Aibu to think that parents who stare at their phone and completely blank their children are a bit shit really.

[gingganggooleywotsit]

Ok I am being judgey and I know I’m only seeing a snapshot of someone’s life but it’s really upsetting me. I’ve been sitting in a coffee shop for a couple of hours doing a bit of work and there is a couple there with a 5 year old boy and they are literally glued to their phones. He’s having to hit them round the head practically to get them to look at him. He has nothing to play with keeps nearly running in the traffic and they will not look up from their phones. Little boy looks really upset. Yeah they might be working too I’ve been there wiith my kids but give the boy something to do or at least make eye contact occasionally! It’s like he’s invisible. 😞

i judged this man doing this walking his kids home from school, poor kids, he was on the phone the whole time, met them out of school and then ignored them the whole walking , and it is not a quick walk

@Pinkandpink

I see this a lot, it’s quite sad. I also saw a women walk a small child aprox 5/6 to school, hand in hand, and she had these massive earphones on. What’s wrong with talking and interacting with your child?

That is really sad to see because you're basically telling the child "I would rather liste to music than talk to you"

@1forAll74

You can witness this everyday in all sorts of places. It is usually women phone addicts, who are so taken up with their phones, that they are in another world, even with their children with them..

I was in a beer garden at the village pub, well before lockdowns. and was sat at the next table to a young Mother, with her young son, aged about four, She was constantly on the phone, and her young son was trying to speak to her, and she told him to be quiet. He started getting upset, and got in a paddy, and started to throw crisp packets on the floor, and stamping about round the table, she got more annoyed with him, and flung him on the seat, then he started crying, then she took a photo of him crying. and said, right, we are going home now after your naughty behaviour.

And people wonder why kids are 'badly behaved' later on and lack language and social skills. That poor little boy, I don't know if I could have bitten my tongue in that situation.

Yabu stop judging other people based on very few facts. focus on yourself and your own life

@Loubiemoo

I saw one today with their phone fixed to the pushchair handle playing a cartoon for the baby.

Yes! I saw this the other day!

I was so amazed I asked the Mum where she'd got it from! It's what bike riders use for sat nav apparently.

Fucking genius! I haven't got any kids in a pram anymore but if I did, I'd be amazon priming the shit out of one!

It's one of the key reasons why kids gets free childcare at 3

Do you mean the 15 hours for 38 wks of the year that everyone gets?

Some parents can't be bothered to engage and that's that

I do agree with this but don't think it's just related to phones. Some parents have always neglected their dc.

@Imicola

I agree, it's really sad, i see it a lot at the park

Park is different to a café imo.

Kids are expected to be running round, noise making in a self contained space designed for that activity.

In a café, it more social or quiet time. So either chatting/drawing/playing small games together (eg draughts, card games, paper games like noughts and crosses) or a quiet time when kids are colouring in/reading and parent is reading or whatever.

And (at the park) the kid doesn't need the parents interaction really, especially at 5.

Plus the park is probably somewhere they go to every day (or nearly)

Yep Dd's has a friend who used to visit with her little boy, I came in from shopping and ran down the garden to catch the child just as he was going head first into my pond, she was oblivious, too busy scrolling SM 🙄

There are such judgmental people on here, you are seeing another person for about thirty minutes. You don’t know what they do for the rest of the day.

I work flexibly from home around my daughter with a deployed husband. Once a week I take her to soft play and sit and do some work. We go to soft play once a week and I sit on my phone and reply to emails whilst she plays. Even if I was sat playing games that would be absolutely fine, it would be nothing to do with anybody else.

I judge too. Probably shouldn’t but when the kids are being ignored, shushed, snapped and shouted at, of course you’re going to judge. And when the kids are running riot, screaming , fighting, perhaps bullying other kids and the parents are glued to their phones, then yep, I’m judging you too. and if you’re kid hurts themselves and you don’t notice or do something about it because you’re on your phone, I’m judging you as well. Trying to have a break doesn’t excuse shitty parenting if you’re being a shitty parent.

@Pinkandpink

I see this a lot, it’s quite sad. I also saw a women walk a small child aprox 5/6 to school, hand in hand, and she had these massive earphones on. What’s wrong with talking and interacting with your child?

Ive had to do that once when I had to listen to an important briefing from work on a day my childcare had unexpected cancelled.

It was on Microsoft teams (on my work phone) right over school pick up time so anyone seeing me for that snapshot may well have thought I was listening to music and ignoring my children.

[quote lifehappened]@Loubiemoo I hope you called social services? [/quote]
No, thought I’d leave that to you.

I’m doing it right now.

Thing is you have no idea what the parents were doing on their phones.

Rightly or wrongly a lot of stuff is done online on smartphones these days. Banking, map reading, booking activities, communicating.

That's the trouble when you only see a snapshot of a strangers life, you've no idea what's going on with them.

I do believe in the snapshot and most parents are doing a good job you are just seeing a snippet.
But for some reason we are seeing more and nore children with speech and language issues at my schook and id be interested in some decent research into whether there was a link.

Tbf, phones have the entire Internet on, whereas kids banging on about cows on the train is quite boring. Maybe the kids should get some proper convo going?

@Buttybach

As people have said.. this is a snapshot. We as parents we all look at phones while kids are playing. She may have had work to do, she may have been dealing with a family crisis. We just don't know.

The other side of this is the children who are continually ignored while parents are trawling social media or playing the Xbox.
I work in education and we are seeing more and more pupils with attachment disorder.
This has huge lifelong consequences.
Some children are coming into education having very little conversation and it definitely is concerning.
While it's important not to judge from a simple snapshot, the repercussions of repeatedly ignoring children are not good.

Friend of mine is an child psychiatrist. She says trauma under the age of 2 also causes severe attachment disorders.

This is really interesting and seems the way with phones being in every household. What the next big thing for our children is going to be.

Interesting stuff. I’ve done a bit on attachment disorders. I’m going to delve into this a bit more. It makes perfect sense though.

I work flexibly from home around my daughter with a deployed husband. Once a week I take her to soft play and sit and do some work. We go to soft play once a week and I sit on my phone and reply to emails whilst she plays. Even if I was sat playing games that would be absolutely fine, it would be nothing to do with anybody else
But we're not talking about this scenario. If your child is enjoying himself without expecting any interaction with you, you are free to do what you want. We are talking about kids desperate for attention who get none at all because the parents are just not interested in interacting with them at all.

15 hours of free childcare even to children with SAHP. Why would they do that if it wasn't for the evidence that too many children lack social interaction and stimulation at home?

15 hours of free childcare even to children with SAHP. Why would they do that if it wasn't for the evidence that too many children lack social interaction and stimulation at home?
It was part of a drive to get unemployed people back to work by reducing the cost of childcare wasn't it? Also, votes...'look how much this government gives to families'.
Never once have I heard the 15 hours free childcare was to give social interaction to children whos mothers own a smart phone but im sure someone will be along with the evidence soon.

Different scenario as I don’t have children yet but a women told me off for walking down the street staring at me phone incase I walked into someone, when in actual fact I’d just received a long message updating me on my dads emergency heart surgery. It’s really easy to judge when you have no idea of their life.

my not me

@JustGiveMeGin that was my understanding & the additional 15 hours is definitely to encourage mothers to work. I think the hours for 2 yr olds are to help attainment levels but they are means tested so i'm sure plenty slip through the net.

How are you all posting these judgy replies if you never take your eyes off your kids?