To think society hates children?

[Orangeandgold]

During a crisis people tend to defend children and babies, but on a day to day basis when everything is “normal” I usually find and feel so much hatred towards children.

My DD picked this up quite young too. It is small subtle everyday conversations and actions.

I would have to remind an adult not to barge past a 5 year old when there is enough space on the pavement; or people that feel that they can comment or roll their eyes at you and be malicious because you have a buggy; or general comments in conversations about “all kids are brats/ those children/why would anyone have them.”; animals are so much more loving than children …

… and the comments go on!

If you don’t want children you don’t have to have them, but we were all kids once. AIBU to feel that society in general hates children and to get upset about it every now and then? Or am I just in a pessimistic bubble? Maybe it’s also the city, people have less tolerance? I just feel nobody really looks out for each other the way we would growing up - I would have neighbours on the look out as a child but now it’s different.

Sounds great @ShoesoftheWorld what country is that?

It's not expectations of the children it's the inactivity look the other way I can't control them attitude of some parents.

I know what you mean OP.

DS and I were walking back from Pizza Express one Friday at about 8pm. We'd had a table booked for 6.30, totally normal Friday night. DS was about 9.

The pavement was narrow, ds walked ahead of me, furthest from the kerb. A woman from a group coming the other way chose to step into the road rather than walk single file then said loudly 'fing kids. What the f is a kid doing out this time of night'

Charming !

I think I'm ambivalent on whether or not society is unfriendly to children. I AM very certain, though, that society absolutely loves to find an excuse to criticise mothers (not parents - mothers). The two can feel quite hard to distinguish in practice.

Yes. I think that it’s easy to mistake plain old misogyny for hatred for children.

Germany, but the same is true of a number of other European countries - indeed, some have more generous policies than here.

YABU. People don't hate children themselves, they hate parents who don't operate them correctly. Your child should never cause a nuisance to anyone else - if they do, it's yourfault.

Children are human beings, though. Not machines. They aren’t ‘operated’.

I expect you routinely cause a nuisance to others, even if you don’t think that you do - inadvertently getting in the way, being slow packing up your shopping, having your tv on too loud so the neighbours can hear, holding up traffic while you parallel park, taking too long to pull out at a roundabout, wasting a GP’s time on something that turns out to be nothing, knocking over a drink at a restaurant, whatever it is. Because, like it or not, everybody is a minor nuisance from time to time.

Surely it’s up to individual businesses to decide if they want to welcome children though?

That’s always the answer we get on the “dogs in restaurants” threads, anyway.

I don't hate children. I hate some of their parents, though.

We all get annoyed by different things. If you are not annoyed by that - then good for you. We are all different. It annoys me. I am allowed to find it annoying. It's not an attack on all parents/women. Just some. I find those people performative and annoying.

Does nothing annoy you? If so, I suppose that makes you better than the rest of us.

A post that suggests “Society hates kids” but is really targeted at indifference to people who choose not to have children.

Who is saying to you “all kids are brats? Why have them? Animals are better? Parents or people with no kids? Do you know these people? If they are strangers then you’ll have no idea whether they have kids or not.

Also the people pushing past your child, did you leave enough room for other people to walk by? A lot of people have invisible disabilities so you can’t assume it was malicious. Having children doesn’t entitle you to have the full path way.

If you don’t want children, don’t have them, yes I agree but that has no bearing on your argument whatsoever and yet another dig at people choosing not to have children. If you have children you have to understand that no one really cares and are most likely rolling their eyes because of your entitlement.

My understanding is that it can be quite hard to get a childcare place and there is a shortage of Kindergarten teachers, especially in certain areas - having only read/seen clips about it though I cannot 100% say how accurate it is?

I find children are often annoying and I find some parents extremely annoying. I don't hate kids though. I had four of them myself.

When it comes to restaurants, they very rarely state on their websites that children are specifically not allowed, probably I suspect to avoid grief. However, that does not excuse parents from exercising a bit of 'cop on' when deciding what is a suitable place to take a couple of under five year olds. The afore mentioned Pizza Express might not be as glam as the white table cloth Michelin star place around the corner but at least the food is more child friendly, the staff are experienced with dealing with young children, they offer pens and colouring pads etc and there is less chance of them getting bored and kicking off in the other place where they run the risk of spoiling someone elses evening.

The afore mentioned Pizza Express might not be as glam as the white table cloth Michelin star place around the corner but at least the food is more child friendly, the staff are experienced with dealing with young children, they offer pens and colouring pads etc and there is less chance of them getting bored and kicking off in the other place where they run the risk of spoiling someone elses evening.

Do many parents actually take their kids to Michelin star restaurants in the evening?

I have two young children and it would be a cold day in hell before I took them to a Michelin star restaurant. I can say with absolute confidence that that’s true of everyone I know who has children a similar age. Can’t afford it for a start. They also wouldn’t like anything on the menu.

Your smugness annoys me for sure! You’re very passive aggressive.

you still haven’t explained exactly what you think performance parenting is, I’d love to hear an example.

I have seen plenty of very young children in high end in places and while many have been perfectly well behaved there have been several occasions when they have clearly struggled with the formality of the place and have started to be disruptive. It is not their fault at all, I just think it is odd to bring such young children to such an environment that they don’t really appreciate, is expensive and the fact that they are probably bored shitless and run the risk of kicking off.

And before people mention it I also get annoyed with the table full of loud drunks as well but least the staff have some control insofar asking them to keep quiet.

@UsernameCreater because I am too lazy to type it out, here's a thread about it:

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/_chat/4443556-Jeez-Performance-parenting-is-driving-me-insane

I think passive aggressive is the wrong term for me - I am pretty direct really. Just accept that we have different opinions and move on.

On MN I have read words used to describe groups of people, usually male, which I as a 75 years old had never seen in writing before and had only very rarely heard so it's hardly surprising that some describe poorly behaved children with these words.

No, you’re coming across as passive aggressive and smug - saying ‘I’m direct’ is code for thinking you can be a tosser and get away with it. Like saying ‘I just say it how it is’. I have no issue with differing opinions, I have asked you for YOUR interpretation of performance parenting, not a thread. I’d like examples of what YOU have experienced that has driven you so crazy that you feel the need to unburden yourself to the world. I’m not interested in that thread which I’ve seen before and is MN bollocks mostly. Actually that might even be the thread where the person stormed out of the shop because someone was asking their child to calculate how much change they would get.

@UsernameCreater why is it so important to you that I list examples of performance parenting? I can't be bothered really, I know what I've experienced and that's enough for me. Why does it matter to you? Just accept that people have different opinions on things and move on. This thread isn't about us.

Stop making out I don’t accept people have differing opinions, that’s another weak MN argument when someone doesn’t know what else to say. You can’t give examples, clearly. It’s just another way for you to ‘be direct’ AKA attack other parents and make yourself feel smug

If you can’t or don’t want to engage in debate, why throw your two pence in in the first place?

In the cities, yes (Berlin especially, it's a nightmare); in other areas, not so much. You might not always get the nursery/kindergarten you want, but generally, you'll get one. The shortage is correct (likewise for school teachers).

Of course it's not a utopia - where is? But nobody is working just to pay nursery fees, and everybody can afford to work. There's a year's parental leave paid by the state, too (more if you share it), at two-thirds of your monthly income before the birth.

it’s called the social contract and it’s a feature of a healthy society

I totally agree with you @ParsnipSurprise88 that was my point! We all support children as a society, and we all support elderly people, as a society, because we recognise these are people who need to be cared for, and that we've all been children and cared for, and (we have to hope) we'll all be elderly and need care to a greater or lesser extet.

My point was that we live in a society which has ths social contract as you point out, and that - almost by definition - that indicates that as a society we do not have children.

There's no need to be so angry - we're in agreement!

Although you might notice that @Orangeandgold appears to direct her ire specifically at childless women:

If you don’t want children you don’t have to have them, but we were all kids once. AIBU to feel that society in general hates children

I think hate is a strong word but I do think some people are intolerant and inpatient; well that was my experience when my children were younger. I think the shit attitudes I experienced were because my children are autistic and so didn't conform to someone's expectations of how they should behave. And I'm not talking about meltdowns but things like my child not having eye to eye contact or losing the ability to speak with the other person. People seem too quick to judge without considering whether something else may be going on. I'm not excusing bad behaviour but sometimes there may be an underlying issue and I think we need to be sympathetic to that because its a horrid situation to have a distressed child and no-one offering support. I've lost count of the times that's happened to me. The other issue I found was that people seemed very keen to blame me for everything whereas there was never any criticism of their dad, even from professionals.

I wonder if that would have made a difference to the Brexit vote :)