Why do some parents discipline their children in public places by telling them that “the “man” will throw you out” AIBU?

[Neverplayleapfrogwithaunicorn]

I have noticed this a lot recently in public places where a parents child is behaving in a spirited way (to be polite) and rather than dealing with it themselves, they tell them that “the man will tell you off” or “the man will throw you out”

Usually if my DD is being a unruly somewhere we tend to give her a warning with a consequence.
And if she can’t behave we take her away from the place she is. We have not had to do this since she was really small thankfully xx

AIBU in not understanding why you would put the disciplining on someone else? Or a fictitious person!

I've been used in the past in restaurants to try and make children behave.
"Tarquin stop running around or the lady will shout at you"
Repeatedly.
Finally from me
"Tarquin! Sit the fuck down!"
Joke.
In reality I as 'the nasty lady' would speak to the parents and as them to parent their own child or they all needed to leave.
To be fair I only did this once after having to do a juggling act with 2 plates to prevent an accident and ended up getting covered in gravy, moaned at by the chef for needing more food and moaned at by the customers kept waiting as it had to go back. Had asked them several times to stop the children running around.
This is why I work nights now, incidents like that, people annoy me.

I'm amazed at all of these people that go about their day watching and judging other people's parenting, especially on these minor issues.

Some of these comments are funny.

I've been guilty of this too.

Agree people use 'the lady will get you' too.

It's just a form of attention seeking and performance parenting.

Unless it's factual, e.g. the pp who says tye waitress will ask us to leave.

It’s not something that usually bothers me but when you witness a 4 year old almost falling off a balcony with an 8 foot drop whilst trying to climb tennis netting. And her mums reaction was “the man will ask you to leave” then that is lazy AF parenting!

Wow. Another parenting fail on my part according to the laws of mumsnet. I use this sometimes because I’ve seen other people doing it and it works. It’s that innocent. It’s not about being lazy or a “shit parent” - surely we are all just doing our best and if we find something that works we use it. I had no idea I was being judged so harshly and it makes me wonder what else I’m doing ‘wrong’.

Obviously I would never actually point to an individual but I have said “if you keep shouting the man/lady will ask us to leave”. And it’s true!

As a relatively new mum threads like this do nothing for my confidence levels.

Can we sound the claxon please!

OP- here's something I've noticed in life. What s with that? Is it just me who thinks...?
Most posters - no not just you. I've seen this/think this... I've done tjat at times haha. Lots of joking, sharing irritating anecdotes and light hearted chat.

Other poster - OMG you lot are sooooo judgey as if you have time to even notice anything like that. Who has time to watch other people and have a single thought about it.

I was thinking we might get to page 4 or 5

So, to be clear, the OP can have “a single thought” about other people’s parenting styles but nobody else is allowed an opinion unless it matches that of the OP? Brilliant.

It was more an observation that there's a pattern on amusing AIBU where by about page 4 or 5 there's usually a reply offering nothing to the discussion other than 'you lot are so judgey & I can't believe you even thought that'.
It's becoming as amusing as the inevitable threads about the royals with the reply 'I can't say I spend my time thinking about what some rich people do' / 'who actually cares what some rich girl wears'.

Some of the comments on here are definitely not lighthearted.
I've never actually done this with ds but I think people saying it's 'terrible parenting' etc are being ridiculous.

The 'Mumsnet bingo' 'sound the claxon' inevitable posts are also very amusing - ha ha

Congratulations everyone on all. Being such fabulous flawless parents. Anyone who says such things is clearly a monsfer. Happy now?

My mum said this to me. I don't get why it's a big deal or why it's "crap parenting". It's not really doing any harm 🙄 Just made me think "Oh I must be being naughty if even that man/lady who doesn't know me has noticed!" It worked!

Or then you get the parent who came into school and told me I needed to get their child to bed on time and could they have my phone number so they could ring me to tell their child off when they wouldn't go to bed.

I’m a police officer and get this on a daily basis. I ALWAYS correct them and say I’m there to help, not to take children away.

My father was a police officer and he HATED this.

I was once in a situation where a mum told her child that the "lady over there will come and tell you off". I wasn't anything to do with the staff of the place, but she thought I was.

I just turned round and said "why would I do that?" and started walking away. I've no intention of being used because someone else can't parent.

It's one thing to tell a child they could be asked to leave, it's factual and can happen. It's a different thing to tell a child that some random person will discipline them.

I often say to my eldest (4) that the waitress/shop staff will ask us to leave if he’s misbehaving, sometimes it’s not practical to leave the place straight away. Unsure why it’s not parenting my child.

That is bullshit. I want my kid to know I am in charge and she needs to respect the ground rules I set for behaving when out and about, not be scared of some random 'man'.

Dara O'Briain hates it too.

I explain to my children that there are rules that everyone has to follow whether they be a child or an adult. If anyone doesn’t follow these rules they can get asked to leave or potentially shouted At by someone else to shut up, if for instance they are disturbing a film in a cinema. I usually get them to observe if anyone else is running around behaving like Animals. Then mention are they allowed to behave like that at school? If that doesn’t work I threaten loss of a privilege, and finally the ultimate is leaving.

I have done this at the cinema and in restaurants. 9 times out of 10 because the toddler is tired and bored. They kick off and throw a tantrum outside the venue. But by the time they get to 4 years old they know I mean it when I say we are leaving.

With respects to climbing on things that may hurt them, you have to let them learn they can hurt themselves by letting them fall off stuff once in a while. Obviously not when it’s risking death or serious injury. My kid wants to jump between large stones, I can see they won’t make it, I warn them, they ignore me, they do it anyway they scrape their knee. I comfort them but also say, “I told you so.”

I agree there is a lot of crap parenting out there, and passing responsibility to others to discipline is not on. It also annoys me when I’m trying to get my kids to behave whilst feral kids run riot. I always get the, “but they’re doing it” reply.

I despise the use of 'the bad man' relatives tried it in mine and were swiftly told no. I don't want my child growing up with some charicature impression of a 'bad man' and not realising that anyone can be a danger and they should be aware of that- not looking for some bloke in a black cape and a bad moustache.

My sil works in a shop and has parents saying this often, she has done for years so it’s not a new thing. She gives the child a friendly/cheeky grin and says ‘I won’t!’ because she obviously wouldn’t throw them out and she doesn’t agree with parents making idle threats. I feel the same - if you’re going to warn your child then the consequence needs to be something you can actually follow through with or you’ll find you’ve backed yourself into a corner if they refuse to comply.

Well, I would tell you children were fairly well behaved. Like all children there were occasions poor behaviour. My son, 9 years older than the youngest (so think at the time), during one of very, very few outbursts of youngest, went to the phone and said he was ringing Father Christmas to let him hear the commotion. My DD shut right up. DS did that whenever it looked like there would be a problem and he never did.

So I don’t disagree with it.

I don’t use this because as a pp said , if you’re going to warn your child you need to follow through with a consequence. But I will tell ds (3) that if he continues to behave badly we will have to leave.

I used to say “No, I won’t “ with a big smile, when I worked in a public building. Not my job to make your child behave.
Best one was when I was walking my dog, small child on the other side of the road, Granddad says “If you’re not good that doggie will BITE you”. I stopped (dog automatically sits because Good Girl) and told him she most certainly wouldn’t and that that was the best way to make a child scared of dogs.