Right. I’m going to call the police at 2 in the morning on a Friday night because there’s a dog barking in my neighborhood. I’m annoyed, not psychotic.
Shrug. You were the one complaining, I merely gave you the realistic options.
Nobody has ever denied that there are annoying and obnoxious people out there, of all ages. If there weren’t annoying people, the BBQ Pit wouldn’t exist. But you seem to be absolutely surrounded by annoying kids - your have terrible neighbours, you are constantly exposed to screaming kids on planes and in restaurants and on vacation - it seems like you can hardly leave your house without encountering these awful modern kids who are nothing like the perfect angel you were as a child.
Either you’re the unluckiest person in the world, or you’re just looking for things to be annoyed about. I’ve lived in and traveled to many places and have somehow not encountered this enormous pack of demon spawn that you see all around you. The occasional bratty obnoxious kid, sure, but not the constant onslaught that you apparently live with.
Also, if you have a noise ordinance in your neighbourhood then I fail to see how barking dogs would be illegal while loud screaming children are legal. It’s about the noise level (and often the time of day), not the source. Why don’t you follow your own advice and call the cops or pound on the door when you are troubled by the kids next door?
I reckon she’s just damned unlucky. 
Oh, forgot to add: the rest of the human-race (for the most part) seems to take annoyances and shit in their stride. It’s part of living in this wonderful and tumultuous world that we share together…the good stuff and the crap that pisses us off. Most of us shrug aside the crap, unless it seriously threatens our health or livelihood. Alas for curlcoat, every noise from a child, every vision of one and even the mere fact they exist seems to assault her very being.
It must be so hard to be her.
Well, she apparently is the sort of person who calls the police for minor noise issues, so, yes.
I suggest you read through the BBQ Pit and see how many people don’t actually take “annoyances and shit in their stride” on a regular basis. Why is it everyone can bitch about lousy drivers and stupid customers but bitching about horrid children is verboten?
I think, if you read the thread, and the linked one (or heck, knock yourself out and click on “find all posts by curlcoat”), you’ll see that it’s way beyond “bitching about an annoyance”.
I’m regularly angry at loud/inconsiderate kids (and their laissez-faire parents), but curly’s objections are “a whole ‘nother kettle o’ fish”… err, minnows.
Meh, in most complaint threads there are some people on the ‘kill them all!’ side and some on the ‘live and let live’ side (and some in the middle), no matter what the topic. Unless you have a really cut-and-dried issue, there are always going to be people who think you are over- or under-reacting, and people who want to tell you how they would have dealt with things differently. Bitching about children is not a special case, no matter how much the OP thinks it is.
Regardless, as **digs **says, curlcoat’s complaints go way, way beyond ordinary annoyance. Every fiber of her being is consumed with a burning hatred for children and anything associated with them (e.g. pregnant women).
Think about it this way - if someone wrote a single thread about some jackass who cut them off in traffic, most people would probably sympathize, a few would tell the poster to chill out, and that would be it. But if someone started thread after thread after thread about getting cut off in traffic, if they jumped into any thread that mentioned cars and railed against those bastards who cut people off, if they bitched endlessly about how much worse drivers are now than they were 50 years ago…well, I’m guessing that most sympathy for them would quickly evaporate. At some point, the only reasonable conclusion is a) this person is themselves a terrible driver, b) this person has an incredibly low tolerance for normal minor day-to-day interaction, or c) this person is bizarrely and improbably unlucky.
Yanno…I don’t usually post in threads that are pitting other dopers…but I’m going to speak up now.
I don’t think that curlcoat has a burning hatred of children. I think she is honestly confused. She has little or no experience with children, but she breeds, trains and shows dogs. She probably starts training her puppies as soon as their eyes are open. She is used to instant obedience, and doesn’t understand why children…who are smarter than dogs…won’t follow the rules.
That said…I like** curlcoat**. All of my interactions with her have been positive. I think she has a fun sense of humor and gives good advice.
It isn’t legal for children to be standing around outside screaming loudly enough to be heard indoors at 2 AM, not in any town or city I’ve ever lived in.
Then the problem is getting existing law enforced. The problem is too many parents expect all these exceptions to common decency be made for their children while offering nothing in return. I’ve had a few neighbors with noisy kids. The only thing that convinced them to cooperate on keeping the noise level of their brats down was a few all-night parties that featured my husband’s friends who playing very profane heavy metal.
My mother used to gag us to prevent screaming fits. It works very well.
Because children are considered little gods and goddesses in the mainstream American culture and nothing can be done to curb their obnoxious behavior.
Obviously.
Well, duh. That’s true of most laws. In the heirarchy of routinely broken laws, “kids screaming outside” isn’t even in the top 50 problems we have to solve. I’ve been nearly killed by some idiot who ignored traffic laws a lot more often than I’ve nearly been killed by a screaming kid, but as near as I can tell half of all traffic-related laws are completely or partially unenforced, and the police largely won’t even bother taking complaints.
Screaming kids at 2 am as mentioned? I doubt that’s what you’re actually claiming. I’m guessing it was more the noisy kids that provoked your metal wrath were chasing around and shouting at 8 pm or so.
No idea about laws where you live, of course, but I feel confident that if I called the police at 2 am about screaming kids, they’d arrive sooner than if I was complaining about a loud party at 2 am-- kids could be in danger. Kids playing at 8 pm not so much. If I called about that, I don’t think the police would come at all because, 1) noise ordinance kicks in at 10 pm and 2) kids should get outside and play, so suck it up, sunshine.
Well, yeah, to adults.
You know, I live in a very quiet neighborhood now, and if I had lived here all my life I would probably be as skeptical as some of you are about the notion of children screaming (not playing; yelling at the TOP OF THEIR LUNGS for a very long time (20 or 30 minutes) in the middle of the night. I would invite you to my old house in LA so you could experience it for yourselves but the new lady who lives in our old house (and who doubtless sleeps with ear plugs) probably wouldn’t like it.
And there are these places called parks where they can scream and yell. Plenty of people in my neighborhood (and in my house) work nights and graveyards shifts, so having it reasobably quiet at all times is important. This particular pair of asshole parents couldn’t understand that which is why the heavy metal apocalypse party was a particularly appropriate response. They got a taste of their own medicine in the form of a very sleepless night and a warning that it would continue until they learned to control their brats.