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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

AIBU to think that this is awful parenting?

134 replies

Screenburn · 28/07/2018 13:23

On a train journey that’s around 2.5hrs, start to finish. Family with three kids behind me who are simultaneously using devices to play lots of music and games out loud - including the Dad, who is actively showing noisy videos to a disinterested child! Mum is ignoring all the kids despite them turning the sound up constantly.

AIBU to think it is crap parenting to let your kids disturb everyone else and it teaches them that their wants always trump everyone else’s??

OP posts:
Downtheroadfirstonleft · 28/07/2018 15:21

It is awful parenting because they are teaching a total lack of consideration for other people.

The parents are refusing to parent their kids and it's pathetic.

derxa · 28/07/2018 15:22

He has already made it clear that he cannot control them and that they will turn it up again. If he turns it down again they will turn it up again. Pathetic.

brizzledrizzle · 28/07/2018 15:26

He has already made it clear that he cannot control them and that they will turn it up again. If he turns it down again they will turn it up again.

My son tried that trick - not on the train but at home with the xbox. The xbox remote suddenly disappeared.

itsalldyingout · 28/07/2018 15:27

I feel for you OP.

This is one of the reasons I book the quiet carriage. I would definitely be looking for a guard to ask them to tone it down a bit, but this won't help in the long term.

Kids need to be taught. They don't arrive in this world with the knowledge to do many things they'll need in life and they certainly don't arrive knowing how to be decent members of society. Even animals teach their young to interact properly in their own society.

The only thing these inconsiderate parents are teaching them is how to be selfish and unlikeable.

RainbowBriteRules · 28/07/2018 15:29

brizzle, that’s fine, at home. But different on a train trying to manage an angry and upset child than at home.

SlothSlothSloth · 28/07/2018 15:29

YANBU at all! I can only imagine that the people defending this do the same themselves.

GenerationX2 · 28/07/2018 15:31

Screenburn - Absolutely I completely agree with you, inconsiderate, rude and not ok

DeloresJaneUmbridge · 28/07/2018 15:33

My son will use devices when travelling as he struggles with travel (autistic) and needs to occupy himself. However he uses headphones and it was always a rule when younger that no headphones = no music/game/video. Headphones are very cheap to buy now and these parents presumably just haven’t considered the effect of the noise on other people.

That said it’s summer holidays and probably exhausting.

And also headphones for children need to be volume controllable to prevent ear damage. These tend to be more expensive and I guess buying for three children would have an impact financially.

elephantfan · 28/07/2018 15:33

I did a 4 hour long train journey with a 6 week old baby and a 2 year old, 25 years ago, on my own, with very little in the way of entertainment apart from a couple of books and some drawing materials. It isn't easy but children have to be brought up, not left to their own devices.

We were homeless at the time and were staying a couple of weeks here and there with friends and relatives until we had somewhere to move into. I was extremely stressed, but I still had to parent my children.

2 parents ought to be able to manage 3 children on a train.

RainbowBriteRules · 28/07/2018 15:36

Sloth, no, I don’t do this myself, volume either on silent or headphones used. I’m just capable of having a huge amount of sympathy for parents as getting kids to behave in a public place in the summer holidays, especially in the summer holidays can be extremely difficult for a variety of reasons.

ScrubTheDecks · 28/07/2018 15:37

“The dad told me that the kids would “just turn it back up again”...”

Yes, that’s poor parenting.
Poor behaviour all round.

But karma will bite him in the arse: his kids just heard him say that they don’t have to comply with anything he asks.

ProperLavs · 28/07/2018 15:40

rainbow sorry but this "We have no idea how easy or difficult it is to get all three children sitting still on the train." is bollocks. I have taken my 6 out on my own on trains and none of them would have behave like this because they were brought up not to.This crappy father on the train indulges his children to the extent that he can't get them to be considerate of others in public.
There is absolutely no excuse for it. It's shit indulgent parenting.

RainbowBriteRules · 28/07/2018 15:43

We know nothing about these kids or their parents. Nothing about what is going on in their lives, whether they find parenting easy or difficult, whether they never learned parenting skills. Likewise we know nothing about any issues the kids have. Perhaps he has tried all sorts and nothing works. Perhaps he just CBA and has tried nothing. We really don’t know.

Rassy · 28/07/2018 15:44

YANBU - find the guard and get him to speak to the parents!

RainbowBriteRules · 28/07/2018 15:44

Likewise the mother. Maybe she was just knackered. Some kids are relentless and on the go from morning until night. Often the same types of children who struggle to sit still. Maybe she was just shattered and had checked out for a few minutes. Not ideal but it happens.

kalinkafoxtrot45 · 28/07/2018 15:45

It's lazy, shit parenting and completely inconsiderate. Thus are Cheeky Fuckers made.

ProperLavs · 28/07/2018 15:47

Rainbow, I don't care why they couldn't bfs to parent their kids, everyone around them was suffering because of the choices they have made.

PorkFlute · 28/07/2018 15:48

I agree it’s inconsiderate. And unless you rely on screens to placate your kids there’s no reason you’d need them. At the very least they could use headphones.

YetAnotherSpartacus · 28/07/2018 15:49

We know nothing about these kids or their parents. Nothing about what is going on in their lives, whether they find parenting easy or difficult, whether they never learned parenting skills

We know nothing about others on the train either - whether they are making a difficult journey to say goodbye to a loved one, whether they have ASD and are triggered by noise or whether they are prone to migraine, etc.

GreenTulips · 28/07/2018 15:56

We know nothing about these kids or their parents

W know they are rude and inconsiderate, we know they've been asked twice to turn it down and won't, we know they are in a first class carriage, and therefore knownpeople have paid extra for their journey only to be spoilt.
We also know the other passengers have 2 1/2 hours of this crap.

My kids rarely go on the train, and manage to sit still, read or play cards and use their phones with earbuds. I wouldn't put up with their noise and don't think anyone else should have too.

They should take a peek at the other passengers and change their behaviour to suit the situation.

Echobelly · 28/07/2018 15:58

It's more behaviour that's inconsiderate of everyone else rather than awful parenting.

I do think sometimes people thrust devices at their kids too early, when it'd be better for them to learn to wait in a restaurant, go on a journey etc without 'needing' them, but you never know what people are up against so I try not to judge. I have a friend, for example, whose son is on the autistic spectrum and I know he finds it very hard to cope with social occasions and unfamiliar places, so playing on the tablet helps him manage, but his mum often feels she is being judged by people seeing him on it in social situations.

hotcrossapple · 28/07/2018 16:05

Be grateful my dd wasn’t on the train - she makes random screaming noises and although I say no etc she thinks it’s funny/enjoyable.

Yes it’s not great but it’s one train journey.

ProperLavs · 28/07/2018 16:09

Why should we be grateful that we haven't come across you and a child you can't control? Why can't you control her? Has she got sn?

9toenails · 28/07/2018 16:09

No, OP, you are definitely not BU.

You might like to explain to these awful parents that they and their children are actually breaking the law:

" Railway Byelaw 7

  1. Except with written permission from an Operator no person on the railway shall, to the annoyance of any person ...
... (ii) use any instrument, article or equipment for the production or reproduction of sound."

There is always the possibility these horrible people have the requisite ' written permission'; it is unlikely, though.

Perhaps the best solution from where you sit is simply to remind the train manager of her responsibility to enforce Railway Byelaws, including in particular the said Byelaw 7.

The train manager should, at the very least, ask to see the written permission for their children to use equipment for the production or reproduction of sound; lacking such written permission, they are breaking the law and should be told to desist, with appropriate enforcement to follow if they do not do so.

user1485342611 · 28/07/2018 16:16

YANBU it's awful parenting.

But you will always get some people coming onto threads like this one and bending over backwards to excuse the inconsiderate parents and try and make the OP feel like shit for expecting normal manners and consideration in a public space.

Swipe left for the next trending thread