Full price babies at the Olympics

[littlepinklizard]

I'm shocked by the conversation I just had with the London 2012 ticketing poeple. My dh and I were lucky enough to get tickets to the horse jumping on 8 August. Our baby is due 2 June, so was enquiring about what I need to do about tickets for the new baby.

They said eveyone needs a ticket - fine.
Children's tickets are £1 - fine.
But there are no children's tickets for the horse jumping so I have to pay £95 to have a 3 month old in a sling!!!
I said I was planning to bf and couldn't go without the baby.
They said the only alternative was to re-sell my ticket or give it to someone else.

I can't justify £95 and I know lots of people who would love the ticket so I guess I just have to transfer it. But I am fuming.

AIBU or are the 2012 people?

Mink, the Olympic organisers aren't saying they don't want babies at the Olympics at all, and they aren't preventing breastfeeding. They just want additional ticket money for newborns who might not even have been conceived when their parents bught their own tickets, and who won't require actual seating.

Oh and all4u having breastfed my first child I am experienced enough to know that expressing for my (to be) 2 month old baby is not going to work, at an age when feeding on demand is the only way to establish a decent milk supply.

Also, about children who already hold 'pay your age' tickets, which were introduced to encourage children to attend, because of the Olympics' intended legacy, which helped to win the bid in the first place. Do you propose they are stripped of their tickets so a more deserving adult can attend?

How do you feel about people buying tickets for their tiny babies (which I will be doing for the events I have tickets for that are not sold out) and the seats allocated to those babies sitting empty while a well deserving adult has to watch at home?

Hear hear, FrustratedMod.

This was just on BBC London News! I'm sitting here wondering if any of the people they interviewed are MN'ers.

I love the idea that MN can get things changed and stuff done.

Yeah I'm glad this is getting coverage but I do hope that the media don't read this thread and take from it that this issue is about militant breastfeeders who do not want to pay their children's way.

For me talk of whether or not children should be allowed to attend, whether it is irresponsible to bring them, even whether you should be allowed to breastfeed in public (??!!) just confuse the issue.

Personally I am happy to pay a charge in return for my tiny baby to be allowed to sit on my lap. I don't intend to block the aisle with a pram and a changebag. I just want to be able to attend the events I have tickets for.

Here's the thing: let's say you take your baby along and it does cry and destroys our only British chance of a gold medal in XYZ sport? What are you going to do about it? Sure you could remove the baby as soon as it starts fussing, disturbing all the other people in the row as you go past them cutting off their view because you brought a baby, then trying to find somewhere quiet to sit and settle the baby... It doesn't sound much like fun for anyone.

Secondly, sure, other people make noise and disturb people - but if you asked a rowdy group of teenagers to remove themselves or shut up, no one would blink an eye. Do that to a mother and the Mumsnet Mafia mobilises (a precisely demonstrated here) and gets up in arms and demands special treatment, regardless of whether or not they are disturbing other patrons enjoyment of the event.

Northerngirl41 - excellent point well made about the rowdy teenagers. If someone makes a complaint about a child making noise you'd be demonised for it.

Yes, I am sure that the sound a newborn baby crying in a huge crowded cheering stadium will destroy British sport as we know it, forever.

I couldn't find any pay your age tickets for the swimming. We paid for 4 full price tickets, which includes full price for the DCs who will be nearly 4.5 at show time. Somehow I don't think the swimmers on the blocks would hear them at the start but a pool is a noisy place luckily.

Great British excuses for not winning gold in cycling, swimming, the 100m relay, yachting, rowing, the marathon:

'...and then against the backdrop of the mighty roar of the crowd and the thundering of the ocean swell, I heard the distant wail of a tiny baby, and my morale completely collapsed.'

northerngirl and if a one year old child who currently holds a ticket bought legitimately in the first round of ticket sales did the same couldn't the athlete sue the Olympics organisers for selling the ticket in the first place? Because, you know, babies ARE ACTUALLY ALLOWED AT THE OLYMPICS.

I mean I'm sorry for 'shouting' but please, read the thread. Whether babies make noise is NOT THE POINT. it's whether they should have to have a physical SEAT. not a ticket, a SEAT.

JFC, I can't take any more, it's no good for my blood pressure.

Hopkins was hilarious she wiped floor with mn Kate
Katie Hopkins knows how to work a situation,and she's the one we are talking about - not the umming anaahhing Kate mn

And I think if seat booked and child capable if sitting with paying adult,not taking up a seat, then the child should accompany adult admitted on primary adult ticket

having had two children myself I wonder if you have considered whether it is a good thing for a relatively tiny infant to be kept in a hot sling, on a potentially sweltering day, with thousands of loudly cheering spectators on either side? This is after all the queueing to get in through massive crowds. What if your baby needs to be changed during a crucial build up to a round? You?d be stepping over the other fans to get out - subjecting them to a loudly crying infant with a smelly nappy which is not the best scenario for others to hear and enjoy the olympic experience for which they have also paid and taken time off from work to attend. Also if you can afford 2 x £95 for your tickets in the first place, wouldn?t it be kinder to your baby and other spectators to express and hire a good quality babysitter whilst you go? Sometimes the joy of having kids demands the odd personal sacrifice for the good of the baby and other members of the public!

I disagree - she came across as a contemptuous baby hating bitch. She didn't wipe the floor so much as spit all over it.

JFC, this is about whether a seat should be paid for that a newborn baby will not actually sit in.

The Olympic organisers are keen to attract families, children and babies to the events anyway.

Yes they are allowed - but they aren't allowed free tickets which will make the parents who have to pay for full price tickets think very carefully about whether the child really needs to be there. It's a fair compromise.

The other objection is that tickets might not even be available for babies whose existence was not known about when the tickets first went on sale.

My kids are my sun, moon & stars but at 6 & 3 I would not expect them to sit quietly through a stadium event. Therefore I have not wasted money on tickets for them, instead me & my DH will actually get to enjoy our unique opportunity to see the best athletics in the world on our doorstep rather than stressing about keeping our DSs happy. I know it's not the same as taking a tiny baby but really you know what? It is not actually possible to have everything. There is no way I would have subjected my children to a big sporting event when they were babies - we would all have had a rubbish time, I did not begrudge that & now a few years later my time has come back.

I can't really believe this debacle.

Q. Are babies allowed to the Olympics
A. Yes

Q. How do you get a baby to the Olympics that wasn't conceived at the time of successful ticket allocation?
A. Pay full price for a seat, even though said baby won't physically be able to sit up unaided, nor will the seat be next to the parent's

Yes there should be some sort of threshold, 6 months seems the bare minimum, possibly a year. Why can't there be sensible debate on this quite laughable state of affairs.

The BBC wheeling KH out, who is only interested in self-promotion & daft arguments, detracts from the serious point raised.

Getting into whether it is right for a parent to choose to take a young baby to an Olympic is besides the point and frankly no-ones business but the parents.

I'm watching 'Twenty Twelve' again on re-run, and frankly I don't think even the writers on that could have dreamt this up.

Airlines manage to allow babes in arms, with an age limit (no bf-ing 8 yr olds sneaking in there) and a ticket, why can't the Olympics.

Well, we're going to five events (thanks Mum!). Kids are 5 & 3.

I am so hoping we're sitting near Hopkins. I will encourage bogey wiping and general whinging if we are (otherwise they'll be on best behaviour and marched out, I won't have them annoying nice people).

I really hope they reconsider their current policy.
I was lucky enough to get family tickets (pay your age for my 4 year old and 1 year old) to go to the early rounds of the tennis at the end of July.
Months after applying for the tickets I conceived and I am due at the end of June.
Baby will be 4 weeks old when we go to the Olympics. I rang the ticketing line to ask about their policy and when I might be able to buy an extra ticket for the baby (assuming it would be like an airline and you could add a babe on lap ticket).
Not only was I told what was on the website. I was also told that if I was lucky enough to get an extra ticket, they would not be able to guarantee that this ticket would be seated with the rest of the family! So, I would be expected to dump my 4 week old baby on a seat in a completely different part of the court to where the rest of us are sitting?
My 4 year old is incredibly excited about the prospect of going to the Olympics and he would be really upset if we couldn't all go because of this policy.
This will be my 3rd child and I know that at the age of just a few weeks, baby will cause hardly any disruption because all it will want to do is feed and sleep. Any crying will be quickly appeased through the offer of a breast.
At the moment, I am hoping that either LOCOG change their policy or I will have to hope that I am lucky enough to get another ticket for the baby and pray that they will see sense and actually seat us together!
I am also happy to speak further on this subject or be used as a case study.
I don't have an issue with paying for an extra ticket - but I am fuming about the uncertainty and the way mothers who have conceived after applying for tickets have been treated.
There can't be 'that' many of us to make it inconceivable (excuse the pun) that they can sort something out for the babes in arms who were not even in existence when the ticketing application process took place.

I agree with oltob that Twenty Twelve couldn't have made this up.

Seating newborn babies apart from the mother. Priceless.

I think any child not old enough to enjoy the event should be banned. What's the point? They are just going to be bored and annoy everybody around them with their screaming and whining and possibly distract the athletes with their wails. Selfish parent's should not be allowed to destroy everybody else's enjoyment or cost an athlete a hard earned medal

People don't hate children, they hate the self obsessed moronic breed of parents who think it hilarious to inflict their badly behaved brats on everybody else. Share the misery and all that.

If you can't or are unwilling to find a babysitter, stay at home or find something to do that your baby will actually enjoy and doesn't ruin everybody else's experience. It's called consideration. Consideration for your baby who won't want to be there. Consideration for other people who have saved, made arrangements for their own, traveled, paid for a hotel and are looking forward to having a good time and don't deserve to endure screaming babies, shitty nappies and the negligent parents who ignore them.

I know that's to much for egocentric parents who imagine the world cruel to even contemplate not revolving around them to understand but nobody cares.

I think one way around it would be a special area reserved for those who insist on dragging their babies along, they can disturb each other with screaming and disgust each other by changing shitty nappies in public. They should be in a soundproof box though so the athletes are unaffected.

bobbledunk, I'm afraid that Lord Coe already has his advisory committee in place, but I'm sure there's a place for you if one of them unexpectedly has to drop out.

Maybe you could head up the Legacy For Children Fuck That panel, or chair the 'I say I don't care but actually I really do' contradiction committee. The cruel baby dragging relay also needs a people's champion, although I hear that Katie Hopkins is being seriously considered for the role.

Meant to say 'nobody cares for your excuses'.