I don’t think we’re saying that children should never ever be heard here.
It’s very obvious when it’s a child having a bad time and just cranky and overwhelmed and when it’s a child that in someone else’s eloquent phrase “has become a little tyrant”.
The former is understandable, if still somewhat irritating, and imho, most reasonable adults view that parent with some degree of sympathy and understanding.
Obviously common sense has to prevail, and obviously we can’t yank our kids out of the public view at every unlovely peep they utter, but there ARE things that a parent can do to train the obnoxious spoiled behaviour out of a child to a great degree (and it should have gone without it being said that sometimes kids are going to be kids).
But too many parents take the “kids will be kids” to the NTH degree and basically let their little monsters run wild in public. THAT is what we’re speaking of here.
To hill o beans, I only had to do this a few times and luckily it was when the cart was not really very full, I told the clerk, who called his manager on their little phone. And yes, you’re right, it’s not going to make much sense to a 2 year old an hour after the incident, which is why I would tell them in the car as soon as we’d left, something to the effect of “oh bummer, now we can’t have peanut butter sandwiches”. And not mean about it either, just disappointed WITH the child and age appropriate too.
Of course a 2 year old won’t understand a long lecture as to why her behaviour was unacceptable, but a short “I’m (mommy is) sad because I wanted to get bread for you so you could have a sandwich, etc” and then end of story is pretty sufficient.
Also, bring in the reinforcements!!! Grandma, Aunts, older siblings, Dad etc, that way, if they’re misbehaving, you don’t HAVE to leave the store, you can have one of the “troops” nab them and take them out to the car.
Again, if you pre-plan some of your (collective you) shopping (or whatever brings out the monster in your child) trips specifically to be “social training” trips, you’ll be SO happy you did!
I remember once being beaten and kicked by MY little three year old monster all the way to the gate of the state fair, because he was cranky and didn’t want to go, it was REALLY, HORRIBLY embarrassing, as he screamed and chased me and kicked at and hit me (he was very spoiled by dad at that point and hadn’t quite learned that MOM had different ideas of what was acceptable behaviour). It was partly my fault as we’d stayed too long having fun, (he had been an angel til about the last half an hour and then the tyrant just CRASHED in on us).
I was not about to give in to his insistance on NOT telling me what sort of pop he wanted (his way of trying to drag his feet on leaving), so I finally said “fine, they have root beer and orange, decide now or go without”. At which he pulled the bratty “mom punch”.
I snagged him up and marched out of the fair area toward parking. He proceeded to hit and pummel me, so finally I put him down and started walking. He chased me, running up and kicking at me and hitting me all the way out of the gate where I grabbed him again and headed for the car.
I absolutely HATE spanking. I don’t have some Dr. Phil-esque thing against it, it just always was, in the words of my dad, “harder on me than on the kid”. Anyway, despite his temper tantrum, we were leaving and that was that.
When we got to the car, I had aNOTHER battle holding him snugly in my arms to make him settle down into his car seat.
The funny part (oh, BELIEVE me, it was NOT funny then, I thought I would die of embarrassment), was that he was asleep before we ever left the parking lot.
BUT, that was one of the last times he ever really pulled a big tantrum, there were a few mini-tantrums after that, but usually at home.
BTW, he’s thirteen now, and I can already count on the “fair story” as blackmail when girls are around 