Originally posted by smacksim
Like I said, I understand the strong reaction. Perfectly reasonable too if the expectations of the place are understood (thinking of an airport for example where everyone has a right to be there). But thinking of the Chicago case, some of those parents seem to have hardened their sense of what is expected everywhere and have made a blanket statement: "We shall be allowed to bring our children anywhere so long as we feel we are controlling them to our standards."
This is what gets my ire up a bit. The audacity of a person to come into my business and tell me what my expectations for them are! I don't accuse anyone in this thread of acting this way, but the possibility seems there with potentially hardened and certainly hard-won self-expectations for family.
Like I said, I understand the strong reaction. Perfectly reasonable too if the expectations of the place are understood (thinking of an airport for example where everyone has a right to be there). But thinking of the Chicago case, some of those parents seem to have hardened their sense of what is expected everywhere and have made a blanket statement: "We shall be allowed to bring our children anywhere so long as we feel we are controlling them to our standards."
This is what gets my ire up a bit. The audacity of a person to come into my business and tell me what my expectations for them are! I don't accuse anyone in this thread of acting this way, but the possibility seems there with potentially hardened and certainly hard-won self-expectations for family.
You already know that I don't expect to bring my child anywhere I choose. You probably also suspect (correctly) that I would end a bad behavior long before an establishment owner would feel the need to intervene. I believe if you consistenly set high but reasonable behavioral expectations, the child will begin to conform.
We actually do this by setting up shorter periods where higher level behavior is expected. A two hour dinner is too much to expect . . . our last time out was a buffett and he behaved perfectly-- THose parents who read a paper at a coffeeshop are setting themselves up for a meltdown-- Any child will act out if you keep them bored and inactive for too long
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