Screaming children banned...

[anakhouri]

I get that and no, my son isn't allowed to shout or run wild in public either.

If someone's kid is howling for 15-20 minutes, then they should be sent outside until the child calms down.

I would give the parents at least 10-15 minutes to try to rectify the situation. It's not always easy to get an upset child to calm down (and it may not be that they are just being brats, maybe another kid smacked them or something) and even if they are trying to leave they may have other children to collect, etc. A little patience is all I ask.

[boringscreenname]

I'm a parent of small children too. I do take my kids to the mall occasionally, but it's usually only the youngest two, when my oldest child is at school. I work nights so on my days off we'll sometimes go to the mall during a weekday, during the late morning to early afternoon. We usually go to a couple stores, the play area, lunch, then home.

My 2 year old daughter loves going out places with me, and for the most part she's well behaved. She knows that if she wants to walk she has to hold my hand or walk close to me, no running off otherwise she has to ride in the stroller with the baby. She also knows better than to throw a fit in public, because it will be dealt with swiftly.

But the last time we went to the mall, she tripped, and scraped her knee up on the way inside. Then the baby heard her crying and decided to start crying too. I couldn't wait to bring them inside until they calmed down, because it was really cold and windy outside. My husband also dropped us off at the anchor's store entrance, and I'm not very familiar with that store, so I had no idea where the bathrooms were located inside the store. I tried to calm them down while we were hastily walking through the store, and I just tried to make it through the store as quickly as possible so we could find somewhere else to quiet them down.

I agree even kid friendly places shouldn't be forced to cater to or tolerate a screaming child, but all I'm asking for is a little patience. If a kid is just screaming for a short amount of time, and the parent is paying attention to the child and trying to get them under control then I could understand having a bit of patience in that situation.

But if some kid is howling for 15 minutes, or running around, and the parent is ignoring them and not trying to rectify the situation then I would fully support the store in kicking them out or asking them to leave until the child is quiet and under control of the parent again.

[AmbrosiaWriter]

I don't mind if a child starts up to cry for some (maybe even for no!) reason and I see the parent is rushing to either figure out what is wrong/discipline/remove the child to calm them down somewhere else.

However, I should be able to turn around and see the parent moving toward/handling the problem within a minute or two.

A few minutes with no parent doing anything and that's it. No more sympathy. Just because they trained themselves to ignore the shrieking temper tantrum of their child doesn't mean the rest of us should have to just deal with it. (Also, if you are ignoring the child and they continue the tantrum I'm pretty sure the "ignore it" method isn't working.)

I will grant more grace time if I see an parent trying to calm the child down, as I'm sure most people who aren't total dickheads would as well. I will - and have - called out idiots who were bitching about a child crying when the parent was obviously trying her best to get the situation resolved (basically she had to herd together three children to bring them all to the bathroom so the crying one could be soothed, as it was really cold and snowing outside.)

At the same time I have called out parents who had let their child kick other people's chairs, screaming and demanding more french fries.

We all know zero tolerance is stupid. I see no reason why to apply zero tolerance to this situation when it has never worked for any other situation.

[Gravekeeper]

When I was shopping with my mom, I behaved myself and kept the noise level down because otherwise we would be "Going home this instant" which was code for "A place with no witnesses". >.>

[bara]

My maw-maw whooped my brothers ass for hiding in clothes racks from her one time. He threatened to tell Dad. She told him Dad would whoop his ass too. (he did for the record)

[anakhouri]

Whenever badly-behaved children come up, everyone jumps to say that when they were kids their parents would have spanked/whooped/murdered them and sunk their bodies in the bayou. It's not that simple anymore; parents have to toe a fine line between making sure their kids are well-behaved, and not having CPS called on them because they threaten to spank their kids in public.

I guess that's not really related to the original topic but I notice it every single thread about kids and behavior.

[bara]

It's not that simple anymore; parents have to toe a fine line between making sure their kids are well-behaved, and not having CPS called on them because they threaten to spank their kids in public.

I guess that's not really related to the original topic but I notice it every single thread about kids and behavior.

I think it is related. Had a neighbor who spanked one of his kids outside and then had CPS called on him by someone.

Ive known him for a long time, long enough to know that he wouldn't spank his kids without due cause. He was then forced to take classes (that he had to pay for) and have a bunch of inspections to make sure he wasn't abusing his kids. This caused him to have to take time off work that he really couldn't afford.

After everything was said and done, he was found to be a fit parent and that he had done nothing wrong. But the stigma is still with him. He now worries that anytime he has to discipline his kids that some busy body with nothing better to do will call CPS again.


I think its related because sometimes there is a good parent who is told he isn't a good parent and then there are bad parents who don't even care.

[anakhouri]

I take my parenting philosophy from "To Kill a Mockingbird": at one point in the book Scout says Atticus doesn't do anything to his kids in the house that he wouldn't do in the yard.

Unfortunately your friend found out that it doesn't guarantee your safety.

[fireheart17]

Whenever badly-behaved children come up, everyone jumps to say that when they were kids their parents would have spanked/whooped/murdered them and sunk their bodies in the bayou. It's not that simple anymore; parents have to toe a fine line between making sure their kids are well-behaved, and not having CPS called on them because they threaten to spank their kids in public.

I guess that's not really related to the original topic but I notice it every single thread about kids and behavior.

I've heard that too.

According to those same busybodies, the fact that we're not spanking our kids has supposedly resulted in an increase of the following:

-Crime. (kids supposedly grow up with no respect for elders, society, tangible object of choice)
-Homosexuality (not sure, but I suspect it's something to do with the whole a gay person is flamboyant idea)
-Unemployment (kids supposedly end up stupid because they don't respect their teachers and end up unable to get a job because they don't respect their boss)
-People going/staying on welfare. (linked somewhat with unemployment, but they supposed are choosing not to work)

-Teenage pregnancy (respect for their partner)

-divorce
-adulterous behaviour.

[AmbrosiaWriter]

I think those people saying "My parents would've whooped me" are less implying the child should be whooped, but more along the lines of "My parents would have been furious and gave me a punishment that I took seriously and did not want to happen again" when we see the parents not handling the situation at all.

They are either, A) ignoring the child and pretty much demanding everyone ignore the child as well, or B) acting all defensive because they are a supah-speshul-purson because they happened to make a baby.

[jedimaster91]

No one expects total silence. But there is absolutely no reason for kids to scream at the top of their lungs either. My kids never did that cause they knew better. I can't stand it when kids do that it hurts my ears and works on my last nerve.

Mine too. A few weeks ago I went off on my friends' kids. I teach the 8-9 year old Sunday School class at church. They are good kids, but rowdy. I can tolerate it for the couple hours I have to and then I'm ready to send them home. I'm also good friends with their parents and have permission from a few of them to whack their kids if they get fresh.

Anywho a few weeks ago we all stayed after services for a Cub Scout pack meeting. Now I get the kids had a long day where they had to sit still and at least pretend to pay attention. They were due for some wiggle time and I'm ok with that. But they decided to run around the gym screaming and I lost it. I had to scream myself to be heard enough to tell them to knock it off.

I think those people saying "My parents would've whooped me" are less implying the child should be whooped, but more along the lines of "My parents would have been furious and gave me a punishment that I took seriously and did not want to happen again" when we see the parents not handling the situation at all.

This. Mama Jedi is someone you do not mess with. Growing up her word was law, and if we broke it, consequences were swift and painful--and not necessarily physically so. I got pulled out of every extra curricular activity I was involved in when I decided to quit doing my homework. To this day, I do not cross Mama Jedi. I have no doubt she would turn me over her knee if she found it necessary. I would never have even thought to pull some of the crap I see my friends' kids do because she would not have tolerated it. At all. And she expected that we would respect any adult the same way. So if our school teacher, Sunday School teacher, youth leader, or whoever told us something, we listened. Because it was bad enough getting caught by Mama Jedi. You did NOT want her to hear it from someone else. And for the record, all three of us turned out just fine.

So it's not necessarily we think the misbehaving kid needs a "whoopin'". Kids need to be taught boundaries and what is and is not acceptable behavior. And if they can't act appropriately, there need to be consequences. Same thing applies to the parents, too. Can't keep your kid from disturbing others? Then you and your kid can't be here. I doubt this is aimed at parents who are trying. It's aimed at the ones who don't care.

[Aethian]

A few days ago we had someone come into the post office with her three screaming and fighting kids. The children had gotten so rowdy that they destroyed some of the items on the wall that were for purchase. One of the items? One of most expensive scale/label makers. Mom was not happy when she had been given the options of pay for the items or have the police called for vandalism to a federal building. I don't know what option she chose but I bet it came out of the hides of those three kids.

[Taurus52]

Ahhh chiid discipline. A subject near and dear to my heart. My late wife and I raise 2 of our own and 10 or 11 that we had through her daycare in the home, plus 8 fosters. Not all at once, we usually had one foster (troubled? teenager) and 5 or 6 daycare kids at a time. We usually kept 1 or 2 families worth of kids at a time, and in general had them from 6 weeks until kindergarten; then summers until they were 10 or 12. Never had to spank a kid, had much better ways to deal with it.
In public manners were taught early, generally at places like the children's museum, the beach, or Mickey D's. One kid acted up, the behavior such as screeching, tantrum etc. and they got one warning if they did not desist then they got picked up like a football and out to the car they went. They got 2 or 3 minutes pus trip time to calm down, if not then the outting was over and all went home. Peer pressure from the other kids usually settled that out by the next trip. We had 2 year old ADHD kids (she had 3 yrs college for spec. ed) that were often complemented on their behavior in stores.
Another technique we used was mine, why spank when you can use pressure points or submission holds. Anyone who has had 2 or 3 years judo can show you these in an afternoon. A wrist lock will immobilize any kid in an eye blink. A spanking only hurts for a couple minutes, with a pressure point a fingertip worth of pressure and the pain goes on as long as the finger is there. No kid wants the Vulcan neck pinch applied a second time. More importantly, in public it looks like nothing at all, "I'm just guiding this youngster to where he needs to be, honest!" VBEG
You must be willing to interrupt your activity and take the kid to where ever you need to take them until they are back in control of themselves. This is the part of disciplining children that is missing. Parents must stop the activity and spend some very intense time with the kid. From what I have seen many parents are unwilling to do this part of it. All children start out as SAVAGES! You must first civilize them before you can complete the raising part.
Oh and those teenagers, they all learned our techniques and use them with their own kids. Very gratifying to go and visit and watch it happen.
Yes, I am now an old fart, but we used our methods from the 80's into the 00's.

[Kagato]

The thing that gets to me is when someone is overzealous about the whole "silencing a rowdy child" thing. I did hear about one case where karma royally bit a shop in the butt once.

A family was wandering an electronics store, browsing for some things for their house. They had their child with them, a 9 month old in a pram. Naturally the baby started to get a bit restless and started crying because it wanted attention. Before either of the parents could even so much as pick the child up, one a-hole of a staff member made a beeline for them and said in a snooty tone that if they couldn't get the kid to be quiet they would have to leave.

They said "Ok, fine. You want us to leave, we'll leave, but you have lost yourself a sale."

The head manager apparently yelled at the staff member later for costing them a sale of almost 10 thousand dollars, as the family had their eye on a computer, tv and home entertainment system.

[AmbrosiaWriter]

Yeah, there's no need to approach the parents when the child has just started to fuss or cry. Kids do that. Hell, I still get fussy when I've been on my feet all day and I just want to go home.

Though if the crying has gone on for five minutes and the parents are not doing a single thing to remedy the situation - if their method is to ignore until it stops so the child doesn't learn he/she gets attention from crying, then they need to move themselves and said child to a location where it won't be bothering other people - then a polite address should be initial move of anyone. Though if the parents respond nasty then gloves come off.

That employee was totally in the wrong there, Kagato.