“The lady will tell you off”

[notedbiscuits]

When I am in shops, I often see kids mucking around and a parent says something like “please stop that or you get told off by the lady “ (staff member)

Why do parents say this? It should be themselves who tell off their children not shop staff.

So you want the child to continue misbehaving in your cafe possibly bothering you and the other patrons? Sounds like an own goal to me.

Gosh OP do you really have nothing to do. Who cares, as long as the child behaves. It's actually a good thing that it's not always on the parent, and children know that their behaviour effects other people too

Why would it be an issue for me if this kid is stressing their parent out? I DGAF about that 😄 I worked I a cafe, it’s not that high stakes. I’m obviously not going to step in and tell someone else’s kid off and potentially make more of an issue out of it, and maybe even be reprimanded for that by parent or onlooker, so why say it?

Parents aren't doing anything to her!?! She is the lifeguard, if anyone's breaking the rules in a public swimming pool she SHOULD be telling them off. Parents warning their children that this will happen is supporting her in her job!!

Absolutely this!

You don’t have kids, do you? Parents say all sorts to their kids to make them behave! The shop lady will tell you off. l’ll call Santa and tell him to put you on the naughty list. Look there you are on the security camera, if the guard sees you being naughty he’ll throw you out. Your face will stay like that if the wind changes. The tooth fairy won’t take rotten teeth so you can’t have any more sweets. Etc.

gah
and when the child realises there is no tooth fairy what then

just tell them their teeth will hurt get rotten and need pulling out

If children are misbehaving in a cafe that behaviour will get affecting the other people there and possibly the staff also. If you are that unbothered by it, don’t get involved in the parent’s conversation with their child. Just keep out of it.

Christ, if the kid was running up and down or shouting/screaming and spoiling other diner's meals, you wouldn't tell them off?

Baffling.

I am that "lady" and it amuses me. But I take my cue from the parents. Mostly they are instilling good manners when eating out in public and saying that "the lady' will tell you off is just a way of them saying to their child, its ok at home but not when out so I give the child the "excuse me young man/lady, do you not know where you are? We dont behave like that in here you know, we are all so very polite and well behaved " spiel ( tongue firmly in cheek and a glint in my eye ) and then go ahead and chat away to the child

Actually I love our young customers, often its their first experience of eating in a more adult environment so I speak to them , ask them if they enjoyed their meal, comment on something they are wearing, admire their colouring in skills etc etc, I just engage with them rather then ignore them.

But yes I will also tell them off, along with any adult who is being rude or obnoxious, The skill is in telling them they are dicks, without them realising

posted twice

Because some parents seem to have no ability to tell their children off. And also drives me mad when they say " the policeman will come and get you ".
Just tell them yourselves !

I often heard that when working in a small local library. ‘Don’t do that, or the lady will be cross.’

‘That’ meaning running around screaming, bashing into people quietly trying to choose books, etc.

Nice kind Mummy was never going to be cross, was she? Only the nasty old library lady.
It would have been good, very occasionally to hear, ‘Don’t do that, because we don’t run around screaming in the library.’

Baffling, really? I would tell the parent, not the child.
As a minimum wage cafe worker, it was never my job to parent other people’s children.

That’s what annoys me too. In your example why can’t the adult say to the child “we don’t run around/shout in the library because it’s bothering other people and is against the rules”? It’s like when I take my son out on his scooter and pop into a shop on the way home “remember, we don’t ride the scooter inside the shop because it’s against the rules”. He knows this, I remind him because he needs expectations laid out for him (he’s a young teen but has SEN and autism). Never once threatened him with anyone in the shop or wherever telling him off, same with his sister.

I’m appalled at the nurses, paramedics etc upthread who have said they’ve had parents using them to threaten their kids into behaving. Absolutely not on. We should be teaching our children these people are there to help them.

I used to get this all the time!! ‘Stop that or the nurse will come to you!’ ‘Stop that, that nurse will give you a jag if you don’t behave!’ 🙈 just parent your own unruly kid and leave me out of it! Why would you make your child frightened of me!? Mind you, when I was wee, my mother used to say, if I was misbehaving ‘uh uh uh! Here’s the man coming!’ What man? Where is he? I can’t see a man, is he hiding?

Not very likely in these circumstances, the parent would obviously be trying to get the kid to behave and mentions the other person to try get them to. Yeh kids should listen to parents first time but I’m sure we’ve all seen kids misbehaving in shops etc. A parent might not want to yell at the child or discipline in the shop so they say that to try minimise disruption. If someone randomly starts telling a child off then I can see the parent not being happy (but that’s where if the parent was doing it someone else wouldn’t have to) but in the circumstances you describe I doubt the parent would turn on them. I also highly doubt someone after hearing “they’ll tell you off” will take that as a cue to lay in to a child

If you think of it as the first stage in "don't do that as it is against the law" it makes sense.

I doubt most parents are thinking in quite those terms at that moment, but kids will gradually have to learn there are outside rules they can't break so it is a good thing.