What grinds my gears!

[Blondbraid]

I'm just enraged at parents letting their offspring act feral and then having the gall to judge people for calling them out on it.

When I was commuting today, a mom with two kids, old enough to talk and walk on their own mind you, was walking right in front of me and the kids were howling like freaking apes for no reason whatsoever. They were not in pain or anything, they just felt like playing howler monkeys, and when I asked "must you be so loud?", the lady just gave a half-hearted hush and the kids kept howling, so when I asked her to tell them to stop, she just snapped at me saying "She's a small child". I told her I've worked in daycare and kids can quiet down if you just clearly tell them, and she just snapped back "then You should understand they can't" and walked away.

Look, I've worked with toddlers, and I know from experience that if they are not in pain or some form of distress, and old enough to talk, they very much can stop what they are doing as long as their parents can tell them to with just a freaking ounce of authority or consistency, but that woman was deliberately undermining ANY attempt, including her own, at making her kids respect their surroundings and other people.

I despise the current idea that any attempt at boundaries or rules for kids is on par with straight-up abuse, parents shouldn't be parents, but some cool friend that's never saying no, and that kids just lack any sense of restraint or consideration.

Well, kid's aren't born with inherent respect for other people, but that's a reason to teach them, not let them run feral until you expect them to just magically be gifted with social skills. I have Asberger's syndrome, so I had an even harder path learning all that, but I did, because I was taught.

And then there's this toxic mentality that any stranger reprimanding a child for bad behavior, what used to be known as "it takes a village to raise a child", is bad and intrusive and that is just another recipe for intensifying any bad thing they do the older they get.

Seriously, people who don't want to do any actual parenting shouldn't be parents, if they want a creature that only exist to be pampered and who doesn't understand or care for human social cues, they should get cats instead.

[Danvzare]

I'm just enraged at parents letting their offspring act feral and then having the gall to judge people for calling them out on it.

In just one sentence, you perfectly described all of the kids near to where I live.
I feel your pain. 

[cat]

I'm just glad you haven't worked in my kid's daycare...

If my kids were to play apes when walking on the street with me, I would not stop them because some passerby demands it. Of course, the situation would be different on a bus or train, but not just walking somewhere outside.

[Blondbraid]

I'm just glad you haven't worked in my kid's daycare...

If my kids were to play apes when walking on the street with me, I would not stop them because some passerby demands it. Of course, the situation would be different on a bus or train, but not just walking somewhere outside.

It was a tightly crowded subway station, not a playground park. And the kids weren't "playing ape" as some cute game, they were howling just for the heck of it.

Let's be clear, I'm not interrupting kids playing in their homes or on a playground, or any place where you could reasonably expect kids to be allowed to run around and play, it's a subway station, where nearly everyone is tired from work or school and just want to be able to go home in peace. Is it really that unreasonable to ask parents to teach their kids bare-bones consideration for the people around them? And why would it be wrong for a passerby to ask for it?

How would you go about teaching kids to respect other people around them and prepare them for the fact that while their parents may let things slide, so many people in their future lives, teachers, bosses, older kids around them, facility staff etc., will not?

I'm just glad you haven't worked in my kid's daycare...

Also, you sound rather judgemental yourself saying that, you don't know where or what my work routines looked like.
Sure, it got loud, but there I at least was able to mentally prepare myself for it, and even so, when the staff was able to put the most disruptive kids in timeout for ten minutes, and just be consistent with having multiple people tell them when their behavior was bad, the kids improved their behavior to others greatly, and the older kids were able to sit down quietly and learn things.

The biggest problem on that daycare wasn't the kids, it was the entitled parents.

[Blondbraid]

It grinds my gears that whenever it's international women's day, you always see a bunch of guys complaining that "But where's the international MEN's day?!",
but there actually IS an international men's day, this very day, November 19, but none of the dudes complaining actually looked it up.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Men%27s_Day