its parents can have a meal in peace, but most people take this sort of act of compassion as a major insult to their character, so I wouldn't do it, but I can't eat when I feel uncomfortable and certainly resent paying for food in those circumstances. I'd also never wait 45 minutes for a table though, unless we were somewhere like DisneyLand where you have to queue for everything and are trapped as a consumer... or there's a great cocktail bar to wait at!:D

Nicki

fluffnutter wrote: »

So how far do you go? Perhaps it's my life choice to sing very, very loudly in public at all times. I'd soon get people asking me to leave restaurants (rightly so).

If you have a good voice though, and were drowning out the shrieking babies, you might rather be asked to stay all evening

dibuzz

Redouble wrote: »

Another one who did this but I would feed baby and eat at the same time! I'd be darned if i wasn't getting a hot meal!

Snap. It's amazing what you can do with one hand while baby guzzles away

victory

fluffnutter wrote: »

So how far do you go? Perhaps it's my life choice to sing very, very loudly in public at all times. I'd soon get people asking me to leave restaurants (rightly so).

I'm pretty ambivalent about this, tbh. I like kids, they cry, it's what they do. It doesn't usually bother me, but it might depend on where I was and what mood I was in.

But what does bother me is the expectation that some parents seem to have that everyone is going to make allowances for their precious children at all times. And, frankly, if I'm having a bad day, or want to have a meeting or an intimate dinner and I've got to listen to someone's squawking baby because they've decided that their right to enjoy their meal's more important than mine then I'll get cross.

It's about courtesy and not imposing the consequences of your choices on other people. This isn't aimed at you personally btw, balletshoes, yours is a valid point and I'm just using your post as a springboard to elaborate on my earlier comment.

If my baby cries in a restaurant, I would leave.

I have to agree somewhat on this post, although certainly empathize and been there with my kids crying ( I remember fortunately it was inside a shopping centre, walking up and down having taken youngest out of the coffee shop, until he nodded off and took him back in again) it seems to me to be the decent thing to do, so that everyone around me gets what they came out for, a sit down, some chat, a nice coffee with some friends without having to listen to a screaming baby, I HAVE left, taken them out of supermarkets if they decided to create merry hell because of refusing to buy them sugary cereal, out they go, end of, back to the car and home.

I would not have offered to hold the baby, not my place, they had tried and not won so they opted for eating their dinner, at least mildly warm.

We left as soon as we had finished eating, the waiter was so overcome with it all he practically ran to get the bill, we paid and left, less financial gain for the restaurant it could be said as we did not want to stay and listen anymore, the couple stayed.

Padz_2

Only a few years back people would take crying babies out of school productions and the like. No one bothers now and the sound of the baby/babies drowns out the children performing.

gingin_2

Padz wrote: »

No one bothers now and the sound of the baby/babies drowns out the children performing.

That and parents having conversations on mobile phones, as I have witnessed.

dibuzz

Padz wrote: »

Only a few years back people would take crying babies out of school productions and the like. No one bothers now and the sound of the baby/babies drowns out the children performing.

I thought I was being clever when I went to one when my daughter was a few weeks old and sat on the back row so I could bf her when she got fussy.
It was only at the end when the lights went back on that I noticed all the dads complete with camcorders stood behind me