Why are adults rude to kids and then expect respect?

GobbledyGook

There are rude people of all ages, but I have to admit adults being rude to children is my pet peeve. How can we expect/insist on good manners from children if adults don't set them the example?

One of the downsides to having a child who has quite a logical train of thought is having to think of answers on this very subject! I expect my children to be polite all the time, but I had to to admit it was understandable when DD1 pointed out she was fed up of holding doors when 28 people in one weekend's shopping (I didn't realise she was keeping count!) didn't say thank you and in fact one caught her with her handbag and didn't acknowledge that either.

A while back I posted on here about an elderly person who shouted at me for having a rude child because my daughter said 'You're welcome'. Now while she maybe was a bit cheeky I could see her point entirely as she'd stood for ages holding the door while a whole group of elderly people from the bowling club went through and not a single one said thank you.

Maybe it's just where I live, but I'm on crutches at the moment so when I get on the bus I've got crutches plus 3 year old and there are far more teenage boys who have offered to help/give up a seat/carry a bag than any other age group. It's also the same in shops where it's mostly teenage boys who've held doors.

Teenage girls (the ones with the orange foundation) and elderly folks are the rudest in my experience.

victory

CATS wrote: »

Victory that is awful, I know I keep getting told one day I will get hurt, but I would have told her where to go - thank goodness my DS does not take after me I cant tolerate injustices and people behaving like that towards another human being. I often get in between fights and stop to help people because as a society we cannot allow behaviour and disrespect like this. The way I see it is one day that could be my child, mother, brother, husband I would like someone to say something. Hence I get annoyed that people are rude to kids just because they are kids! but I guess we get rudeness at any age by the looks of it

This will lead the thread to go totally off course but yesterday I was with son in Macs, it was real hard to watch how irritated shall we say? Irrritated and dismissive some of the staff were of the youngsters in there when they were just asking if there was a seat or where the ketchup was or could they have a straw, I know they are very busy but if it was not mostly for them then their business would struggle, not one of them seemingly had any patient with them or what they were asking... just yesterdays observation

Georgiegirl256

victory wrote: »

Well then thanks for the explanation:p

You're welcome. :cool: Personally, I didn't feel it needed one, but here goes....

So what if OAP's have 'endless chatter' about what's going on in their lives? So what if they are complaining about things? What harm is it doing to you exactly? It doesn't make them rude. But you complaining about it....well I thought that was rude and disrespectful.

A lot of older people feel deserted and lonely, for some of them, the journey on the bus might be one of the only times they get to see anyone, and a lot of them will probably know each other on the bus if they do the journey regularly, so I would say they could be forgiven for maybe having a little moan about the weather, about their family or whatever.

Better?

victory

Georgiegirl256 wrote: »

Better?

Oh so much better now;)

FBaby

The problem, and it shows clearly on this thread is that what one considers rude, another won't and vice versa. I remember an incident on the beach with one girl of about 6 we'd never met before coming to me and husband and interrupting our conversation to get us to talk to her. At first I went along with it, but she kept on coming back and interrupting so after the fourth time, I told her that my husband and I were trying to have a conversation and couldn't keep stopping to talk to her. I didn't raise my voice and certainly didn't curse but she went crying to her mum who turned around and shouted at me I didn't need to be so b*** rude to her.


She thought I was rude to her daughter by telling her I didn't want to interact with her any longer, I thought she was rude for letting her daughter disturbing us. I expect some posters here would agree with her whilst others would agree with me.

Pollycat

GobbledyGook wrote: »

There are rude people of all ages, but I have to admit adults being rude to children is my pet peeve. How can we expect/insist on good manners from children if adults don't set them the example?

One of the downsides to having a child who has quite a logical train of thought is having to think of answers on this very subject! I expect my children to be polite all the time, but I had to to admit it was understandable when DD1 pointed out she was fed up of holding doors when 28 people in one weekend's shopping (I didn't realise she was keeping count!) didn't say thank you and in fact one caught her with her handbag and didn't acknowledge that either.

A while back I posted on here about an elderly person who shouted at me for having a rude child because my daughter said 'You're welcome'. Now while she maybe was a bit cheeky I could see her point entirely as she'd stood for ages holding the door while a whole group of elderly people from the bowling club went through and not a single one said thank you.

Maybe it's just where I live, but I'm on crutches at the moment so when I get on the bus I've got crutches plus 3 year old and there are far more teenage boys who have offered to help/give up a seat/carry a bag than any other age group. It's also the same in shops where it's mostly teenage boys who've held doors.

Teenage girls (the ones with the orange foundation) and elderly folks are the rudest in my experience.

I've made a similar point about holding doors open in an earlier post and people not acknowledging it.

It's bloody rude and it infuriates me! :mad:

I did tackle some middle-aged, well-dressed woman who breezed into a shop when my (then probably 8 year old) nephew had held the door open for her. Not only did she not acknowledge him, she actually pushed the door further open than necessary and hit him with the door.

Boy! Did she wish she'd said 'Thank you' to him by the time I'd finished with her!

I really feel for your daughter. How can we expect them to respect older people when some of them are so rude?

I have occasionally (when I've got 'grumpy head' on) said calmly 'Thank you so much for allowing me to hold the door open for you'.

If they look blankly at me, I say 'Manners cost nothing'.
Most of them have the good grace to look sheepish or ashamed.

If I hold the door for someone and they say 'Thank you' I always say 'you're welcome'.


FHS, it's not that hard, is it.

victory

FBaby wrote: »

The problem, and it shows clearly on this thread is that what one considers rude, another won't and vice versa. I remember an incident on the beach with one girl of about 6 we'd never met before coming to me and husband and interrupting our conversation to get us to talk to her. At first I went along with it, but she kept on coming back and interrupting so after the fourth time, I told her that my husband and I were trying to have a conversation and couldn't keep stopping to talk to her. I didn't raise my voice and certainly didn't curse but she went crying to her mum who turned around and shouted at me I didn't need to be so b*** rude to her.


She thought I was rude to her daughter by telling her I didn't want to interact with her any longer, I thought she was rude for letting her daughter disturbing us. I expect some posters here would agree with her whilst others would agree with me.

You are absolutely right:D we went to a theme park once and sat down to eat our lunch, a little one came over and chatted away ( the parents could see him and just let it carry on) we chatted back but then we had to go and tried letting the lad know that we could no longer talk to him, he got upset , mother came over and took the child away with a look on her face that said 'you are the worst humans in the land, all he wanted was some company, someone to talk to':rotfl::rotfl::rotfl: we felt bad but we had to get going on the rides:rotfl:

victory

Pollycat wrote: »

.




If I hold the door for someone and they say 'Thank you' I always say 'you're welcome'.


FHS, it's not that hard, is it.

I say 'I think the word you are looking for is thank you':rotfl::rotfl:

adouglasmhor

I've seen much worse. A young/middle* aged man with obvious MH problems and an appalling amount of small scars on the back of his head decided to spread his Celtic Scarf along the ledge in front of his seat at the front of the Double Decker I was travelling in on Saturday.
Another man of about the same age sitting behind me with his lady friend (who was wearing a Rangers tracky top of some kind) launched into a fury swearing and shouting at him. The guy who had spread the scarf out put it away with some mumbled protest. this was taken as defiance by the other guy, who proceeded to threaten him again. I had to intervene by saying, the guys put it away that's the end of it.
A young mum and her pre teenage daughter who had been in front of me and immediately behind the Celtic fellah got off the bus at the next stop, the little girl looked quite frightened, I saw them trudging along the grass verge at the side of the road, so it's pretty obvious to me it wasn't their stop and they were not comfortable with the situation. I am sorry to say the little girl had not seen who was causing the problem and may have thought it was me.
The bus driver came up to see what was wrong and said police would be called if there was any further problems.
Celtic guy was still muttering to the older couple who were sat next to him for the rest of his journey. They were not involved and had nothing to do with it so they tried to ignore him.
I did keep an eye out to check that they got off at different stops.

*Some people seem to think middle aged is walking stick, pipe and slippers. I am 52 in September. Don't smoke, don't need a walking stick but I( do have slippers for lazing about the house after metafit, body pump etc. and a shower. the two protaginists in the story above were probably early 40s, but about 12 inside their heads.

aileth

Pollycat wrote: »

I did tackle some middle-aged, well-dressed woman who breezed into a shop when my (then probably 8 year old) nephew had held the door open for her. Not only did she not acknowledge him, she actually pushed the door further open than necessary and hit him with the door.

It's definitely not confined to kids holding doors either. I find M&S tends to be a particular hotspot for you holding a door open for people and they just breeze in like they're strutting into the Savoy and a doorman, who is utterly beneath them, is holding the door open for them, and then when they exit they just let the door swing into the face of someone behind them.

It's very childish but I got a huge kick out of someone doing this to me at a coffee shop. Entered, door swung into my face, she was ordering some fancy brew so mine was finished first, she followed me out and I did exactly the same thing to her. She then tutted and swore as she walked off. But blimey, it felt good

And as Victory said regarding OAPs needing shopping bags/carts put next to them to block other people at all times, I once had an elderly gentleman who came and sat opposite me on the tram and put his multiple shopping bags in front of him and ontop of my feet. He didn't move them and avoided all eye contact, so I made sure I had a slight foot jerk as I rose to get off at my stop