I've just seen the most depressing thing

[Havesomecommonsense]

In a coffee shop, in comes a Dad and his daughter (roughly 3 years old)
He made a comment to the daughter about this being a weekly visit before he dropped her back to the mum
He then sat her on his lap, gave her a phone and she watched instagram videos and he watched his own phone holding it over her head..
He gave her some food, which she kept choking on intermittently. He barely said 2 words to her
Yes I'm judging, but fgs do better

But he has her once a week. What is he "getting through"?

We went out for lunch on Friday, a young couple sat at the adjacent table with their about 2 year old. They put a phone in front of him (with audio - lovely) and the two of them huddled around another phone. No one spoke. Yes, I judged. It was a truly depressing sight.

It is sad, I think some people are so addicted to their phones that they don’t even realise how much of their lives it is taking up and how much they are missing out on and they are raising a generation to do exactly the same

you only have to look around and see that women are the worst offenders for being ion their phones and ignoring their children!

Funny, I've seen the opposite

Nope it wasn't, it was video after video she was flicking through at the top
Insta stories
There is no excuse . No matter what anyone on here says. A small child and a phone addicted adult. No connection between them

IF he was trying his best, it wasn't good enough.
This is a child.
On here, if someone doesn't try hard enough to look after their dog they are jumped on, but all excuses must be made for crap parenting. It's mental

I just don’t know what you want us to say. Poor child? Poor child. Shit Dad? Shit Dad.

you don’t know these people.

I second that! I feel sorry for the daughter having to grow up with a overbearing busybody superior mum like that.

Honestly, people can fuck off. We are very very rarely home, kids need activities and be busy, but If I spend my days entertaining my kids, taking them everywhere, and I plonk them in front of a screen when I sit down and have my coffee in peace for 1 hour in the middle of a busy day, it's my choice.

With my "poor parenting choices" my kids are all top of the class, in the higher sets, spend all their weekends in sports competitions, and have more friends that I have time to accept invitations from. Even I am surprised how bright they are 😂

So honestly, fuck off. I am a better mum because I have my coffee in peace, and no one needs yet another performance parent in a coffee shop showing off to people who couldn't care less what amazing parent they are 😂

what a child needs, is a parent that shuts up for 10mn once in a while, not keeps yapping nonsense all day to show the world how great they are.

Honestly, just.. shut up and be quiet. It's exhausting for anyone, even a child, when a parent can't stop talking.

but if they all had a book you would be ok with that?

Old people see " a phone" ,we see "a camera, a calendar, work emails, school information, clubs information, appointments, holidays booking, communication with friends, food shop and the list goes on..."
Kids check their merits, homework, teachers comments of the day on their phone, team selection for the match tomorrow..

I fight very hard against "shorts" and more than 5mn against short videos because they are damaging. but a phone is a tool. We have a small tool in our pockets instead of lugging multiple things, books, diary, calendar..

And wouldn't your kids just want to be at home sometimes instead of being dashed about every weekend? Downtime is just as important.

Why do you feel the need to have them being 'busy' all the time?
Why can't they be bored and just spend time at home?

It was the complete lack of interaction. The parents paid no attention whatsoever to the child. Completely different to be looking at a book together, completely different to be looking at something on the phone together and talking.

And I’m sure you’d be complaining if they hadn’t given the 2-year-old the phone and he/she was running round the restaurant screaming, bashing into your table. Honestly when I go out to a restaurant and see a toddler on a device I think thank fuck, my nice quiet meal won’t be disrupted 🤣
Also, maybe they never get a chance to have a nice meal just the two of them because they can’t get childcare so have to take the kid with them. Maybe the rest of the day he’s not on any device and is fully engaging with his parents. It’s not bad parenting to want to have some quiet adult time, people no longer have ‘the village’ to entertain their child whenever they want. It’s all on the parents. Kids also don’t have the attention span to sit quietly at a table for an hour and have a conversation. Without the device he’d just be running around disturbing other diners. The parents are being considerate to other customers by providing their child with entertainment in a space that it’s very hard to entertain a child without being disruptive to other people

Ironically it's exhausting for your kids to be dashed about every weekend doing sports competitions.

Awful, OP. Judge away, I'm with you. We sat at a cafe on the seafront this Sunday morning, gorgeous day and the beach just a few metres away. A man arrived with three children, the oldest a girl of around 8, and two young boys who were very lively and noisy. The father told them they couldn't go and run around on the beach, told his daughter to supervise the boys, then got his phone out and spent the next half hour scrolling while his daughter did the parenting. The boys were running wild around other tables, chasing seagulls, shrieking, while she tried to get them to behave. He pretended he wasn't there. Bastard.

Personally I can’t think of anything worse than children being given a screen to entertain themselves. I bet you could think of at least one or two things worse than screens though, if you attempted to think really, really hard.

Maybe but out and let your daughter parent her own children.

So you're more concerned what people think, than having a quiet, well behaved child to deal with? It would be lovely if all children toed the line and behaved themselves in public and only spoke when spoken to, yadda yadda....the fact is, some kids need a distraction, at the airport for example or waiting in line for that, I'm not going to apologise for giving them a device rather than having a stroppy, loud child wreaking havoc..... In the OPs case, yes that snapshot of interaction seems sad, however that's a very blasé comment from you, I hope none of your grand children have additional needs.

It IS utterly depressing. And it's Mum's too. I see many women pushing prams and pushchairs, where the baby is forward facing and the Mum is on her phone. Just fucking put it away! When my kids were little, we always had pushchairs that faced us, and we would talk whilst walking - pointing out things, like cows/sheep/trees - whatever - never see that these days.

Me and DH were in a restaurant recently, and we were the only 2 people not staring at a phone. The table next to us, was Mum, Dad and a girl of about 8 years old. Both parents doom scrolling and the little girl had her forehead on the table as she had no one to talk to. Honestly, I could have tipped their table over and hit them round the head with it. WAKE UP!!!! You fucking Zombies!!!!

Was the baby facing her or outward facing? My baby went through a phase of only napping in the pram. So I’d turn it outwards facing and walk until she slept.

I absolutely did go on my phone a lot of this time.

Mostly because it was the only time I was getting any semblance of my own time at all and the alternative was to go slightly mad. Also my baby couldn’t see me on my phone as they were outward facing, and needed quiet so no interaction so they could sleep.

And I’m sure you’d be complaining if they hadn’t given the 2-year-old the phone and he/she was running round the restaurant screaming, bashing into your table. Honestly when I go out to a restaurant and see a toddler on a device I think thank fuck, my nice quiet meal won’t be disrupted 🤣

Why would it be one or the other? 🥴 Ours are early 20s, so screens weren’t a thing. We took them to restaurants all the time. We talked, played and interacted with them. They never once ran, screamed or bashed anything. We taught them how to behave. If we wanted adult time, we arranged child care.

My previous comment also goes to @Blondiebeachbabe. A forward facing pram once a day for nap time doesn’t mean a forward facing pram for every outing.

I can't believe it either. Surely there's nothing so important on your phone whilst your child is intermittently choking ffs

I think parents who usually engage but are using screen as a temporary diversion, won’t be able to help but pay intermittent attention to what the child is doing - that’s how they parent. That’s not what’s being described here. It looks different.

Oh and saw a Mum recently scrolling as she walked. It was a very busy road. Her toddler was so far behind, that I could have stopped the car, abducted him, and she would have been non the wiser. Or he could have walked into the road. Zero fucks given. Lazy, lazy, lazy.