Loud parenting in public spaces

I don't think this is an obvious example of performance parenting. If you're at a Lego cafe with your child it seems pretty normal and appropriate to compliment or comment on something they build, rather than ignoring them and judging others for interacting with their kids. If my child made a massive Lego tower I would probably say 'wow big tower!' in my own living room. Similarly, if a child recognises and asks a question about a cat they see, it would be pretty weird for the parent to ignore it and not answer.

You don’t talk to your kids from a very young age = they will be delayed in speech and never communicate their needs

you talk to them too much = you are obnoxious

you don’t encourage their interests even if they are bonkers = you are neglectful and don’t let them be themselves

you encourage them with things they like = you are pushy because they couldn’t possible love that!

My eldest loved Greek Legends when he was 3/4 (started off by watching Hercules and reading a book for kids about Medusa someone bought him) and we used to regularly go to museums and chat about his favourite, Perseus. People probably thought why tf are they bringing a 3yo in here but why would we go otherwise? I can’t imagine anything worse than trying to publicly engage a preschooler in anything they didn’t want to do. And actually, not their business.

It’s done by super competitive parents who are ambitious in every part of their lives, and see parenting as another competition. It’s purely to impress others and show how perfect they are.

That’s not performance parenting though is it? They don’t even know if you are in the house or can hear them

Meh, if your children are very young I think you sometimes have to resort to that kind of thing to capture their attention/get some sort of interaction going. I remember taking toddler DD to some gardens near us around the time she was obsessed with naming different flowers and colours but too young for proper conversation. I said "oh look - some purple daisies - aren't they pretty!" or something like that, and a woman on a bench next to us snickered to her partner: "sorry but as if she gives a shit". I'm not really sure what else you're meant to do at that age - walk around in silence?

My instinct would have been that she was joking?

Someone bought my son a book called Quantum Physics for Babies, and he loves it because we do silly voices for the protons and electrons, and jump up and down, and he gets a big round of applause at the end for being a Quantum Physics.

I can imagine us making a silly joke about it in public, much like this.

(His favourite TV show is Ice Road Truckers, for balance)

@MumbleBumbleAppleCrumble Now I’ve come across many a loud show off in my time and many an exhaustingly perfect parent (they often like to eulogise about the fact that their child is now 8 and has yet to be subjected to the horrors of refined sugar).

This IS an example! Just imagine that said "perfect parent" is eulogising/exclaiming to their own child, loudly in public "Oh no darling, we don't eat refined sugar, do we. So bad for you. Here, have a lovely plain rice cake and a carrot, so much better." That's performance parenting.

It really, really is not engaged, active parents chatting away to children, praising them, identifying successes, encouraging interests etc.

Lots of people deliberately misunderstanding the op and what performance parenting is. Trust me it’s real. Visit any cafe in Richmond or similar areas you will hear many examples.

My brother is the worst for this…. It’s so cringey 😬

The funniest one I remember is when we were at a soft play, majority of my family were there (brother isn’t local and we don’t see him very often), anyway brother who is very big headed had popped out to buy snacks for his family to have whilst travelling home that evening. Obv his son who was only around 3 at the time had seen the snacks and didn’t want to wait…

Cue my brother trying to show great parenting skills ‘we can’t eat the snacks now Christopher, but we can have a sandwich now and save the snacks for later…. We can’t have snacks now but we can have sandwiches, it’s not good to eat too many snacks Blah blah blah This continued with him very loudly going on and onnnn checking around to make sure people were watching etc 🙄 it was quite obvious that Christopher usually gets his own way.

Christopher won in the end and had his snacks bless him 🤣😊

Brother appeared quite embarrassed that his ‘skills’ hadn’t worked….

This has been a revelation, performance parenting. I didn’t grow up in the UK and couldn’t for all these years understand why British mums (and some dads) were so loud, encouraging and like in a TV ad when they were talking to their kids. It seemed like (still does) that no one actually talks to their kids like that but I did doubt my mothering skills myself more than once why I didn’t do that. No longer!

Or.. some people like attention in public.

Is that really so unbelievable and offensive to say?

Your comment is horrid. Why so angry?

Agreed. As I say it’s more about weird content than any “silly” or exaggerated voice IMO. I suspect some of thise judging would probably cringe if they heard the voice they used to use (or will one day use) to talk to their own toddlers /children under 5.

I actually can’t stand people who loud… anything! Let alone loud parent. I was on the bus the other day and two young guys were talking about the pub they wanted to go to/the price of a pint/which pubs they liked, so loudly and I thought shut up! No one cares?! Some people talk for attention!

Surely it’s more the content than the loud/exagerated voice? There’s no “normal” way to talk to an 18 month year old. Because most barely know what the fuck you’re talking about. And if you don’t talk in a loud exaggerated voice often many won’t even acknowledge that you’re talking to them. So yes some parents might sound stupid, but they’re basically prioritising interacting meaningfully with their child over sounding like an idiot to strangers. Which I would have thought ought to be applaud. The issue surely is rather more one content, ie of stuck up/smug parents being stuck up and pretentious (talk of Land Rovers, talk of famous artists with 2 and 3 year olds etc etc), and using chatting to their child as another opportunity to try to show off to passers by.

Performative parenting is annoying yes. However lots of the examples of this thread just read like good language development. I’ve cared for kids with speech delay or auditory processing challenges and you do have to speak loud and clear. Kids with anxiety may need talking through what’s happening/about to happen. Why should the child not get the best support for their language development because others don’t want to observe it?

It's not just the volume. With performance parents, their supposed engagement with their kids is just fake public role-playing that they turn on when other adults are around, because they think it will impress.

And it clearly does impress at least some gullible souls, judging by the posters here defending them.

This.

Of course the other possibility is that this thread is full of joyless unimaginative rather horrid little people making envious attacks on parents who are able to engage with and enjoy their children

Agree. I have noticed several families with young kids walk by our house whilst the mother/father is doing a loud narrative voice on everything so whole road can hear them 🙄

Don't. You are doing the right thing. Talking to your children about anything and everything is the best thing you can do to encourage their speech, understanding, thinking etc etc. If other people don't like hearing it then it's their problem not yours.

oh my goodness! All this time it appears that I’ve been parenting terribly - I (stupidly) thought that parenting was about encouraging a child’s interest, both in those things they are already interested in and also gradually widening their field of possibility by bringing other things into their lives… but no! Apparently this is wrong and I should have just left them to licking stones and scratching their bums! Silly me. So pleased and relieved that I have been corrected!!! (Though thankfully we made it past toilet training before I realised my error)

The kind of thing you would do with a child who is nervous of them.

Or, maybe the parent has a loud voice anyway. 🤷‍♀️

The reality is, it’s only in the minds of the spectator that it exists. Nobody actually knows.

Some people do speak overly loud in a public spaces, but I really can’t get too annoyed about someone speaking to and encouraging their children. On the whole it is surely ‘A Good Thing’ and far better than the alternatives.

The finest and funniest parenting compliment that I ever received was from a very well spoken lady in a north-London park cafe. We got into conversation and she asked to whom my then two-year-old belonged. I replied that I was my DC’s mother. She expressed surprise, and said: ‘Oh but you were speaking to [them] so nicely and sometimes the mums you see can be so impatient with their children. I thought you must be a really good Nanny!’ 😁😂 😁

I think another definition of it is when the parent is pretending the kid enjoys something when the kid doesn't give a shit. 'Look at the ducks, you love ducks don't you, there are more ducks there. Let's count them together!! 1,2,3,4 ducks!! See them swimming, you like swimming don't you...." meanwhile the child is licking a stone ignoring the ducks and the parent.