A recent story on the BBC website has got me thinking about an aspect of modern parenthood that has been a niggle of mine for awhile.
Why do parents seem to expect that every place has to be child-friendly?
Don’t get me wrong…I like kids and although I don’t have any of my own (I can almost hear all the parents out there dismissing my standpoint already with that matronising little limp-wristed wave that is in popular use these days). I appreciate the fact that for a long time, many places frequented by parents with young children had an appalling lack of facilities and this situation needed to be redressed.
I just don’t see why everyTHING and everyWHERE needs to cater to mummies little treasures?
My local pub has a nice garden area, near the canal and this time of year, a beer or two in the sun on a Sunday afternoon while reading the paper should be an enjoyable experience.
Just opposite the pub is a fully equipped adventure playground, provided at great expense by the publican. The playground is situated away from the canal and the garden bar, but within easy line of sight for Mum and Dad. Despite this, the pub is regularly over-run with the little darlin’s running through the seating area, screaming, shouting, kicking footballs, fighting, crying and generally making a bloody nuisance of themselves while the adventure playground lies unused and mum and dad ignore them.
This scene is played out thousands of times all over the country on a daily basis, but now it’s going from the sublime to the ridiculous! Now, parents seem to expect to be able to take their kids almost anywhere and when they get to wherever they are going, they seem to think they can let their kids run riot, expecting everyone else to watch out for them!
When I was a kid, there were plenty of times when my parents went out without my brother or me. They arranged someone called a BABYSITTER to come in an keep an eye on us while they went out. When we were taken out with them, we were expected to behave to an acceptable standard; if we didn’t they would take us home and next time we would not go with them!
Unfortunately, thanks to a combination of the nanny state, the politically correct and a shortsighted view regarding our current birth rates (looking at the NATIONAL drop instead of the huge GLOBAL increase) parents are being granted an unreasonably favourable status and this in turn is encouraging more unreasonable behaviour.
So for all you parents out there – let’s get a few things straight:-
- YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR YOUR KIDS!
You chose to have them (if you didn’t you should have thought more carefully before you played house) so live with it! Your life as you know it is over and it will not be the same! At least not for the next 18 years or so, until your progeny leaves home!
- TRY AND TAKE YOUR KIDS OUT WHEN THE REST OF US ARE AT WORK
If you need to get new shoes for little Amy or little Jimmy needs a haircut, try and take them out after the morning rush hour.
Avoid taking them and their double-buggy into town during the 12pm-2pm lunchtime period when employees are dashing in and out of town to grab food, pay bills, run errands, do their banking and the 1001 other things they need to do in their 30-minute lunch break. The same goes for Saturday mornings! The rest of us are stressed out enough already without having you run over our feet or bang our shins with your buggy, while you wander aimlessly around the shops, completely oblivious to the horde of angry workers trying to get by you. Get organized! It makes a far more pleasant shopping environment for all of us…including YOU!
- STOP FOISTERING RESPONSIBILITY FOR YOUR OFFSPRING ON THE REST OF US!
Don’t expect the rest of us to be your unpaid child minders. It’s not up to us to monitor your kids, while you swan off to the bar or gabble endlessly about how difficult it is to get the kids into a good pre-school these days.
If you are taking your kids out for the day, you still have to control them or alternatively, leave them with some form of duly qualified / paid supervisor.
Don’t let them run riot and then kick up a stink when they fall in a nearby river because they climbed over a safety barrier, or got skittled by a car because they chased a ball out onto the road without looking. You must still watch them yourself!
- STOP EXPECTING EVERYWHERE AND EVERYONE TO CATER FOR YOUR NEEDS!
You already get preferential status in restaurants, on planes and in most public places…what more do you want?
Face the fact that you are not always going to find nappy changing rooms in every facility, that there are places around the country (and the world) that have not been constructed just for you and your offspring.
Oh – and when the little tykes start to scream, sulk, throw tantrums and generally disturb the rest of us, kindly take them home! They are obviously tired and in need of rest; ignoring junior while he screams his lungs out for 20 minutes at a pitch that makes dogs in the next village start to howl and makes the wax run out of our ears will NOT endear you to the patrons of the pub, restaurant, grocery store or other public place you are frequenting.
- FOR YOUR OWN SANITY (AND OURS) FIND A GOOD BABYSITTER!
Believe it or not, there are still actually places and events in the world that are NOT suitable for junior (you may have hazy recollections about visiting a few, back in the days before the kids arrived), so do us all a favour; get off your arse and organize a babysitter well ahead of time!
Don’t turn up to a place or event that is unsuitable for kids with the little dears in tow, claiming that the babysitter “let you down at the last minute” (we all know this is parent-code for: “I forgot to call the babysitter and my mum just laughed when I phoned her an hour before I was due to come out to ask if she could cover me AGAIN”). If you can’t organize a sitter, don’t bother showing up…and next time get organized (like the rest of us have to)!
Bear these simple rules in mind and you might find the rest of us become a little more accommodating. Now it’s probably time to change your youngest one’s nappies so I’ll leave you to it…
+21
