To hate when people say a baby is ‘flirting’

I really hate it too.

Yep it’s so gross!!

also phrases like “pink to make the boys wink” when girls are wearing pink.

or calling baby/ toddler boys “heartbreakers”

I didn't even know this was a thing until recently. My first gave strangers daggers all the time 😅 but my second (he's 16 months) loves getting strangers' attention and flutters his eyes at them and grims. He just loves attention from people (so long as they don't touch him). And I've heard this phrase so often the last few weeks... Found it odd but didn't bother me that much

Flirting wouldn't bother me but saying a child is sexy is disgusting. We have a parent at nursery who when dropping her DS off always says bye sexy boy.
I struggle not to cringe every time.

Agreed. I don’t think it’s as bad as some of the other examples given on the thread but it makes me cringe.

Rude. I’m a boomer. Never heard it.

The flirting comment, is that a boomer thing? I’ve only heard it from that demographic.

Are they trying to be funny?

I had a friend who would tell her son her was sexy and make "wit woo" noises at him.
She thought it was cute

I thought it was strange.
On reflection, her value as a person was probably overly invested in her appeal to the opposite sex and being called sexy was something she felt was a compliment of the highest order.

I’m 60 and have never heard anyone say that.

Strikes me as something a pervert would say, tbh.

I remember hearing an elderly man saying a baby was flirting with him when I was waiting in a queue years ago. The mum looked really uncomfortable but he kept going with it. I’ve also seen mums calling their toddler sons sexy on another online forum. It’s all creepy.

I can only hope those using these words don't mean it in a sexual sense and have a different interpretation. I could see flirting having a meaning like charming etc but I'd seriously struggle with sexy!! One day someone looked at baby DS and said he looked like a slob. I was gobsmacked and heard later its used locally to mean relaxed. I grew up only 40 minutes away and never heard the word used that way.

Hate it!! There's not always a lot to say about a baby and sometimes we end up attaching 'grownup' personalities to them ('he loves watching football' no, he gets excited when his dad's cheering or whatever) but absolutely no need to make it sexual! 'She's friendly/in a good mood/a people person' would all work.

I've never heard anyone say this, but yes I agree it would be a weird thing to say.

Saving this thread to use against my mum if she ever tries to tell me I'm being oversensitive when I react to her saying my 2 year old is flirting with waiters 🙃

I can't get excited about the flirting thing. Perhaps I am a bit older but to me flirting is about charming people rather than necessarily anything sexual (or even deliberate).

Calling children "sexy" on the other hand is really very strange. Do people who do so think it means something different to what I think? I would definitely challenge someone who said that about a child in my family.

Did you tell her to stop it? I hope so. Every single time. It's not acceptable.

Yes agree and any similar language.

I think the only way of stopping this kind of thing is to call them out as talking like a paedophile. Do you mean to sound like you are sexualising a baby like a paedo? How disgusting, please stop.

Oh yes and calling a baby a flirt is plainly grim

This.
I would be appalled at such completely creepy, inappropriate language being used about a child.

When my son was a baby my uncle’s then wife kept saying he was “sexy”. He was 6 months old ffs just stop it

I've never heard people say it to babies (thank goodness!), but I remember being at secondary school and talking with friends who were saying, 'oh, don't you remember when you were little and you played with a boy, and your parents would say he was your boyfriend and you would get married' like this was some really sweet memory - I had plenty of friends who were boys and no one ever said anything like this! I thought it was bloody weird at the time, and I still do...

It's not the same level of ick, but my MIL calls DS "little footballer" at every opportunity. Started the minute we told them his sex. And they all talk about books being nerdy.

I can completely sympathise.

I had an imaginary friend (called Jack), when i was about 7-8, and I obviously grew out of it.

That didn't stop an uncle from mortifying me for yonks bringing it up. Saying things like 'i saw Jack with another woman!'.
I remember thinking - are you completely clueless and can't tell that I'm embarrassed? Or you can, but fuck it, you'll go out of your way to embarrass a teenage girl??

You’ve just described a few of my childhood experiences from parents and grandparents. The shaming of normal behaviour and then the taking the piss out of my normal hormone behaviour as a teenager. I couldn’t wait to leave home