hey, the idea is not that new, you know.
In protestantism, all women are condemend, and can only be saved by baring children.
If you were barren (I’m talking Middle Ages here, generally), that was a sign from god that you were a bad person, and were not worthy of salvation.
tsjah.
What can you say?
hey, the idea is not that new, you know.
In protestantism, all women are condemend, and can only be saved through motherhood. They uphold the state of Matrimony as the highest baring children.
If you were barren (I’m talking Middle Ages here, generally), that was a sign from god that you were a bad person, and were not worthy of salvation.
tsjah.
What can you say?
Although I am not particularly fond of children, I am good with them when I have to be. Including a friend’s child who has mild Asperger’s syndrome - she and I get along just fine, TYVM.
And I’m with auntie em. If I hear one more variant of any of the above from anyone I’m going to commit mayhem of some sort. My mother is the most egregious offender, but she’s not the only one by far.
There are numerous types of parents - on a sliding scale from truly awful to wonderful. And numerous types of children - once again on a sliding scale from truly awful to wonderful.
I’m an OK parent. I’m certainly not wonderful (and I’m a lot closer to wonderful than truly awful) - but I do try and be aware of other people - with and without my kids. And I have OK children - not children who are little angels, but human children who I don’t really trust at a restaurant with an actual tablecloth. This is not because they don’t hear the word “no.” This is because despite hearing the word “no” all the damn time, they (my daughter in particular) doesn’t enjoy hearing it and has poor control (hey, she’s three - we are hoping she learns control by the time she’s fourteen) over her public displays of disappointment.
So we don’t go to fancy restaurants with our kids. And we don’t go movies where there won’t be lots of other children. And we make sure our children are welcome at the party/wedding/BBQ.
This does not mean I have little brats - I don’t, I have really wonderful kids - just human ones.
There is a middle. I’m staking it out.
A lot of the issues that the childfree have with other people’s children - those of us with children also have. You know that last really nice dinner you went to that was ruined by someone else’s kids? – there is a bright side – you weren’t paying a babysitter to be relieved of your own children’s whining for a couple of expected blissful childfree hours. You know how when “Nancy” brought “Timmy” over to your house and the little shit terrorized your cat (who is not used to children) – Timmy’s come over to my house and terrorized my children, who aren’t any more used to bullies than your cat is. You know how you are in the middle of an interesting conversation about a workable peace plan in the Middle East and “Diane” has to start talking about how her son is so cute and feeds his peanut butter to the dog - it happens to us, too. You know how you end up picking up the slack for a co-worker whose always running for her kids - yep, I’ve worked with one of those (notice past tense). Nice to know I have Grandma in town ready to pick up my own kids at a moments notice so I can pick up his slack - its always nice when you spend the weekend away from your own children because your co-worker has been too busy spending the work week with his.
And finally, you know how people tell you you’ll change your mind about kids - having them won’t stop it - you must want more - one or two or three seems simply inadequate to the complete stranger or anyone whose title is “mother in law” (or alternatively, three seems far too many, didn’t you know the world was overpopulated and how can you bring children into this horrible place anyway?).
Interesting…
I’ve always associated the word “sizeism” with large people until now.
Clearly, “sizeism” can be used when talking about very little people, too.
This just SMACKS of, :eek: “Not MY little angel!!”
Seriously. If’n the bitch doesn’t fit, you must acquit!
If your children ARE well behaved, great. You have nothing to be defensive about. But if there’s even the slightest doubt in your mind that they are a problem in inappropriate places, YOU SHOULD FEEL GUILTY. Just because you are paying the same (and may I state, I don’t give a flying fuck how much you tip, that isn’t the point…) THE point is, that if your children are screaming or misbehaving, they are ruining the experience that I’M paying for. If this is the experience YOU want for your money, that’s your problem, DON’T ruin mine because you are a selfish asshole who thinks that because he procreated, he has the right to just do whatever pleases him.
I ASKED my parents the other day about what they did with my sister and me when they wanted to go to dinner. They both gave me the same story. Every now and then, they would try to take us to a nicer place. If one of us acted up, they would pack us up and leave immediately. They would explain to us, now we’re going home. We’ll try again when you can behave yourself. Now THIS is responsibility. Teaching accountability and keeping everyone sane in the process.
Like I said. If this doesn’t apply to you, disregard it.
To everyone else who is reading this…I’m happy that you found some happiness in your children. I hope you are a good parent.
-OR-
I’m glad that you’ve decided to find happiness without children. I hope you are a better person for it.
Oh, and Dangerosa…
You are OBVIOUSLY level headed…thank you for that;)
Eh. A lot of people tell me that I’m good with children, and that it’d be a shame for me to go childless for the rest of my life. I don’t want them, I probably never will (my SO feels the same), but since I do enjoy being with the kids the short amount of time I am with them, I take their comments (as judgemental as some of them are) as compliments. After all, when it comes to a decision as large as having children, off-the-cuff comments made by parties not directly involved with the making (or caring) of said kids, hold no weight with me.
So, when they do tell me that I need to have kids (and/or act shocked/negative when I reveal my lack of desire for producing the lil’ chittlins), I just shrug it off and move on to another topic. Or, hell, in an ironic twist, I go back to playing with the kids and ignore the adults. 
Of course, I’ve also never been in a situation where someone is constantly going on and on about how I need to have kids, and then gets almost scary-angry when I tell them I don’t want children. So, YMMV. A lot.
The reason that people with children seem so smug when they say something like,
“When are you going to have children?” or “You’ll change your mind someday!” is because most people, at some point, think they’ll never have kids. However, most people do eventually have kids. People who are perfectly capable of having children but choose not to are in the extreme minority. There’s nothing wrong with being childless, but you’ve got to remember that the other 99% of the human race (no, no cite available) does have children, and to them children are as much a part of life as death and taxes.
I want kids. Am I under the deluded impression that when I have these kids, they are going to be perfect angels all the time? Hell, no. My brother and I acted up. We got in trouble. I’m sure we embarrassed our parents in public quite a few times by throwing a temper tantrum. Kids are unpredictable. But my parents also managed to let us know immediately whether or not said behavior was acceptable, and if it wasn’t, they took steps to correct it. I think that’s ALL anyone asks of parents out in public - take some responsibility for your children. Don’t let little Timmy scream bloody murder in the middle of the aisle or in the middle of the restaurant because you don’t feel like dealing with him or because you can’t say no to him.
My mom and I went to IHOP one Sunday morning for breakfast when I came for a visit last year, and there was a large family of mostly adults sitting with two small children. These kids screamed and hollered through the entire meal, threw food, and were genuinely terrible. Do I blame them? No. I blame the parents who let them yell bloody murder and toss pancakes and syrup all over the floor (the parents and other adults in the group weren’t much better). When they left, they received the death glare from EVERYONE around them - it was like an instant bonding experience for the rest of us. (Aside from the fact that we all left the waitress bigger tips because for this table of eight with food PILED under it and on it, they’d left her all of…oh, $3). THOSE are the kind of parents that piss me off and I will do whatever need be NOT to become a parent like that. I have a lot of respect for parents who actually parent, and I think those parents are in the majority.
Clint, I’d love to see an actual study that says that 99% of the public has children - I don’t have anything on-hand, but will be happy to look - AFAIK, the number of people choosing not to have children has been on the rise in the past few years. I think it’s a number that’s only going to increase more and more.
Ava
Actually, since we’re on the subject of restaurants, I don’t have a problem with the occasional tantrum in an eating establishment (my one caveat here being that I rarely eat at places where it would be completely inappropriate to bring a child–my philosophy is that if the establishment has high chairs and booster seats, who am I to decide where kids should and shouldn’t be?). After all, even the sweetest baby can have an unforeseen meltdown, and most of the parents I know are not happily thinking, “Screw everyone else–my baby is king” when it happens. My hope is that should the meltdown last longer than a minute or two, the child will be taken out of earshot of other diners. However, hell, folks gotta eat, and if I had to choose, I’d much rather have a baby screaming through dinner than through, say, a movie or a play.
My pet peeve is parents who demand special treatment in a restaurant (besides the whole “Our table is allowed to break the sound barrier without getting arrested for disturbing the peace” deal) because they have kids.
Case in point: I used to work at a place where there was often a wait (sometimes rather substantial) for a table at dinner. I can’t tell you how many parents came up to the hostess stand to inquire about how long the wait was and, when told that it would be, say, 40-45 minutes, would whine about how they couldn’t wait that long, because they had kids . . .
. . . but instead of leaving and seeking out another restaurant, would leave their name, stay and wait and constantly bug the hostess to bump them up on the list because they had kids.
Once a friend of mine was hostessing for the evening, and had told a couple with two toddlers that the wait would be half an hour. 15 minutes into that half hour, they came to the hostess desk to check on the status of their table. All perfectly fine, but when the hostess perkily told them that there were (only) two other (small) parties ahead of them (which meant that they’d likely not have to wait the full 30 minutes she’d quoted), they said, “Can’t you just seat us first? I mean, come on–we have KIDS.”
The hostess had had about all she could take at that point (either that, or had had a couple of vodka shots), because she looked at them and calmly replied, “Well, you should have used a condom if that’s a problem for you.”
While I don’t condone her behavior, it was somehow gratifying that someone had the balls to say it.
I don’t even think I’d have had a problem if the people had, say, checked with the other parties ahead of them, and gotten the OK to go first. I bet people would be willing to do that out of courtesy, like how if you’ve got a cart load of groceries, you let the guy who only has one package of hot dogs and a tube of Preparation H go ahead of you in the checkout line. But I don’t agree that parents should expect such special treatment (nor should the Weenies and Hemorrhoids guy).
There. I’m off my soapbox now.
Nowadays, that sort of behavior can get you into serious trouble . . .
No offense, but my guess is that you don’t get it nearly as often or as badly as those of us with uteri, and certainly don’t get as much shit about how one day your clock will start ticking (or, better yet, shit about how you should just have them now while you’re young enough to still have “good eggs”, in case you change your mind later).
I mean, you are, like, The Pied Piper of Sesame Street–you’re like a larger-than-life glowing TeleTubbie in the sky, dropping candy out of your ass! It’s uncanny how much kids instantly love you. They stare at you in near-catatonic awe and supplication upon first sight, and are awash in euphoria when you pick them up to play with them. They carry your picture in their little fists and waddle about their playpens calling your name when you’re not around. It’s truly a sight to behold.
JMHO, of course, but I’d still bet that despite all this you get far fewer comments about how much you need to breed than most childless women of a “certain age”, whether or not they even particularly like kids.
Wonder why that is . . . ? 
At any rate, this may be while all of us barren old spinster hags are so damn resentful.
Its not ‘off the wall ranting’ when people who are never going to have kids try to judge those who do. They haven’t a clue and haven’t any right to judge. Its not irrational to say that people only one or two years outside of a dorm room don’t know everything (no matter how many people gang up to say oitherwise).
To Lezzer: You want kids someday. Fine. You still have no right to judge me or mine. Had some bad experiences with children, have you? I’ve had bad experiences with the superior ‘child free’. As for dragging my kid to LOTR, no…I rented it on DVD. The Last movie we were at, however, while my boy was perfectly behaved, there were lots of 20somethings talking through the movie & answering loud cell phones…but of course this post isn’t to Bitch about that.
Also, I never read about your coworker from Hell. But your comments seemed to mimic all those that I’ve seen begrudge ‘take our children to work day’…or those times when you have to watch a sick child. Your coworker must have been the exception (and no, I’m not going to go dig for it…the connection speed is slow enough now).
I did read the thread about kids on airplanes and I knew there was a great deal of anti-child hostility here. I just didn’t expect almost all the parents to stay quiet and take it on this thread.
If this thread is about people being unreasonably pressured to have kids…well I have no comment about that. I’ve never pressured anyone to have kids. There were joking comments made by friends and acquaintences that my wife and I got as to when we’d have #2, but we never took them seriously: Life’s Too Short. At least thats what we thought.
If this thread is about people without children setting rules for people who do…in their own homes, fine. Its your home, its your rules. If people can’t abide them they won’t come. Irregardless of the rules, thats reasonable. If it was my house, I’d expect you to say the same.
If this thread is about people without children setting rules for people who do in public…then you’ve crossed the line. You have as much right to tell me and my family what to do and where to eat as I have of telling you what to do & where to eat. If I’m disruptive, you’ll call the manager…or if Your disruptive, I’ll call the manager. Its as simple as that.
Darlin’, did you even glance at the OP before getting up on your high horse about those evil child-hating younguns?
This thread is not about setting rules or standards or expectations for anyone, anywhere. It is about the desire for our friends who happen to be parents to treat us with the same courtesy and respect and understanding they expect us to give them.
Okay. #1. When did I judge you for having children???
#2. If you’re not one of the parents I’m talking about, then why are you taking such offense? Obviously I’m not referring to you and yours (if your kids are as well behaved as you claim.) I’m not understanding where your hyper defensiveness is coming from.
#3. My coworker from hell, brought her kid everywhere. To meetings, to staff lunches, to Christmas parties. It was freakin’ ridiculous. We couldn’t get any work done. I put on political fundraisers and she brought her two year old to an evening reception at a winery at $500 a head. How appropriate is that? And I sure as hell had a lot to say about it because it was my event, and my reputation on the line. So don’t tell me not to judge in that situation.
#4. If you’ve got so many questions about what this thread is about then maybe you should go back and read it a little more carefully.
#5. My name is lezlers, not lezzers.
“Irregardless”
Is not a word, damnit.
Faruiza, not to get into semantics, but it is an acceptable replacement for the more correct word “regardless”. It became a part of common vernacular very much the same way that “I could care less” did – people constantly using an incorrect, bastardized version of the true phrase/word.
No offense taken, of course; heck, I thought about my lack of a stinky pinky when I mentioned the small number of comments I receive. After all, my Skippy Swimmers are good until I’m 80 or so–no need to worry about my biological clock ticking, much less waking me up and making me hit its snooze button.
As a male, I definitely don’t encounter near the same amount of childless stigma by which you lasses tend to find yourself burdened. For which I am thankful, of course… but still, I’m not sure I would care too much even then. As long as my partner agreed with me on the issue, the opinions expressed by those other than the mortar or the pestle in this drugged concotion of life wouldn’t matter much–if even at all.
Still, I fully realize that I’ve yet to walk a mile in your 6-inch heels, Lady, so see that cloudiness overhead? That’s the smoke I’m blowing out my ass.
As for your much exaggerated description of me and kids: obviously they like hanging out with someone over whom they find it easy to pull the mental wool. Kinda gives them a boost up in the old self-confidence area. Besides, I don’t seem to recall them wanting to shy away from you. Some even gave you hugs right away.
Oh, but maybe that was all the men…
I don’t blame 'em.
:smack:
If you say so…Ok, I won’t argue…but maybe if I start saying that the sky is red, that’ll catch on enough so that it will become true, too…
Sorry for the hijack!