Actually, not for me. I don’t see anything wrong with the ticket at all, since there is a law and we live with the laws (as much as some of us dislike them, I still think we should follow them). The only arguement I got into was over the fact that some citizens (not officers of the law) would like to tell off the parents for not belting in their kids. The ticket is not the problem at all, it’s the private citizens in my face I have a problem with. Like if I walked up to you and said ‘you really shouldn’t let you kid _______, it’s not safe’. You as a parent would think (I’m guessing) shut up, I’ll decide what’s safe, resenting the implication.
Just out of curiosity… this is for those of you who are of the non-interferance mindset:
If you saw a parent severely beating a child, would you do anything?
If you saw your neighbors hitting their kids all the time, and those same kids were always covered with cuts and bruises… would you do anything?
Yes, we have a system in place for removing kids from unfit parents… take a wild guess how that system finds the kids in need? Bingo! From people who care enough to say something.
Short story:
A few years back a 5 month old baby with 20 broken bones was removed from her parents in Tucson. The bones were all in various states of healing, so it was a case of repeated beatings, not one incident. I suppose you would have minded your own business… it’s a damn good thing someone didn’t, and that girl was helped before she was killed.
[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by tradesilicon *
**
I think this quote reinforces the point that Diane was making. In situations where the behavior that is criticized is bad “in the eye of the beholder”, we should mind our own business. Such as if I tell you that you shouldn’t feed your kids pizza because it has too much fat, but you think the veggies and cheese on it are nutritious.
However, in a situation where safety is an issue and there is a clear right/wrong, you’re damn straight we should speak up. If I tell you that you should buckle your kids in, am I wrong? Of course not. You’re the asshole if you’re not strapping them in, and I have every right to tell you so.
As an afterthought, I meant to say the person who would say that in trade’s quote was the asshole, not you, trade.
OpalCat, you are talking about a completely different situation here. If I routinely saw a neighborhood kid getting abused, of course I would report it. But that’s very different from sticking your head into someone else’s car that you’ve never seen before and yelling because their kids are unbelted. Diane, after reviewing the thread, I think that is the specific behavior that tradesilicon is talking about.
[digression]My 10-year-old cousin has a large birthmark on his face. My aunt was once visited by the police because some woman in a parking lot decided that it was a bruise and called the cops. It was fortunately nontraumatic for my cousin, because he was asleep when the cops arrived. But where does she get off leaping to conclusions and sending in the police like that? [/digression]
Similarly, how do you know that the driver of the car is not attempting to get off the road safely so that he can read the kids the riot act? Furthermore, do you really believe that anyone who lets their kids ride around unbelted is going to have his behavior changed by other drivers’ yelling at him on the road? The point is that the behavior does absolutely no good, and is invasive of another’s privacy. There is a reasonable justification for invading the privacy of others in order to prevent the endangerement of children, but yelling at random strangers does not accomplish that goal, or any goal except venting your own frustration.
Which is apparently acceptable for others but not for me…
Well when they live in the same apartment complex you do, and you see them, day after day, pile into the car and take off… and then arrive home… always unbuckled… it’s pretty obvious. When the highway is free and clear for miles, and the parents are singing along to the radio or laughing with each other, and the kid is just bouncing around the back seat… it’s pretty obvious.
Look, I’m not saying that giving analogies is bad, I’m saying that I don’t think the one you gave is accurate. Obviously, I also gave an analogy that has nothing to do with seatbelts. Further, you did not previously give any details to suggest that the parents not belting their kids are people you see all the time.
I nevertheless stand by my contention that yelling at them may vent your frustration, but it does nothing to actually remedy the situation. And if yelling isn’t going to accomplish anything, I agree with tradesilicon that you shouldn’t do it.
My inclination is to break their arms, and tell them to try again. My actions would be to stop the bunghole, and call the police.
If I saw it once, it would be enough. See above for reaction.
I draw a very clear line between violence and negligence. Ah well, maybe it’s not so clear.
Finally getting back to this:
I actually am fairly open to suggestions from other people if they are not presented in an insulting manner. I tend to get defensive if someone implies that I am an idiot and in that vein I would be likely to tell someone to shut up.
At one time I hovered around a temporarily distracted mother in WalMart whose child was precariously close to falling out of the shopping cart onto the hard floor. This mother thanked me. Another time I did something similar at Target, and the mother had the MYOB type of response. In both cases, the child didn’t fall out of the cart, and I like to think that I helped prevent that from happening.
I would think if a person really wanted parents to change their minds about the carseat thing, yelling and name-calling would have little positive effect, but some other method might work.
As I have said numerous times in this thread, I am NOT going to fuck off and only worry about myself no matter how many times you tell me not to. I’ll do whatever the hell I want.
Comprehende’ yet Doofus?
I’ll make it simple.
Diane see bad parent.
Diane tell bad parent to make kid safer.
Diane not care if you not like her to talk to bad parent.
Diane tell you that she will still tell bad parent not to be bad to kids.
Diane say her penis is bigger than your penis and she not even have a penis.
Diane call you a stupid ass.
I’ll ask again since you still haven’t satisfied my question - Do you have a point you are trying to make or do you just enjoy spewing bullshit across the board. Make a point in this debate or shut the fuck up.
Okie dokie?
Diane, everyone on the board except you (and maybe OpalCat) has figured out that the point tradesilicon is trying to make is that you have no business yelling at parents you see at stoplights, and that you should mind your own damn business. Apparently, you don’t mind acting like an asshole at stoplights, because somewhere, sometime, in some mystical other universe, maybe you could save a child’s life. Well, maybe I could save your child’s life by telling you to learn that if you attempt to change the entire world by yelling at people one by one, all you will do is make yourself so overstressed that you will probably die of a heart attack at a young age and leave him motherless. But if I told you that, you could rightfully tell me to fuck off, because it’s none of my damn business.
Tell me, have you ever changed any facet of your behavior whatsoever because some other driver yelled at you at a stoplight? If not, then what makes you think you can cop some sanctimonious holier-than-thou attitude about your own behavior? Every post you make makes it clearer just how severe your rectocranial inversion has become.
ENugent - Speaking only for myself, I never scream or yell at a parent to buckle up their kids. If they are driving down the freeway, I just catch their eye, tug on my shoulder strap, and point to their kids. I usually do it with a smile even though I am disgusted. It isn’t hard to figure out what I am trying to get across.
If they are at a light next to me, I will say politely, “I don’t know if you noticed, but your kid must have gotten out of his seatbelt”. They know and I know that the kid wasn’t in the belt to begin with, but they usually thank me right before they tell the kid to buckle up.
Of all the times I have done this, I have only had one mother get pissy with me (she had three toddlers climbing back and forth from the front seat to the back seat). I told her in these exact words, “Look MOM, either buckle up those kids NOW or I report you”. I guess she was dumb enough to think I really could do something about it because she started buckling them up before the light changed.
Did I care that I pissed her off? Hell no. If it saved one of their lives or even prevented a bump on the nose from a quick stop, then it was worth it.
ENugent - Everyone? EVERYONE??? Huh, interesting. :rolleyes:
Who says I act like an asshole at lights?
Diane, I have no problem with any of the behavior you describe (well, the “look, Mom, buckle them up or I’ll report you” is borderline, but I’ll overlook it since you were polite the first time). My only problem with you at this point is your past unwillingness to read what tradesilicon was saying and attempt to understand his point of view, and especially your telling him to shut up when he was the one making polite and rational arguments.
-
I have read what Trade has written and I do understand it. I just don’t agree with it.
-
I told Stofsky to shut the hell up, not Trade. I’ll continue to flame Stofsky as long as I think he is talking out his ass.
-
Hi Opal.
I would still like clarification on the “everyone” claim, as I can go back and count a half dozen or more who don’t agree with him.
Trade’s post was about how he didn’t think it was right for people to yell at parents at stoplights. If you come back and say, “don’t you dare tell me what to do,” the inference that you yell at parents at stoplights is pretty strong. Now that you’ve clarified that you don’t, I’ve stated that I don’t have a problem with your behavior, just with your debating style.
Having gone back over the thread, I’ll also withdraw “everyone.” I attributed some posts to you and OpalCat that were in fact made by others. But I do see posts by quite a number of people who agree with tradesilicon, as well, so I think a self-righteous belief that anyone who disagrees with you is an idiot is unwarranted.
sulking, sniveling, and pouting that no one has seen fit to address any of the points in her own post
I’d have to say that I do think this is different. The parent who is beating the snot out of their kid is directly harming a child. Not seatbelting them in is *leaving open the potential * for a child to be harmed. There is a difference, clearly smaller in some folks’ judgment than in others.
What I was saying is that most parents take risks at some point or another. What differs is which risks they take. What also differs is whether outsiders judge parents’ risks to be dangerous enough to warrant outside interference.
Obviously, just because I see a difference here does not mean I am indifferent to the plight of babies like that 5-month old you described.
It’s be interesting (to me, anyway) to draw up a list of risky behaviors (behaviors that potentially endangered a child) and see if we agreed on the reactions to take. For example, a pregnant smoker. I know people who would gladly shove the lighted thing up the mom’s ass. Others would disapprove but not say anything.
We saw a bunch of yahoos at the truck stop a couple of weeks ago. Mom, Fido, and about 6 kids were riding in the back of the pick-up, in 95 degree heat, under a tarp. We lost no time in getting their plate number and reporting their inbred Beanie-weenie eating asses.
Road rage being what it is these days, I have a tendency to try and avoid contact with other drivers. A simple dirty look one day resulted in one sonuvabitch tailgating me halfway home, shouting and making obscene gestures. He didn’t go away until I drove to the police station.
My two year old has a nifty little conversion booster that holds up to 60 pounds. Right now it has a five point harness, and when she outgrows that it has guides for the shoulder belt to run through to make sure it’s positioned properly. Now all I have to do is try to buy a car that was made in the last ten years so the back seat will have a shoulder belt. I too have seen those little pads that are supposed to wrap around the belt so it’s not cutting into the little one’s neck; call me paranoid, but I’m not trusting Velcro to stop my kid from flying through the windshield. If they’re too short for the car’s seatbelt, then they need a booster.
I think that would be interesting also, because everyone’s list would be different. An acquaintance from Sweden told me that in her country, it is against the law to spank a child. Here in the US I don’t think that is illegal anywhere, but the difference of opinion so far is merely that, a difference, and not (yet?) on different sides of the law.
And you make a good point about the difference between potential risk and someone pounding the crap out of their child.
No, it’s called jumping to conclusions based upon things other posters have said opposed to the things I have stated. It also says a little bit about reading skills.
In case you haven’t noticed, this is the Pit. If the rules here have changed, I didn’t get the memo. If you don’t like my debating style, skip over my posts. All you have to do is look for the Diane lable. Simple, eh?
If I feel that I have been rude or too strong with someone, I will apologize. On the other hand, if I think someone is being an asshole, I’ll tell them.