# I pit crying babies in public places **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [January 25, 2010, 3:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-crying-babies-in-public-places/526368 "2010-01-25T15:52:08Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 11
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2010, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-crying-babies-in-public-places/526368/201 "2010-01-26T17:03:31Z")
> [@Clothahump](#): > > This Chili’s doesn’t provide crayons. My daughter worked there for three years as a hostess, which is why we still go there. Yes, they have high chairs. Yes, they have kids. Yes, sometimes the kids get unruly. But they, in all the times that we have been in there, have _never_ had a situation like that that was so badly mishandled to the point where we won’t go back again. > > And bottom line: yes, management dropped the ball but only after the parents had totally blown the situation out of the water. I’ve never been in a Chili’s that doesn’t provide crayons. I would assume that its the type of restaurant chain that I could take a child to and let them behave like relatively well behaved children - which I think this one is. But those parents DO sound like jerks. ---
**Author:** ![Fuji](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a9a28c/32.png) [@Fuji](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fuji)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2010, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-crying-babies-in-public-places/526368/202 "2010-01-26T17:03:56Z")
[quote=“tacoloco, post:200, topic:526368”] > [@Fuji](#): > > See, **tacoloco** , you retard? That’s how to use scare quotes.[/SIZE] > > Thanks, English Language Expert Person. :eek: No problem, vBulletin Expert Person. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2010, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-crying-babies-in-public-places/526368/203 "2010-01-26T17:05:06Z")
> [@Fuji](#): > > Ah. I figured you’d disagree. Maybe it’s a regional thing? I grew up in the Metro Boston area, and I see nothing wrong with occasionally answering rudeness in kind. Ever been to a Red Sox game? Plenty of opportunities there to practice what one preaches… No its not a regional thing. Answering rudeness with rudeness is always rude…even at at Red Sox game. Its just that rude people don’t care. (TA: And sometimes, its like justifiable homicide - maybe Miss Manners would convict you, but a jury of reasonable people wouldn’t). ---
**Author:** ![tacoloco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7993a0/32.png) [@tacoloco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tacoloco)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2010, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-crying-babies-in-public-places/526368/204 "2010-01-26T17:09:10Z")
[quote=“Fuji, post:202, topic:526368”] > [@tacoloco](#): > > No problem, vBulletin Expert Person. 😛 😛 ---
**Author:** ![MeanOldLady](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/meanoldlady/32/10737_2.png) [@MeanOldLady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MeanOldLady)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2010, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-crying-babies-in-public-places/526368/205 "2010-01-26T17:12:24Z")
> [@Dangerosa](#): > > No its not a regional thing. Answering rudeness with rudeness is always rude…even at at Red Sox game. Its just that rude people don’t care. There may be something to this regional thing. Coming from LA, the hyper-polite Minnesota nice thing caught me by surprise. “Fuck you,” in Los Angeles is a perfectly acceptable response to rude behavior, as is giving the bird to idiot drivers. In Minnesota, rudeness is best responded to with, “Goodness gracious! Wherever did you learn your manners?” I was in my car with a friend recently, and honked at some ass who thought it would be wise to dash in front of me, causing me to smash the brakes, on an icy road. My friend said, “I think that’s the first time I’ve heard a car horn in ten years.” Even honking a horn here is too rude for people! That’s what it’s there for! ---
**Author:** ![Fuji](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a9a28c/32.png) [@Fuji](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fuji)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2010, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-crying-babies-in-public-places/526368/206 "2010-01-26T17:13:03Z")
> [@Dangerosa](#): > > No its not a regional thing. Answering rudeness with rudeness is always rude…even at at Red Sox game. :dubious: Hmm… I don’t know about that. Remember, this is a town where at a downtown rally thousands maniacally chanted “Yankees Suck!” At a _Patriots_ rally, that is. ---
**Author:** ![villa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/bc79bd/32.png) [@villa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/villa)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2010, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-crying-babies-in-public-places/526368/207 "2010-01-26T17:22:48Z")
> [@Clothahump](#): > > And the parents need to be prepared for draconian action the first couple of times: when the child misbehaves, one parent _immediately_ takes the kid out to the car for a spanking while the other settles the bill and gets the food boxed up to go home. The child is specifically educated that their actions caused this result and they are sent straight to bed when they get home. This is where I lose sympathy for you. You don’t have the right, or the knowledge of that child, to determine how that child should be effectively disciplined by his parents. You do, I agree, have a right to insist that the child is removed if he or show won’t stop bawling. But to suggest I have some requirement to spank my child for disturbing your meal is ridiculous. My son, now almost 10, has acted up once in a restaurant to the degree that I had to take him home. But it sure as hell isn’t your business (provided I am starying within the law) how I disciplined him to ensure it was not repeated. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2010, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-crying-babies-in-public-places/526368/208 "2010-01-26T17:26:47Z")
> [@Shot\_From\_Guns](#): > > Speak of straw men, and they shall appear! I don’t think anyone here has contended that children should be excluded from public entirely. Then we evidently are not reading the same thread. > [@](#): > > We merely desire that when children are \*\*misbehaving \*\*in public (screaming, crying, running around the restaurant instead of staying seated at their table), that either (a) their parents should quiet them or remove them or (b) the management of the restaurant should ask the party to leave. Did anything I actually, you know, wrote in the post replying to you, contradict that?! > [@](#): > > Absolutely not. But when a child has been brought into public and starts misbehaving, they need to be corrected or removed. Otherwise, they’ll hardly learn what constitutes appropriate behavior, if there are no consequences for behaving poorly. That’s how it worked when I was a kid–if we started acting up, and didn’t immediately stop when corrected, especially if it was in such a way that we’d be disturbing other people, that was it. My parents would immediately request the bill, pack everything up, and hustle us to the car while apologizing profusely (ETA: to the staff, not to us kids, unless it was to apologize to the kid whose night out got ruined by the other one misbehaving). And I’m not some old fogey reliving the glory days–I was born in '83. My parents just had a modicum of common fucking decency and consideration for other people. Interesting that you feel the need to trumpet these virtues. Again, I wonder whose posts you have been reading - evidently not mine, since you apparently are of the opinion that you are arguing with me over these points. > [@](#): > > Honestly, I’m not sure what the confusion is here. Either you think that disruptive children should be corrected and removed, in which case you agree with us; **or you think that children should be allowed to do whatever they want in public as some kind of learning experience, no matter who else it inconveniences,** in which case you’re a fucking retard. The confusion is entirely on your part. You are seemingly of the opinion that I’ve advocated the position I’ve highlighted, and as a result have heaped on the abuse; which merely rebounds to your discredit, as being totally unwarranted. Tell you what: read the thread and find a single post in which I’ve taken a stance even remotely similar to the highlighted statement. If so, I’ll gladly consider you right, and say so. ---
**Author:** ![Muffin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muffin/32/4341_2.png) [@Muffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muffin)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2010, 5:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-crying-babies-in-public-places/526368/209 "2010-01-26T17:29:46Z")
> [@ZPG\_Zealot](#): > > A woman was arrested in my area who was prostituting her daughter at truck stops. This had been going on for many months, but she only only got caught after a waitress noticed how she took her daughter back to “look at the trucks” and the girl had a really negative look on her face at the prospect. ZPG, when some of us say that a parent should take a misbehaving child outside, I’m pretty confident in saying that we don’t mean take the child outside and prostitute her. ---
**Author:** ![MeanOldLady](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/meanoldlady/32/10737_2.png) [@MeanOldLady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MeanOldLady)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2010, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-crying-babies-in-public-places/526368/210 "2010-01-26T17:36:17Z")
> [@Muffin](#): > > ZPG, when some of us say that a parent should take a misbehaving child outside, I’m pretty confident in saying that we don’t mean take the child outside and prostitute her. Excellent. I L’d-O-L. ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2010, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-crying-babies-in-public-places/526368/211 "2010-01-26T17:40:17Z")
> [@Clothahump](#): > > This Chili’s doesn’t provide crayons. Blasphemy! I still have, from college, a child’s placemat on which a good friend of mine, at that point in Organic Chemistry, had drawn out, in crayon, some crazy chemical reaction she’s just had to memorize. > [@villa](#): > > This is where I lose sympathy for you. You don’t have the right, or the knowledge of that child, to determine how that child should be effectively disciplined by his parents. I don’t think the point was, “You have to spank your kid when they misbehave, or you’re a bad parent.” I think it was, “You have to make it clear that this kind of behavior is unacceptable, and this is how I’d do it.” > [@Malthus](#): > > Then we evidently are not reading the same thread. Then why the hell do you keep picking at my posts, if you agree with me? ETA: I went back and skimmed over your replies to me. What I see is you whining about how parents have to take their kids out, or they’ll never know if they can behave. Nowhere in those posts did you indicate that you thought that parents should actually be responsible if their kids don’t live up to their expectations, and you kept poking at all the people who’d simply requested that misbehaved children be controlled or removed. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2010, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-crying-babies-in-public-places/526368/212 "2010-01-26T17:43:37Z")
> [@MeanOldLady](#): > > Can we **please** not turn this into the “Indulge ZPG in all of her Fortune-Telling, Child-Killing, Crystal-Ball-Reading Lunacy” thread? > > As someone who will admit to disliking children, I don’t advocate an absolute rule, and I don’t think anyone is. See **PoorYorick** ’s response to you, post 39 (and many by others subsequently defending it). > [@](#): > > I don’t demand, at the first whimper of a small child, that it be ejected from the restaurant immediately. If we’re talking about a baby that is so goddamn annoying that multiple patrons complain, as the OP described, can we agree that the kiddo needs to go outside until it shuts up, even if you are at Chili’s or whatever family-friendly establishment? I’ve been agreeing with this the whole thread, though way I’d put it there are various things that the parent ought to be doing in terms of soothing and distracting first; taking outside is one of several techniques. Point is, I don’t think anyone is really of the opinion that it is okay to ignore a screaming child. ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Whisperer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cat_whisperer/32/4839_2.png) [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2010, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-crying-babies-in-public-places/526368/213 "2010-01-26T17:49:30Z")
That’s funny, **Muffin.** I was also thinking that Indian baby-snatchers should look into Denmark. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Doughbag](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/aeb1de/32.png) [@Doughbag](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doughbag)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2010, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-crying-babies-in-public-places/526368/214 "2010-01-26T17:54:05Z")
When my little brother was crying for sweets in the shop, other people told my mom to just get the damn thing and make the baby to shut the fuck up. Her reply was always something like “If you want to pay for it, fine with me” or “Mind your own business and stop upsetting my kid”. Now, 25 years later my mother is the one, who gives out to the mother with the crying baby… go figure … I sometimes like to point that out to her, since it amuses me, but I’m getting nowhere there either. A couple of months ago I was at a wedding, where a kid was screaming mad in the church for the mum. Some clown next to us said something like “Who the fuck brings a baby like this to a wedding, that bitch should have stayed at home or leave”…well that bitch was the bride. ---
**Author:** ![Caffeine.addict](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f475e1/32.png) [@Caffeine.addict](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caffeine.addict)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2010, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-crying-babies-in-public-places/526368/215 "2010-01-26T17:54:15Z")
> [@Fuji](#): > > No, you gibbering cretin. If the friend (scare quotes not necessary, shithead) had directed invective at the parent, that would have involved actually speaking _to them_. But this is irrelevant - from the context of **Alice** ’s story, it is quite clear that the parent did hear the friend’s comment. And they had a chance to speak directly to the friend, but passed on that option. Just as passively as the friend making his initial commentary. But only the friend “lacked the balls”? Sure. So, being passive agressive is a plus in your book. Frankly, I wouldn’t want to be seated next to either party in that anecdote. One party has a screaming child. The other party is passive agressive and doesn’t use language appropriate for polite company. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2010, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-crying-babies-in-public-places/526368/216 "2010-01-26T17:56:35Z")
> [@Shot\_From\_Guns](#): > > Then why the hell do you keep picking at my posts, if you agree with me? Maybe you should be asking yourself this question? I would have thought before heaping on the insults. Point is, what I was disagreeing with was your championing of the exclusionary principle. > [@](#): > > ETA: I went back and skimmed over your replies to me. What I see is you whining about how parents have to take their kids out, or they’ll never know if they can behave. **Nowhere in those posts did you indicate that you thought that parents should actually be responsible if their kids don’t live up to their expectations,** and you **kept poking at all the people who’d simply requested that misbehaved children be controlled or removed.** [Emphasis added to emphasize idiocy] Then you are, alas, a fool. Or perhaps you simply missed all of my posts discussing “reasonable accomodation”. For an example, see my post 158 (you quoted it so I can only _presume_ you read it and understood it): > [@](#): > > Parents: that means judging whether the venue is really child-appropriate for children of that age and taking reasonable measures to disciple, pacify or if necessary remove unruly children Or perhaps you would care to retract? ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2010, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-crying-babies-in-public-places/526368/217 "2010-01-26T18:04:34Z")
Sorry, **Malthus** , you’re right. Most of your previous posts were such poorly thought-out drivel that I started skimming, assuming more of the same. My apologies for failing to noticie that you finally conceded that you actually agree with everyone else here and were apparently just being contrary for the sake of being contrary. ---
**Author:** ![MeanOldLady](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/meanoldlady/32/10737_2.png) [@MeanOldLady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MeanOldLady)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2010, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-crying-babies-in-public-places/526368/218 "2010-01-26T18:06:01Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > See **PoorYorick** ’s response to you, post 39 (and many by others subsequently defending it). Post 55, yo. 48 and 51 also work for examples of people not supporting a No Children Anywhere rule. I think most of the responses here have been reasonable. ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Whisperer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cat_whisperer/32/4839_2.png) [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2010, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-crying-babies-in-public-places/526368/219 "2010-01-26T18:07:42Z")
> [@MeanOldLady](#): > > Post 55, yo. 48 and 51 also work for examples of people not supporting a No Children Anywhere rule. I think most of the responses here have been reasonable. And yet the argument has gone five pages here in two days, and this is far from the first time we’ve had this discussion. I don’t quite get it. ---
**Author:** ![villa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/bc79bd/32.png) [@villa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/villa)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2010, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-crying-babies-in-public-places/526368/220 "2010-01-26T18:08:45Z")
> [@Shot\_From\_Guns](#): > > I don’t think the point was, “You have to spank your kid when they misbehave, or you’re a bad parent.” I think it was, “You have to make it clear that this kind of behavior is unacceptable, and this is how I’d do it.” Then the point was inartfully made, certainly. I have a pretty extreme reaction to someone telling me I have to hit my kid, when they have never met him. And that is, unfortunately, a suggestion you hear from a lot of people. Though, of course, never about my son because he is a perfect little angel. 😛 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-crying-babies-in-public-places/526368.md?page=10) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-crying-babies-in-public-places/526368.md?page=12)