AIBU to be annoyed with middle aged child haters????

[Syrupent]

At a retitement do this week, the conversation turned to the school run. One colleague bemoaned the fact that he has to ensure his newspaper purchaseing trip does not co-incide with the 'school run'. His wife agreed that seeing the cars dropping kids off made him unspeakably angry! Another colleague agreed, saying she believed children are still 'grown with legs'. Well i am keen on cutting down car use, but many of these parents were no doubt dropping off on their way to work, not having the luxury of time to walk. The school run is such an easy target, I don't drive my own ds to school so no axe to grind BTW! But what really annoyed me about their attitude was the fact that they are happy to fly long haul on their numerous holidays, which must cause loads more pollution. None of these people have/want children as if you couldn't guess.
It just irritated me thassorl....

I tell a lie, Xenia killed it!

bumloveyesorno

I tell a lie, Xenia killed it!

bumloveyesorno

Did someone mention sex? Ah might have known it was that hussy!

MHAMAI's back!

Kerrymum said she'd been wondering where the hell I've been? Funny that same thought had crossed my own mind.

Who let the dogs out? Who, who?!

Completely off topic and blatant hi jack but I'm reading a book at the moment and couldn't help thinking of you expat. The Author is called Clarissa Pinkola Estes. The book is called "Women who run with the wolves" Are you familiar with it?

I've just started it but she speaks about carry on the tradition of being a Cantadora Fascinating stuff, every woman should have a copy, very empowering stuff.

OOoooo, I'm familiar with it now!

That's two books recommended by MNers for my next amazon order AND thanks to some posts by KerryMum, come to find out, amazon.co.uk sells Kiss My Face beauty products, too.

Bonus!

Honestly, it's probably one of the best books I have bought and that's after nearly four years of reading every manner of psychology. She is a Jungian psychonalyst but I think it's her profound knowledge of the old stories and as I say I've only started to read it but it's powerful!

I'm middle aged too and take no responsibility for what 'my generation' has done as I'm a bit like my elder sister. She was a 60's teen and she can't remember free love, drugs, or any of that so called revolutionary stuff.

I was an 80's teen and I lived through Maggie, miners strikes, race riots, etc...so I think we saw our fair share of crap.

That doesn't give us the right to slag off todays younger generation for dropping their kids off at school by car or for moaning that all kids are rubbish these days, and 'when I was a lass, it was so much better'!

It's a karma thing though. If you tolerate others, allow for their eccentricities, differences, etc, you'll generally get by o.k.

Not all middle aged people are grumpy arseholes who moan about kids. Not all the younger generation are 'whatever' mumping mindless morons. Generalisation is not a great thing...it belittles the people you're talking about and you as the proponent of it.

Right...where shall I shove this soapbox now. And if anyone suggests somewhere dark, warm and not too far away from my mouth, I may get a little agitated!!!! Or at the very least, I'll get splinters in an unusual place!

I've just posted on the wrong thread . HTF did that happen??

Damn my husband's laptop...it's so capricious!

Oh I haven't....it was the talk about books on the thread above. It confused me...well I am of a certain age!

Also more to the point, most people do not get the first choice of school that they want, and in order to give thier kids a good education they have to drive further to achieve this.

The british public at large dont like children.

You can say that about so many sectors of society beep'er. The british public at large is really the press....or select groups of people.

Catch me on a bad day and I'll moan about shop assistants, Royal Mail, men, kids, teachers, schools, etc.

Catch me on a good day and I'll praise up shop assistants, Royal Mail, men, kids, teachers, schools, etc.

The press (some of them, anyway) on the other hand can't help but eed on our neuroses by handing out soundbites around how hateful our kids are, how 4 x 4 drivers are satanic worshippers, how old people are curmudgeonly, etc.....

It's a sweeping generalisation and not true.

Now teenagers on the other hand....(sits and waits for hand grenades to be thrown!).

feed, even, rather than eed...I'm all thingers and fumbs today.

As a 'Greedy, smug, bitter, nasty' Baby Boomer, I'm wondering exactly when those halcyon days were because I don't remember them. Life's always been a struggle for most people, from time immemorial, and I don't know anyone of my generation who has had the life of Riley. Plenty of us are still working well into our 60's because pensions have been ram-raided, though I dare say that's wrong too, because no doubt we're stealing jobs from younger folk. I'm afraid the world doesn't owe anyone a living, you just have to suck it up and get on with things.

"I see no hope for the future of our people if they are dependent on
frivolous youth of today, for certainly all youth are reckless beyond
words... When I was young, we were taught to be discreet and
respectful of elders, but the present youth are exceedingly wise
[disrespectful] and impatient of restraint" (Hesiod, 8th century BC).

Nice to know that some things never change!

Like it 80s mum!!!! Nicely quoted and it certainly puts things into perspective.

50's parents were horrified at their kids..my parents had me late in life and were horrified with me, and so it goes.

I have to say that I have found my low expectations of teens challenged lately. Yes, we have morons who decide to walk down the middle of the road, even if they know you're coming in your car, and then hurl abuse at you when you narrowly miss their ankles......BUT

I'm feeling anectdotal....I was on a tram the other day when a large group of threatening looking teens got on. They were slightly rowdy, swearing, but not overly obnoxious.

The tram was crowded and I was one of a number of people standing. It wasn't a problem, my stop was due fairly shortly.

When people got off at the stop before mine, a space cleared on the seating opposite me. A young lad from the gang sat down and his much bigger (much more threatening looking) mate, told him off and said he should have offered the seat to the lady first (me!).

I'm not SO old that I would be offered a seat...and I'm not a yummy mummy, so that wasn't the motive, but what a lovely, positive thing to happen!

I couldn't stop telling people about it.

Yes....I admit, the kids scared me a bit when they got on, as they were a rough looking bunch, but it just shows that generalisation never works! You can't tar everyone who looks a certain way or acts a certain way with the same brush!

I would say that it was the parents of the Baby Boomers who "never had it so good"

Quote Harold MacMillan

Ah the school run. The hackles it raises.

To be fair, I think there are a large number of people who always drive when they could walk. Of these, there are the lazy, and (probably the bigger group) there are those that have strict time constraints as has already been pointed out.

Then there are those that feel the need to drive for other reasons, eg. they genuinely live far away, they have lots of children/younger children/disabled children, only occasionally when it's raining or when they have an appointment. Then there are those without cars or who just never drive.

I don't think it's worth getting het up about. As someone has wisely pointed out, it would take a lot of school runs to make for even one shorthaul flight.

Although I must take issue with the idea that people could walk to work. Obviously, some could, but I would guess that, ON AVERAGE, people's work is much further away than their children's primary school.

Again, I can't drive and so don't have a vested interest,.