Mean, anti-kid people suck! Let these people know what you think!

I really can't imagine how ideas like the ones in this article manage to stay around when they are so outdated and just wrong. I suppose I could take it as an indication of the fact that our society is decreasingly family-oriented, that fewer people have children at all, and that those who do have less involvement with them than parents in previous generations. I'm sure all of the above would be accurate statements, but that doesn't make it right.

In case you can't click the link, the article it references is one from Better Homes and Gardens, called "The 10 Commandments of Dining with Little Children". Oooooh wee... here we go again. The non-offensive parts of the article were certainly written by Captain Obvious himself (Don't block the aisle with big strollers? Discourage food fights? You don't say!) but the offensive part was written by every anti-child piece of crap person on the planet. "Thou Shalt Not Breastfeed at the Table", it says. Then it goes on to say how nice the bathrooms in upscale restaurants are, and that certainly it wouldn't be bad to take the baby there to nurse, so as not to disturb other diners.

Let's take just a minute to break this issue down. First of all, I've ALWAYS found the notion of nursing a baby in the bathroom totally offensive. For one, where are you even supposed to sit? In most bathrooms, there are no chairs, so you have the option of sitting on the sink counter (which is generally wet and crawling with bacteria) or on a toilet (barf). So which one of these is more preferable for a little baby to eat his/her dinner on? How about this, anti-child people, which one of those surfaces would YOU like to eat YOUR dinner on. Secondly, bathrooms stink. I hate public bathrooms so much that I will do just about anything to avoid using them because they are so disgusting and fetid. The majority of people are the same way, at least to an extent. Again, why should a baby be sentenced to eat their meals in a room that smells literally like crap? Sick. For another, I don't know about other babies, but loud noises scared both of mine (a sneeze was the one sure thing to set Erin off, and Orren is scared to death of the vacuum cleaner!) and bathrooms are loud. There are toilets flushing, hand dryers blowing, doors slamming. It's like a baby horror movie!

Let's put this person's "Commandment" about not nursing at the table into honest words. It would read, "Thou shalt feed thy baby in the filthiest, smelliest, scariest environment available, because babies are not people, and do not deserve basic courtesy like a clean place to eat."

We can even take it one step farther and think about mom. Our society chastises mothers enough for breastfeeding. From disapproving stares from old people, pointing and snickering from high school kids, and being told by uneducated moms that it's disgusting, it's not easy to be a breastfeeding mom these days! I know! I tried! I've nursed both my kids in public and it was horrific. Not to mention, the actual act of breastfeeding is incredibly difficult in many cases, and in all cases, requires long term sacrifice on the mom's part (mostly dietary). So we know that, but even so, we're going to take it one step further, and say that moms who have actually made it work for long enough to be up to going out to dinner should be punished further by being exiled to the bathroom, and probably condemned to eating a cold meal because babies always need to be fed right when the food comes (it's Murphy's Law, you know).

It's just too outlandish for me. I wouldn't even think they were serious unless so many of the comments on that article were anti-breastfeeding, and anti-child. I guess it's really true that our society does not care at all about kids, or families, or anything like that.

I also wonder why this article gives parents so little credit. We don't block the aisle with a bulky stroller. We have a Britax Blink which folds up compactly enough to store under the table. Half the time, we go out to eat at 5:30 to beat the rush, and are seated immediately, so we don't even bring the stroller in. Discourage food fights? Seriously? Any PARENT who lets their kid have food fights is probably not the kind of person who belongs in any establishment more upscale than McDonald's, and it's got nothing to do with the kids. Plus, I mean, I had no idea my kids shouldn't just run all over the restaurant freely, and play with the noisiest toys imaginable. What? You don't like our Tag Reader?! How could you! OK, seriously, though, my kids color at the table, or we bring books to read, or something. I don't know anybody who brings noisy toys to nice restaurants. Who does that?? This article doesn't give parents nearly enough credit.

This all reminds me of when the "child-free by choice" people invaded a well-known moms' message board, and told everyone that all we deserved for being "breeders" was to eat fast food unless we left our kids with babysitters. Screw that. My kids can go anywhere I can go. They behave themselves, and the reason they do is because they know how to act in various types of places, some of which do not include a drive-thru lane. How about that...