Children having their own seat on a packed train.

[user1493559472]

I am on a packed train. A child who is about 3 years old is sat in their own seat and not on the parents lap, would you ask to sit down and the child sits on parents lap? People were standing.
Thank you

Yes, of course it is, within the role of a parent of a 3 year old.

A three year old is clearly a vulnerable person. A parent's role is to guide and instruct. A parent is able to take a holistic view of the needs of the child . And the reason the parent is given this legal and moral duty is because their child is physically less capable and not capable of living autonomously without parental guidance.

So, yes, I think it is fine to model selfless behaviour to my three year old. I think not doing so is an abdication of parental responsibility.

Gosh, what a warped view of parental care.

This is your caveat: "with a high risk of an upset child making their discomfort known plus another person sitting next to them likely getting kicked as the three-year old wriggles."

This is not inevitable.

The fact you think a tired upset three year old is ‘badly behaved’ says it all,

You said that, not me. My experience with my three children (all well over three years old now) is not what you described.

But modelling selfless behaviour would be you giving your seat up for a stranger surely?

What within that post do you disagree with and why?

It would be selfless, but it wouldn't improve the average comfort on the train carriage.

Instead of them standing and me sitting, I would be standing and they would be sitting. No change.

In my scenario, all three of us are sitting. In my experience, this is not a major sacrifice for me or my three year old (we may be a little less comfortable, although the benefit is we can also have a cuddle).

It's not good manners to make yourself and your child very uncomfortable for a journey, it's being a martyr

I do think people aren't thinking about this at all from the POV of the three year old. Sat in their own seat, they can talk to their parent, their parent can read to them or play simple games. Sat on their lap, all they can see is the seat in front of them, they cannot easily look at a book or anything.

Grown adults don't do that on train journeys, they have headphones/play on their phone etc, why do we expect 2-4 year olds to manage to be content with it?

With my primary age children, I will make them budge up so we are three to a double seat is the train is very busy - because that isn't actually very uncomfortable and we can all still read which is what we tend to do on train journeys.

But I didn't take my 3-4 year olds on my lap just to make some random able bodied adult happy and I won't apologise for it

No I wouldn’t, because I wouldn’t ask ANYONE for a seat. If someone gives me one I’m grateful, but if not, it is what it is.

That children are less important than adults, as stated already.

But if your child gets fractious and squirms like mine would have done and potentially starts crying - that isn’t increasing the comfort of the train is it?

I would absolutely have moved my child for a cuddle if I thought it was conducive to everyone being comfortable. If I thought my child would be far more uncomfortable by moving them and would be very difficult for me on a packed train then I wouldn’t. I’m not going to martyr myself for other people. I would be really angry with a parent who moved their child and that child started crying because of it and distuebed everyone else.

Two people sitting in one seat isn't remotely close to two people actually each having a seat.

I think I’m putting forward a realistic scenario based on my experience of journeys with small kids on trains (both mine and friends/families).
Just out of curiosity how often did you travel on journeys of say 1 hour plus with your kids on public transport when they were toddlers?

It's not the same, no. It's a bit less comfortable. But three year olds are... small children.

Not very often.

Why is this a journey of one hour plus?

but many 5 year olds are pretty big and heavy and hard to have on a lap for several hours

also there are people on this thread who think any child of any age should be made to get up and offer their seat to an able bodied adult.

Because as per my earlier post I think it’s super reasonable for parents to budge up for short journeys but not for longer ones. You responded that I was being pessimistic and I just wondered if that came from actual experience or more an ideal of how it should work. I used to take my toddlers regularly on 1-2 hour train journeys (at least monthly, sometimes more frequently) so when I say I don’t think it makes sense for long journeys I’m saying it based on doing a few different things with the eldest and figuring out what typically worked

I would absolutely have moved my child for a cuddle if I thought it was conducive to everyone being comfortable

Excellent. Then I think we are in agreement.

Yes, five year olds are. But I have constantly been referencing three year olds.

And where in that post do I say children are less important than adults?

so you wouldn’t move your 4 year old? selfless modelling of behaviour only goes until the age of 4?

I mean, isn't it pretty obvious that the way you model behaviour is different as children age??

At some point, a child becomes too big to sit on your lap. At three, in my experience, cuddling a child on your lap is doable. At twenty-three, it will not be. I don't think this is rocket science.

It's absurd to make this about age.

Some 5 year olds are the size of 3 year olds and vice versa

Also TBH for me the age thing goes the other way entirely - once my younger one turned 5, he was able to read by himself and to understand the need to budge up on a train. At 3, he wasn't. As he was a relatively large 3 year old and I don't have the arms of Mr Tickle, I would have had to stop reading to him on the train journeys to have him on my lap and he would not have been old enough to understand why a random able bodied person was important enough to disrupt that

I'm not making this about age!

The whole thread is about three year olds! Someone else started talking about five year olds.

Of course, all children are different but three year olds are mostly smaller than five year olds!

No the thread is about children having their own seats on trains. The OP mentions that there was a 3 year old in her example but the discussion title was specifically the general question.

You directly contrasted an overtired upset child with a well behaved child, clearly implying an overtired upset child is badly behaved.