Is society becoming more hostile to children?

[MsFrumble]

Why does society feel like it’s becoming increasingly hostile to children? And why is voicing anti-child views or politics becoming more acceptable—or is it not, and there’s just a lot of online noise about it?

I’m not talking about choosing not to have children, that is obviously fine and good.
But there does seem to be a growing tendency to feel it is okay to openly describe children as at best an inconvenience and at worst a blight; to argue they should be excluded from public spaces unless they behave like adults or are tightly controlled; and to view children as “adults in training” rather than as distinct individuals with their own needs and rights.

Children are a highly vulnerable group, with no power and distinct rights in law—the right to play, education, protection, and so on. We were all once children, and unless you take a fairly nihilistic view, most people would agree that how we treat them matters because they are the future.

The material reality / politics around supporting kids is also quite grim: exorbitant nursery fees, schools under pressure, health visiting and early years support underfunded, maternity care in crisis, a lack of youth services like centres for teenagers etc etc

So why does society feel so anti kid?

This is why people are less tolerant. Because some parents really do think it's fine for children to run around in a coffee shop.

The odd scream of excitement, yes. But not continuous screaming, kids are perfectly capable of having fun and even making some noise without screaming constantly, but they will obviously do it if they're allowed to. Again it's lazy parenting.

And the kids weren't just running around tents, they were running in and out of them with the approval of the so-called parents, which I was gobsmacked by. Surely you don't think that's OK?

Nailed it. 👏

Yes but it is children’s behaviour, usually from poor parenting, that is causing people to get frustrated. The behaviour, not the fact that they are children.
Poor behaviour can and should be challenged.

The examples you give of disabled etc are facts that cannot be changed and therefore it is not right to compare them.

I completely hard disagree with the lazy gentle parenting and agree with society become less tolerant of anything especially children and families. How sad.

I presume you were all model children when you were young and if you were parents would have perfect parenting and the most well behaved children to grace the earth 🙄

Please none of you have children so society can recover from the sheer bitterness you’re all spreading towards children and parents who have a hard enough life already.

Well, I hope you wouldn't actually hit them, but I do agree that behaviour is beyond the pale.

Defensive much?

Of course I am. I think it’s vile bully behaviour on this thread directed towards parents. Parents who are trying their best every single day that are being beaten by society and people like you. I don’t need you to like my children or be tolerant but I also don’t need you disparaging us for our life choices and our parenting.

It's just a natural consequence of an ageing society. People have always, always felt that today's children were less respectful, less polite, more unruly than they were in their own childhood, throughout history. There's nothing unusual about that, but there's something very unusual about a society like ours where nearly 40% of people are over 50, and so where those views are so dominant. It's the same reason as why the politics of nostalgia has become such a huge, and toxic, force - it's normal for people to think the good days are behind them as they enter their own later years, it's not normal for those people to so hugely outnumber those who still have the hope and dynamism of youth.

I'm feeling this. On the weekend I had my new bike stolen in an area I would formerly have said was very safe. They used a professional bolt cutters. The police told me this is now endemic and they are operating in organized gangs.

I'm shocked.

I was in a supermarket with teen DD (18 at the time) silently judging parents for letting their kids (maybe 8 years old) rush about on scooters inside the supermarket.
Before I said anything she commented how annoying and anti social it was! So it wasnt just me being a grumpy old woman!

Ive got kids, im not miserable about them, one of the worst things about covid was passing a school and not hearing kids shouting and playing. Its possible to accept and understand kids behaviour is not naturally the same as adults without wanting to be barged into by a kid scooting around the supermarket, or have them run into your tent when your camping?

We will have to disagree.
The 90’s were largely the decade when formal childcare began to take off.
And by the 80’s many married people were most definitely on two salary mortgages.
And mobility ie people moving away from ‘families’ where they lived happened as far back as the 70’s.

I think part of the problem is that some parents seem to see things in all-or-nothing terms, and when bad behaviour is complained about they tend to come out with crap like 'Would you prefer them stuck indoors on screens?', 'Adults behave worse', 'I suppose you think children should be seen and not heard' and more recently stuff like 'When you go to public places the public do tend to be there' (wow, clever 🙄) and of course the ever-popular and not-at-all-entitled 'If you don't like it stay home.'

Personally I really enjoy watching kids playing and having fun, and even enjoy the noise that naturally goes with that, within reason, but threads like this never cease to amaze me in terms of the number of people who are all 'my little Bratzilla is a free spirit in beautiful bloom, he/she can scream, run around and inconvenience other people including other children as much as he/she wants and if you don't like it you're a miserable child-hater and should stay home' and appear to think anyone who doesnt agree thinks children should be silent, smacked, seen and not heard, and indoors on screens, which literally no one thinks or ever says. (OP, I don't really mean you here - your posts have been more balanced than this - I'm talking more about other people who express their so-called views on this topic whenever it comes up on Mumsnet.)

The entitlement and inability to see things in reasonable, nuanced terms are off the scale sometimes. If we don't mind the kid next door screaming sometimes while playing but do object to them going 'AAAH!' 'AAAAH!' 'AAAAH!' in the back garden for the entire afternoon, we must want them silent and indoors on screens. According to some on this thread, the same apparently goes for prolonged disruption of other families' enjoyment and even going into other people's tents ffs. It's pure nuts as far as I'm concerned.

YANBU - even Mumsnet has some posters who are distinctly anti-children.

That's an awful lot of incorrect assumptions (about me, at any rate) you made in that post. If you read the longer post I just wrote you will see all I'm suggesting parents should be is reasonable, and I suspect that applies to the majority of people you see as haters.

Fair enough. I don’t believe in a hierarchy of age. I think children have the same rights to be kids and exist happily in society (note I do not mean to do whatever they want, I mean to live in a society that accommodates childhood, which is obviously going to include statures and boundaries) as adults do to be adults. But I appreciate your taking the time to explain your view.

I do believe that as a society that everyone is of EQUAL worth, but that we have a particular duty to protect the vulnerable, and try to ensure they are accommodated and supported, alongside the less vulnerable majority. Rather than to set things up to work for the majority, and let other people who do not fit the majority or can’t meet its standards struggle and try to conform. Hence, the post about the world being less friendly to children.

I extend this view to kids (no vote, no financial power, physically weaker and smaller, less able to advocate for themselves, more vulnerable to abuse and unkindness, emotionally less in control, needing time to play and to learn, less able to cope in a world designed around healthy adults). And to older people (physically frailer, less economic power - sometimes, but sometimes a lot more, vulnerable to abuse, less able to cope in a world designed for health adults). And other groups as well.

Children are less capable of emotional and behavioural regulation than adults, that’s a fact. A very well established one.

They’re not becoming child hostile it’s poor parenting hostile

But I think a huge point a lot of people are making is there some parents DON’T try their best every day. And that’s why there’s so many problems.

If your parenting includes letting your children hit people’s tables with big sticks while they are trying to eat then people will judge you and your life choices and parenting. If you are not doing that, then people won’t, and so I don’t see why you are getting so defensive.

I note with interest that my OP was about society feeling anti kid BOTH because of how some people talk about children / parenting and behaviour AND ALSO because services that exist to protect children and give them a good start in life and support parents have been absolutely gutted by democratic governments.

But almost the whole thread has been about whether children are or are not badly behaved and whether parents are or are not to blame for this.

“The material reality / politics around supporting kids is also quite grim: exorbitant nursery fees, schools under pressure, health visiting and early years support underfunded, maternity care in crisis, a lack of youth services like centres for teenagers etc etc”

Obviously (to me at least) there is a link between these things and IF (as plenty of poster are saying) children’s behaviour and parenting have got worse, this is likely to be at least in part, because services and support has been slashed by governments who have prioritised spending on other things / groups.

But that doesn't mean that children do whatever they want without parents telling them that some behavior is completely unacceptable. There is nothing wrong with saying no and meaning it. Parents should parent. No one gets it right 100 % of the time, but it seems that some don't really try.

I completely agree. That’s why it is so important for parents to not put them in situations they can’t cope with and to gently teach and guide children as they develop skills and abilities. For example, kids shouting with joy in a playground - that’s great and ok. Kids shouting in a hospital ward - that’s not ok so the children need to be taught what is ok and if they aren’t capable of regulation then it might not be suitable to take them.

Otherwise, how will children develop these skills. No one is expecting children to behave as mini adults. But we are saying that parenting is key - you can’t just not parent and expect children to do as they please everywhere for everyone else to suffer any consequences.

Not sure how well I’ve explained that, but I don’t think you understood my initial post from your response.

Sorry I think I just understood what you are trying to say. You are saying that children are less capable of regulation therefore can be compared to the disabled, elderly and minority groups?

Children are not permanently children and this is a temporary, developing state. Therefore I do not believe it is comparable to the other groups with permanent characteristics.

I was responding to your suggestion that I shouldn’t compare negative attitudes about kids to negativity about disabled people or other groups, because kids can change their behaviour but a disabled people cannot change their condition.

I was making the point that kids are less capable of changing their behaviour than adults, so I think the comparison is fine. I am disabled FTR and I do things to safeguard my health and mitigate my impact on society, like take medication and don’t put myself in high risk situations - so I and many disabled people do do loads to adapt to society. But I also expect a certain amount of accommodation from society, because while I can manage my disability to some extent (just as a kid can manage their behaviour to some extent) some of it is out of my control (just as a kid’s emotions are.).

To your point about kids needing to develop behavioural regulation skills, absolutely. But how are they supposed to develop those skills if they aren’t exposed to situations in which they will need to regulate their behaviour.

For kids to learn that - you shouldn’t shout and run amok in a restaurant - they need to experience a restaurant. Ideally you start with a cafe and not the Ritz, but the adults in the cafe are also going to need to accept that a bit of kiddish behaviour is BOTH normal, and part of learning, slowly, over time and as they get older and mature, how to sit and chat and wait. If they can’t accept that, maybe they should stick to the Ritz.

Your hospital case is a more extreme example, where either you don’t take the kid, or you have to take them - because perhaps they need to visit a dying relative, or come with a parent who has no other childcare to see mummy and the new baby - so you do what you can, but you also ask for a little grace and understanding if your kid is a bit overwhelmed and doesn’t behave perfectly. Hospital wards (in visiting hours) are worse than soft play centres in terms of noise and chaos anyway!!

I think that I haven’t maybe explained my point very well. I’m not saying that people have issues with kids in certain places. It is if kids are not behaving appropriately in these places and no one is parenting them to show them.