I don't appreciate little children telling me how to cross a road

The BBQ Pit
1

When you start paying my taxes, then maybe you can tell me how to cross the street. Until then, keep your gob shut, m’kay?

So I went for a walk in my neighbourhood, all unaware that it’s time for kids to be released from the zoo (I don’t have kids, and have no idea about what times they do stuff). As I’m walking home, I cross the street in the crosswalk, looking for traffic, the usual. As I get across the street, a seven year old boy tells me, in a snotty tone, “Cross with the patrol next time.” Um, what patrol? That girl over there who’s busy setting up traffic cones (for what reason, I don’t know)? So how is this supposed to work - I stand around on the corner, waiting for some child to get their shit together so that they can escort me across the street? Not going to happen. Not today, and not next time.

Let me say before someone jumps down my throat, that I would have waited and crossed with a patrol if there had been one standing there. I suppose that there are rules that school patrols are taught - like I said, I have no kids, and I really don’t know what goes on with patrol crossings. I suppose they’re also taught to tell adults how to cross properly. That they can ease up on - little Johnny there just about caught an earful.

2

Little Johnny is also 7 years old. You, presumably, are much older, and (also presumably) have learned proper syntax and etiquette by now. Johnny probably thought he was doing you a favor.

Just let it go, man. This is a spectacularly weak Pitting.

3

Featherlou
We adults already know that crossing the street requires making sure that you don’t die while doing it.

A seven year old could be easily distracted by the fact that he’s recently gained freedom from the classroom and could forget that survival thing.

It might be annoying to you, but I’m glad the kid is such a believer in the crossing guard that he pits an adult for not complying.

If you’re in that situation again just smile sweetly at the little brat and say, “Bite me, Shrimp!”

Bubba

4

My sympathies. My niece seems to have inherited my brother’s (yeah, my brother’s, not mind, that’s it, that’s the ticket) know-it-all tendancies, and it’s getting damned annoying.

Yes, thank you, I am aware that I normally walk the Princess Penny-dog with her harness, but today I was in a hurry. Yes, I’m aware that she really doesn’t like to walk with her leash on her collar, but today I was in a hurry! Get off my back! When you walk her (which I haven’t seen you get off your lazy butt to do), you can fight with that blasted harness to your little heart’s content.

Better yet, why don’t we go get a muzzle - and I don’t mean for the dog!

5

Geez, little Johnny needs to be cut a bit of slack here. The poor kid was probably under the misapprehension that the rules that apply to schoolkids (you must NEVER cross at the crossing without permission from the guard) applies to all people at all times. He’s had this dictum drummed into him from his first day at school/kindergarten and probably doesn’t have the worldly experience to be able to understand that such rules are not universal.

I don’t understand why on earth you could be upset by his ‘advice’. :confused:

6

I agree with kambuckta. Why on earth get so upset with a seven-year-old who takes what he’s been assigned to do seriously (and bravo to him)?

No. If you’d given him an earful, that would have made you less of an adult, and more of an ass.

7

I sympathize with the OP. Oh, for the days of “seen and not heard.”

Seldom seen, for preference.

8

I don’t think the issue is that Johnny Rotten was giving advice to an adult, I think it’s the tone of the sprog put forth by the OP.
Compare:
“Why didn’t you wait for the crossing guard?”
<in a snotty tone>“Cross with the patrol next time!”

Sure, kids aren’t always down with the whole etiquette thing, but they should at least know not to be snotty (the OP’s word, not mine) to an adult…especially a stranger.
For instance, I’m a smoker. I’ve had 7, 8, 9 & 10 year old kids coming up to me out of the blue, and saying, in a very rude tone, “You shouldn’t smoke!”
My response is, in a very polite tone (but with an evil grin), " And you shouldn’t talk to strangers."
Bottom line is, sure–let kids speak, let them be heard. But for dog’s sake, they’d better be polite, or they’ll get an earful.

9

I guess I wasn’t clear - the kid was the crossing guard. And maybe it shouldn’t have bothered me, but it did. I don’t much like being told what to do by a seven year old. I evaluated the situation, I decided that the crossing guards weren’t in effect yet because the one on my side of the street hadn’t taken position yet, and I crossed the street. I assumed that he hadn’t evaluated the situation in as much depth as I had, and just gave me his pat answer of “Cross with the patrol next time”, which I felt was not valid in this situation. Rather than spend the time to discuss the pros and cons of crossing guards with a seven year old, I took my peeve to the Pit. And yes, it is a very small peeve in the grand scheme of things, but dammit, it’s MY peeve.

10

Sounds like the kid was snotty about it. I don’t blame you for feeling peeved. There are ways to get your point across without being snotty about it. Sure, he’s seven, but does that automatically make him not snotty? I don’t think so. Snotty is snotty, and it’s human nature to not take kindly to snottiness.

Besides, I doubt that the only thing saving you from imminent death on the highways was this seven-year-old kid.

11

Heh. My response when a schoolbus full of 13-year-olds yelled out the window that I shouldn’t smoke was to flip them the bird.

Hey, they need to start learning early what the proper response to unsolicited advice from strangers is.

12

First, to tackle the big issue, what the hell is a 7 year old doing as a crossing guard in the first place? The whole point of a crossing guard is to be sort of the mature head in a potential crisis. Hell, some of the larger vehicles that sit up high (not to throw stones at the sacred SUV cow) probably can’t even see the little tike.

Moreover, this whole incident speaks to the astonishing lack of respect for adults that kids are learning these days. Hell, in my day there was an obvious and monolithic double standard. Adults had earned the right to make their own choices and do as they please. That right was a nebulous and far off goal for my childhood psyche. The very concept of correcting an adult would have been akin to inviting Og to unleash the lightning and smite me. These were all powerful beings that knew what the fuck they were on about and it was my job to keep my pie hole shut, observe their arcane ways and hope beyond hope that one day I would join their mysterious and powerful ranks.

I say you should have bitch slapped the little fuck. That would teach him an invaluable life lesson.

Kids today. :rolleyes:

13

Though your responses have been varied, I must agree with your feelings about what went down.

When my sister was still in elementary school, I would occasionally go to pick her up when I was home from college. A short walk from our house (and a rather big housing development) to the school and one street to cross that, at school’s start and finish, is exceptionally well-guarded by the powerful authorities that are bestowed on volunteer neighborhood mothers.

Look, bitch, I’m twenty fucking years old (or was, at the time). I will not wait for you to clear the damn crosswalk and prance out there with your stupid orange flag and ridiculous yellow vest, despite how important you may think it is that you do all that.

Her job is not to save my ass. Her job is to leave me the fuck alone. My parents were’nt idiots and taught their kids to look both ways before crossing, and by this time in my life, I have finally figured out how to not die in a crosswalk.

Why does this person even exist? I know kids in my neighborhood have no fear of playing in the street. Are they no longer told to look both ways?

And what about about talking to strangers? What about being a little shit and pissing off a stranger?

14

Now, for the most part, I’m not overly-fond of kids. I really only like my own kids. I can tolerate other peoples’ kids. I get along okay with friends’ kids. Kids in general, though - I avoid them. They’re a strange alien race. Actually, most of the problem is with the PARENTS, and I know this from experience - having watched them and all that good stuff.

But…you’re pitting a seven-year-old for telling you to cross with the crossing guard. Seven-year-olds aren’t exactly 100% on the deductive reasoning, and they’ll repeat things they have learned - especially if they are SAFETY issues - to anyone who’ll listen. They don’t think of these things as “things only kids have to do;” they are ABSOLUTES which everyone must follow or risk HORRIBLE BLEEDING DEATH. The kids aren’t thinking, “Oh, it is an adult. I must use a different set of standards when dealing with this adult, for s/he is far wiser in the ways of the world than I.” No. They are thinking, “You’ve gotta cross with the crossing guard or you could DIE because a SPEEDING CAR can come out of NOWHERE and RIP YOUR HEAD OFF!!!”

Also, the person who WROTE the original post later said that the seven-year-old was the crossing guard. I, um, doubt it. Crossing guards are either adults, or older kids - older in this case meaning 4th or 5th graders. If you have kids, you know how much difference two years makes in how much responsibility a kid can handle. So I doubt a seven-year-old was acting as the goddamned crossing guard.

Issue was taken with the TONE…as in "The snotty kid disrespectfully SNAPPED at me that I HAD to cross with the GUARD. Well…at a school crossing, with kids around…you should. Also, the kid might’ve spoken in a disrespectful tone because s/he figured that anyone who didn’t KNOW that (particularly considering the possibility of SUDDEN FLAMING DEATH) must be an idiot. And how much extra time would it have taken to wait and do so? 30 seconds? Maybe? “But I shouldn’t have to wait! I’m a grown-up!” Well, but you’re also there at the school crossing. You should set a good example. “That’s their PARENTS’ job.” Okay, their parents have to teach them EVERYTHING about social mores and you would prefer to set the example that, when you’re a grown-up, only PARENTS have to follow the rules.

Which would explain a lot of hostility toward kids, actually.

And, you know, a reasonable alternative (and one which I have used, when crossing with my kids without the guard) is, “You know, I’m an adult, so I already understand how to safely cross a street. Thank you, though.”

15

For what it’s worth, I think you got either the kid’s job or the kid’s age wrong – if he was really a crossing guard he wouldn’t have been 7 years old and if he was really 7 years old he wouldn’t have been a crossing guard. I’ve only seen crossing guards at elementary schools and the job is given to kids in the oldest grade at the school – 5th or 6th grade, usually. At my kid’s elementary school that was 5th grade and the job was awarded to “good” kids – decent grades, fairly responsible, etc. My son was a crossing guard. He’s almost 18 now, though, and I can’t remember what the rules were regarding grownups crossing with the guards. At any rate, I doubt they could have enforced any rules against grownups. Certainly the kids had to wait to be crossed, but they couldn’t make you wait, I wouldn’t think.

It sounds like the kid had a bit of a 'tude. You see this a lot in kids who think they’re smarter than you. To an extent, I blame this on TV sitcoms where the dumbest person in the show is always the grownup – usually the grownup man. Also on the fact that DARE programs and such encourage kids to ‘educate’ their elders about the evils of substance abuse, etc. At my house I battled mightily to convince my kids that both of these concepts were bullshit. Anyway, my response to the little Hitler-crossing-guard would have been, “I’m a grownup. I’m allowed to cross the road anytime I want. Children have to wait for the crossing guard, not grownups.”

16

A seven-year-old definately wouldn’t have been the crossing guard. I think the OP probably has the age wrong.

Anyway, I was in the safety patrol in 4th and 5th grade. I took it damned seriously, too. I was an agent of the law and a protector of the ‘little kids.’ I stood in the pouring rain an hour before school just in case some kid had to cross the street rather than get a rid from his parents.

I can’t believe someone would pit the safety patrol. These are kids volunteering for a thankless, often difficult job. They don’t get anything out of it and they certainly don’t deserve the attitude some of you people have towards them.

Heaven forbid we should teach our children responsibility at an early age. :rolleyes:

17

Well, we have 7 year olds as crossing guards- they are supervised by the ‘army of mom’. They are given instuctions to cross everyone during certain times.

The reason the adults need to be especially conscientious about ‘the rules’ for crosswalk safety is that they are setting an example for the literally hundreds of kids who are leaving school at that time. Since the age of the guard tells me it is an elementary school crossing, I wouldn’t think it would be difficult for you to at least attempt to set a good example for some kids for the occasional minute or two without getting your feathers all ruffled. Surely even the crankiest kid-hating curmudgeon wouldn’t really want to encourage small kids to neglect basic street safety during a busy driving time. I guess.

18

Exactly right. The only crossing guards I see around here are cops.

19

I could not agree more. Did the little darlins have the nifty orange belt with the shiny badge too? Yep, that first taste of power over your peers can be heady. Sometimes, one might even forget oneself and expect that power to overlap into reality, in this case, into the adult world. Perhaps a short retort referring to crossing guard poles and where the sun don’t shine might have restored the normal order of the world.

20

See. that’s where the difference lies, people who haven’t got kids, like me and the OP haven’t got heads filled with
“Omigod, there’s a random child, I must set it a good example”.
All parents are supposed to be wired in such a fashion - though some aren’t - and I wouldn’t be at all surprised if there were some non-parents who think this way. I’m not one of them, that’s all there is about it.

It would not occur to me in a million years that I was encouraging any child to do anything.
If that makes me a cranky kid-hating curmudgeon, then there isn’t a whole hell of a lot I can do about that, is there?

FWIW, anklebiters with big important, life-saving jobs such as being the school crossing warden should apply themselves to the job at hand, not remonstrate with passing adult strangers.

Just call me the poster girl for Curmudgeon Weekly.