Why do some people let their children behave so badly?

I was looking for advice when I came across this . Today my DD ran off from me in a car park and was heading towards a road (not busy but still) and I shouted and ran to get her and she stopped as I fell over in the process but the noise stopped her and also alerted someone in a car I was there and my DD. My DD has run off in a car park too. She is almost 2.5 but we have spoken about it and thought it had stopped it wasn’t until today that I realised how serious it was. I was definitely not letting her run around the car park or anywhere else.

We have spoken about what happened since.

Maybe their trying to get rid of them. 🙈 only reason to let your child run around a carpark is because you don't want them anymore and don't care if they die?
What other reason could there be?
How many times were children run over before they started putting in sensors and cameras so you could see behind the bumper.
Before anyone says maybe they have sen, it is still the parents responsibility to keep the child safe.

We have a few autistic children in the family and some are non verbal. Their kept safe by not being allowed to run off, even when they have had violent episodes due to being non verbal and can't communicate why their in pain etc its heartbreaking but the parents still manage to keep them safe.

I don’t know if I’m missing context, but you seem to be taking this personally.

And FWIW, having a good job isn’t the measure of whether someone is a nice human at all

Quite, no one had any idea what I was going through on the day I encountered the swinging child 🙄

I really don’t give a shit, we’re all going through something, just be respectful of other people and teach your children to do the same.

I wonder about parents who neglect their children's social development to such an extent that the children become a problem and ultimately antisocial.
Do they think the sun shines outta little Johnny's a* when he's kicking a stranger in the shins?!
And when someone corrects them or their child, they get so butthurt and bent out of shape at the mere inkling that their child and -by extension - themselves might be wrong in some way 🙄

Yes sometimes I feel the ‘you don’t know what people are going through’ has been massively stretched far beyond its original intention

You have NO IDEA what's going on in their life.

Certainly not any form of knowing what is acceptable behaviour, that's for sure.

I managed to bring 3 kids up to adulthood all who now have good jobs etc despite being a lazy bastard.

Because they're lazy bastards with no standards.

Decent parents trying their best won’t criticise you for being judgey op. It’s the ones for whom it touches a nerve that kick off. Easier to blame everyone else than parent your kid innit?

My friend is like this with her two year old. The other day he got the local swimming pool evacuated by swinging on and opening an alarmed fire door. They posted about it on Facebook as in “haha my son is such a legend” and regularly post pictures of him behaving badly in public with captions such as “living his best life”, “he’s a born adventurer” etc. It’s like they think he’s so wonderful that all bad behaviour is excused.

YANBU! Small children require far more supervision than what is typically given, and those parents who do hover next to their child get jeered at as helicopter parents. I was the mum who followed DD closely whenever we're out, partly to check she didn't get hurt but also to make sure she didn't do anything to annoy or disturb others. I can't count the number of times when I was literally the only parent following a pack of kids. It's boring and strenuous because I have to half keep an eye out for the other children as well. I've stopped a 2 year old from walking directly into a hot BBQ once because the parents are notorious "sit down relaxers" who only focus on adult conversation when with friends.

DS wouldn't act like that in school, he would mask all day, meltdown at home, so not been in that exact situation. But somebody might see me buying him an ice lolly or ice cream after what looks like bad behaviour because icy cold things help him regulate - if we're at home he'll have a bowl of ice cubes.

On the other hand you'd never have seen me as the parent helplessly watching as their child ran riot. It was commented on in the toddler group I took DS to, that I hardly sat down as I was always chasing after him, making sure he took turns nicely, didn't hit other children or knock them over while running laps of the hall etc. chasing after him when we were eating out as he'd just suddenly make a run for it.

I probably looked like I had an uncontrollable child though. Turns out he's ND. Fortunately I'm oblivious judgey looks.

Oh I have a relative whose parents took the approach of ‘I wouldn’t ever embarrass my child by telling them off for their truly awful and entitled behaviour in front ofothers’. He is now is narcissistic twat that nobody likes. Except his parents.

This is why consequences in the real world come as such a shock to some young adults and it triggers the entitlement response. An eroding of confidence in parents ability to bring up children has come from a deluge of 'advice' books, social media creating false impression of parenthood and stoking unattainable ideals. Consequences doesn't have to mean punishment but it should allow a child to experience the effect of the behaviour they engage with, eg throwing my ice cream on the ground in a temper means I have no ice cream, pushing others means I will have no friends or might get pushed back harder, making no effort means little reward, screaming at family makes me feel shit etc... I see so many parents of young children feeling like they aren't confident enough to take the lead, worry about others judging has always been there but social media has falsely exaggerated the reality.

Was on a tube not long ago and a child of about 9/10 was standing on the seat in his football shoes and swinging from the handles on the roof of the carriage. She was busy chatting to the other mother she was with. Eventually after many glares from other passengers and a muttered comment from one along the lines of 'is it a playground?' The mother gently said to him 'darling, I think you should stop doing that, bc all these people are worried that you might hurt yourself'.

I really don't care what kind of back story there could be to explain why it should be ok for a child to stand on the seats and swing around a moving train or why it's judgemental for me to think it's disgusting behaviour, mostly on the parent's part.

Great post

Here's the answer to the OP.

No because they’ll get their online ADHD diagnosis or their ‘trauma’ diagnosis and their ‘anxiety’ will be to blame.
but we won’t be able to say ‘sort yourself out you brat’ because #bekind

and it will all be the big bad employers fault for not pandering to their ‘needs’ and ‘well-being adjustments’ aka ‘let me do what I want without any consequences or I’ll be off stressed’ which means they just wont ever hold down a job or be a functioning member of society.

we are doomed

You are right. It's everyone's business if it's affecting others. What you let your kids do at home is a different matter if you can live with it. Children's behaviour in schools and other public spaces has to be their parents' responsibility. Who could disagree with it?

Sometimes it will be a usually active parent having a particularly bad day. Maybe they're exhausted from always trying their best with a generally more challenging, higher needs child or maybe their kid is usually an angel and they've been thrown by a glitch in that moment.

Sometimes it will be useless parents who don't care, they're too busy, they don't want to put the effort in, if it's not ignoring it's shouting and threatening at every little thing so the child becomes desensitised to it.

The problem is, as a passer by you don't really know which one it is.

I also get a bit annoyed by the automatic assumption that bad behaviour equals Sen because from there it's an easy to jump to "Sen equals bad behaviour" and feeds into people's anxiety about getting their child diagnosed - "I don't want them to be labelled" etc.