Performance parents

[Maryquitecontrarymary]

Am I the only one who is irritated like hell around these people?
At airport waiting to board flight. Couple infront with 2 kids who seemed to want everyone to know what fun they are and how much banter they have together as a family. "Oh look at us, look how fun we are, look how great we get on with our kids".
Try to ignore but it's impossible as they are so loud and they are constantly looking around as though to see who is watching and listening, so you have to make sure you don't look their way or make eye contact.
Oh and guess where they happen to be sitting? Yep you guessed it, right behind us. I swear the whole flight could hear them and only them. The woman had a gob like a foghorn and seemed to swing between being performance banter mum and having a go at her husband. Even ear plugs couldn't drown them out.
I'm surprised these people don't exhaust themselves with their performances

If you want to see performance parenting at its finest, come to the nursery school where I work. Drives me crazy, and it's the dads who are worse than the mums.

You're a bit unhinged really aren't you?
You've decided I have big issues. OK.
Don't see anywhere that I have come up with 'other issues' or any 'back story' for anything. So not sure where you are getting that from
Anyway, as you were.
Ah maybe you're the performance parent who was on my flight. I get it now.

Somebody please give me an example of how this type of 'performance' parenting or conversation would go?!

Not back issues or story; just forming a quick judgement/ assessment
For example, might be :
Noisy: drunk
Noisy: excited group
Noisy: argument in-full flow
Noisy: performance parenting- usually slow, loud, deliberate speech; usually very obvious to others around

Or the annoying parents in question are really obnoxious, and are harshing everyone else's mellow unnecessarily 🤷‍♀️

There are few things I hate more than people accusing others of performance parenting. I mean how arrogant and self absorbed must you be to think that anyone behaves in a particular way with their children just to impress you?

Who knows. Maybe they were loud and annoying but I can't believe anyone can keep up an act like that for longer than a few minutes just to impress someone else.

Ugh.

These parents make my skin crawl.. loud voices, silly voices , over egging normal interactions , craning their necks around to see who is looking and listening while offering a wry smile, while shouting 'GOOD JOB' in their finest SoCal drawl.
Yawn.

'Can you find your peg, Tarquin? Show mummy where your peg is. Is this yours? You clever boy, now, can you put your coat on all by yourself? Mummy will help because we need to get to Grandma's. She has your favourite for lunch- quinoa with goji berries! Mmmmmm! Can you tell mummy about when you had this for supper in Tuscany? Do you remember? What was your favourite part of that holiday? Now, put your hat on, what colour is it? Ochre, that's right! Say bye bye to Mrs Jewel Anemone! Bye bye! Now, can you find mummy's Audi.....?' And so on, in an outdoor voice and endlessly. Every day.

Brilliant definition; sums it up perfectly

But how do you explain the constant looking around trying to make eye contact with other people while they are doing it?
If they are engaging in conversation with someone, why is it so important for them them to be checking to see if others are listening/ being entertained by it.
That's what makes it stand out as a performance/attention seeking behaviour

I wonder of these people actually are aware of what they're doing? I mean they must be. Maybe the urge to do it comes actually, I do doubt they would ever think that it would be obvious to other people what they're doing.

Yup. Irritated me. You'll get the faux shocked responses on her, sorry you don't Tracy with your children, but we both know there is a big difference between interacting/ engaging with your children and putting on the public performance parenting so everyone is acutely aware of your interactions.....bugs the shit out of me too. Just been to the zoo.......joyous performance fathers everywhere.....

Maybe you need to experience it for yourself to understand....

Just to clarify, you’re suggesting that people are deliberately performative about their parenting, unknowingly? So just parenting then?

Agree with you. It’s irritating when you can’t get away from it. There’s a big difference between engaging with your children at a normal volume vs delighting in others overhearing your interactions. Like those people on trains who just love to have a conversation way louder than necessary because they think they sound oh so important or funny. No one is impressed and no one cares to hear it.

Watch it, you'll be accused of having big issues in a minute 😂

I think, you are either imagining it or maybe they are anxiously looking around to see if there are any strangers judging them.

I mean, seriously, don't you think that parents get enough judgement and criticism and guilt tripping as it is? Constantly? If the kids were happy with it what is the problem?

I also don't like loud and brash people because i find them distracting and grating but that is just some people's personality. I feel by calling it performance parenting you are adding a nasty, moral undertone to what is possibly just a different type of personality like saying they care more about appearance than their children.

Parenting. But extremely loudly and shoe horning in showing off 😀😀

Quick question, is the below different?

"Can you find your peg, Ollie? Show Mummy where your peg is. Is this yours? Clever boy, now, can you put your coat on all by yourself? Mummy will help because we need to get to Grandma's. She has your favourite for lunch - sausage and mash! Mmmm! Can you tell Mummy about when you had that for tea in Wales? Do you remember? What was your favourite part of that holiday? Now, put your hat on, what colour is it? Blue, that's right! Say bye bye to Mrs Jones! Bye bye! Now, can you find the car?"

If it’s said at the same unnecessarily loud volume and as much (or more) for the benefit of others as the child then yes it’s the same imo!

If it were delivered at the same volume for the benefit of others, no.

No cos a quick "off you go, bye, have a lovely day" is all that's necessary in this scenario 😂

Snap! 😆

I am fairly sure we could be accused of this in airports. I am so terrified that my children will kick off,I will do anything to entertain them and show other passengers that I am indeed trying.

This is really interesting because often with kids out in public you are engaging with them and talking to them and it is pretty mundane stuff like oh look at the fire engine etc etc. And I can see how in public you feel your parenting is more on show so you probably do socially anxiously try to come across as 'nice and normal'. I've seen some performative parenting here in Germany and it's interesting because in the UK it seems more about showing how talented and well behaved your kid is, or how banterally adept your family is, but here it's about showing people how you are drumming an ethos of perfect practicality and sensible methods into your kid, it's much more like 'we have to put our hats on now, it's WINTER! Everyone HAS to put their hat on in winter. That's right, put it on properly. Otherwise you might get COLD!'. So the message is more like 'OMG my kid is being taught the real practical rules of living very sensibly.'