Reach your kids some fucking consideration! [ranty]

[someonestolemynick]

This has been inspired by the mummy who let her two charming kids scoot around Tesco. But it also goes out to the geniuses who keep their little darlings watch Peppa Pig on the bus or the pub. The parent who doesn't think it necessary to teach their kids that the appropriate response to bumping into another human is to apologise.
I have noticed this more and more: children (being children) act loud, entitled or aggressive and the accompanying adult smiles indulgently rather than correcting behaviour that infringes on others.

Ianbu

I don't understand why supermarkets and other indoor attractions haven't banned the use of scooters, bikes etc on their premises. They are clearly inappropriate and dangerous to use in these areas.

The idea that children run riot in cafes, supermarkets etc is because they can't run wild in fields 'like the old days' is flawed.

Myself and one set of my cousins did just that as we lived in rural areas. Other cousins lived in cities, nowhere to run riot in unless parents took them out to parks at weekends. But their parents expected the same manners towards other people as our parents did. And my cousins have taught thier their kids the same values despite them not being able to go out cycling to parks and woods like my kids can.

It's down to the parents to distill good manners into thier kids. If they don't how are the kids supposed to learn? If the parents indulge their bad behaviour then they are setting the kids up for a fall when they realise the world does not in fact revolve around them.

Merchant, how is it rude for people to ignore your post? Have you responded to every individual on the thread? Or is your opinion more important than everyone else's? There is a certain irony that on a thread about self-entitled behaviour in children, I am utterly distracted by the 'whole-world-revolves-around-me' attitude of an adult poster.

As per my previous post, I think that some adults are very unreasonable in expecting children not to exist in certain spaces. Some parents are also very selfish in letting their children's bad behaviour impact on others but I think it has always been such. The current irritants are scootering in shops and sound on devices. But I can remember as a child adults complaining about ball games near their houses/balls going in their garden/chalk pictures on the pavements outside their houses. And there have always been children who are too noisy/boisterous/got ants in their pants at inappropriate times.

Hmmm. My mum never had to deal with us playing up in shops because once we were past toddler stage she used to leave us in the car! I have memories of waiting for what felt like hours in the car park of the shopping centre, in my mum's Austin Metro with my brothers, clambering over the seats and making up games. Obviously not socially acceptable nowadays, but I do rather envy her!

I don't think it's just about kids "roaming free in the fields", because children and adults do share spaces more than when I was a child in the late 70s and 80s. Whether it's due to fears about safety or societal lifestyle changes, such as eating our more often for example.

The worst behaviour from parents that I have ever seen was when they let their little darlings run around a world war 2 graveyard/ memorial like it was a playground or a tourist attraction. Disgusting. I was shaking with anger at the disrespect.

Marinade the kids who start school in disposable pull up nappies now would have started in pants in the late 1970s (when I started school) regardless of not being toilet trained, and just wet themselves and been sent to/ helped to change . There was a drawer of spare pants for the 4 and 5 year olds to change into in the event of accidents in the reception class we were sometimes "allowed" to go and help out in during the afternoons when I was in "top juniors" (year 6 now). Disposable pull ups are now fairly affordably available and weren't then, but is surely less entitled to send your child in a nappy than in pants knowing they will more than likely wet themselves.

There were also more special schools open back then, and some of the non toilet trained 4 and 5 year olds were and are not toilet trained because 30-40 years ago they would have been in special schools, but are now in main stream.

I am fairly confident that there is the same mix of shit and not shit parenting now as there always has been, and that people with the luxury of enough time to gossip were having the same conversation 40, or 80, or 120, or more years ago about standards slipping, just using different specific favourite "love to hate" stereotypes of dreadful modern (at that time) parenting.

Namey I don't understand why you're being so unpleasant to me? I am pretty measured in my responses, and noticed only on this particular thread that people, weirdly it seemed to me, were entirely ignoring my probing into the reasons for these changes. I genuinely felt that the issues I raised were being ignored. No, I haven't responded to each and every poster - but the views expressed by most very much all chimed in with each other and backed each other up, so there was no need to. I feel your suggesting I have a 'world-revolves-around-me' attitude is really hurtful, when all I was hoping for was a minimal amount of response, be it agreement or disagreement. Isn't that how threads usually work, or is it normal to entirely ignore one particular poster, unless they're an obvious troll?

I don't disagree with your ideas about needing to instill good manners Willow. But, again, you've used personal anecdotal evidence and haven't really addressed why you think (if you do think this) manners are just not taught as much now?

People have questioned my logic, which is fine- but may I ask what the logic is in suggesting that parents just sort of stopped caring about teaching manners? Some posters don't seem to want to allow that changes in the use of public spaces have affected how we view behaviour.

What is the reason for all this unacceptable behaviour and lack of manners then? Are people just getting worse?? I can't see what else you are suggesting?

I don't understand why supermarkets and other indoor attractions haven't banned the use of scooters, bikes etc on their premises.

So if it's not forbidden it's perfectly OK ?

I have certainly seen signs going into shopping centres saying "no heelies, no scooters, no bikes". It's hard to see them sometimes because of the crush of kids on heelies, scooters and bikes ...

I'll repeat my prediction upthread that someone will be seriously hurt - or killed - by some form of stupidity involving heelies, scooters or bikes. And then you'll see the security guards stopping people.

Merchant, well I am genuinely sorry that my comments have been hurtful - I have been too heavy handed. It is very odd though, in my experience to complain so vociferously that people are ignoring your point on a busy forum of strangers. It really is! But I suppose I have been unpleasant to keep mentioning it, and you are right, there's no need.

Anyway, I think I'll bow out now as it has been the least enjoyable thread I've experienced recently!

I will just say this - when I see a certain demographic being roundly slagged off (in this case, modern parents), I will generally step in. To me, just stating that a certain group of people are crap, and sharing stories about how crap they are, is unpleasant. Doesn't make it better if you are a member of said demographic; plenty of women, for example, get fully stuck into slagging off women as a group; the idea is that you thereby separate yourself from the group.

I don't like it.

But some posters are absolutely wedded to the idea that parents are now just inherently worse as a group. And nothing I can say will change that.

Some people are convinced that the country is going to the dogs. Just bear in mind that it was that sort of thinking that led to Brexit.

Thanks though namey - just read your comment. I appreciate it

Planes/trains/buses - all public transport - should have a notice on the backs of every seat that says 'USE YOUR HEADPHONES YOU IGNORANT SELFISH ENTITLED ATTENTION SEEKING TWAT'.

That'd sort it.

@Evelyn, I am a child of the seventies and your recollection does not mirror my own whatsoever. Wearing the cloth nappies invariably meant that children were all toilet trained by the time they started school as they soon learned it was not nice to have a wet and/or dirty nappy. I do not remember any child wetting themselves in class on a regular basis so I really don't agree with your statements on this subject. Starting reception in a nappy due to lazy parenting is entirely different to a kid in pants having the occasional accident.

The vast majority of children starting school in nappies have special needs. They weren't allowed to go to mainstream school in the 70's.

Marinade if you were in reception yourself you wouldn't have noticed probably. I remember it from when the girls in top juniors were allowed to volunteer to help in reception some afternoons if we'd finished all our work etc. Obviously not all children were perfectly toilet trained in the golden past of our childhoods any more than all children start school in nappies in the shabby sub standard present :o

My own sister wet the bed until she was 9 and had a lovely humiliating alarm to wake her siblings up so that we'd all know she'd pissed herself again... Nothing wrong with her, no special needs, child of the 70s, parented by shiny 1940s born parents... Stinky nappy buckets in the corner of the bathroom didn't produce immaculately toilet trained children, though they incentivised getting kids out of nappies to reduce parental work load (which isn't exactly an argument for parents of the past being less lazy!)

Merchant

I think the main basis of the thread was people letting off steam about their experiences of crap parenting and badly behaved kids.

Its perfectly ok not to want to discus the why's and where fors and society's problems at large.

You could start your own thread if you wanted to discuss that and you would get a lot more viewpoints.

I call bullshit on the epidemic of "5 year olds starting reception in nappies". For a start, apart from the tiny fraction of children who have their birthdays between September 1st and the beginning of term, "5 year olds" don't "start" reception in anything (and if you have to age-up the allegedly incontinent children to make the claim seem more scandalous, it's probably nonsense). Also there have never been any figures or actual evidence, just some anecdotes originally published in the Daily Mail. Which has no agenda, no siree.

@Mrsfrumble
www.theguardian.com/teacher-network/2015/apr/18/secret-teacher-parents-toilet-train-children

www.eric.org.uk/news/rise-in-children-starting-school-in-nappies

Surveys have been done with teaching staff regarding this matter, not bullshit at all. Do you do any research before you comment?

I call bullshit on the epidemic of "5 year olds starting reception in nappies"

I've taught reception for years. We have yet to have a child start reception in nappies aside from the tiny minority who have physical problems.

Can I ask if this was inappropriate

Went to Tesco with 2 year old on reins, she sang happy birthday to you as we walked down each aisle. She was loud but just singing the same words to the happy birthday tune

I pushed trolley and she sang

Now is that wrong, ? I only ask as I might be one of those irritating parents and would love to know

Also she usually says hello and bye very loudly to everyone we walk past

Feeling a bit paranoid

@Hiding, that might be your personal recollection but it is hardly fact and is not of itself indicative of whether it is a wider problem, which teachers have self reported on.

I, as a teacher, can only report on what I see. What I have seen over the last 10 years of teaching in a school in an area of deprivation, where children have a chaotic home life, is that outside of physical issues or SN children are not in nappies.

The Guardian's "secret teacher" is just an "issue of the day" column and doesn't have anymore credibility than the DM.

The Eric survey is credible, but the statistics themselves include 3 year olds at preschool, not just reception and up.

@MrsFrumble, do you not think that the Guardian, as a reputable newspaper, checks the credentials of their authors prior to publishing those pieces? Otherwise this would be a deliberately misleading piece would it not? Easy to check payslips, teaching certificates etc.

Anyway I have not come on here to have a bun fight about children starting school in nappies so will also retire from this thread now!