Tuesday, June 12, 2007

So, yeah...kids today, huh.

That thread at feministe just keeps going. I think there's more to this I want to talk about as well; for one thing I've been meaning to talk more about Alice Miller for quite a while now.

For now, though, I just want to note this:

I like the whole “I deserve to not be bothered by screaming kids in fancy restaurants, I’m paying good money to not be bothered by people acting irrationally and having tantrums” riff, I think everyone can probably relate to that really. I mean from the customer side, of course.

There was a funny article in this collection of food writing essays I have; the author and his wife decide to throw caution to the wind and take their two year old to one of the fanciest restaurants in town. Amazingly, every time she started to go into one of her two-year old behaviors–I want this, I’m gonna slide under the table now–a waiter instantly appeared to take care of her every need. Apparently they managed to keep her placated throughout the entire meal. No screaming.

What the author concluded from this was that actually, billionaires are a lot like two year olds. They get their every whim attended to immediately and apologetically, pitch a hissy fit if it isn’t exactly right -right now-, and accept this as their due.

What fancy restaurants failed to realize, says the author, was that sooner or later people with -actual two year olds- would figure this out and take advantage of it.

4 comments:

Sassywho said...

haven't had a chance to weed through that thread yet.... i love kids and i'm one that believes children should be out in public... and lean more toward giving parents the benefit of the doubt... but get this shit that happened last friday..

i'm walking into a deli and the there is a guy coming out blocking the doorway... his 2ish year old daughter just walks out past me right... he's trying to talk her back in meanwhile blocking the motherfucking door. 2 minutes of him standing in the doorway, me getting annoyed and asking him to move... and then he says to me "watch her for a second" and turns around and walks off before i can say a thing. WTF????

so there i am stuck outside with this dumbass's kid while he's doing god knows what and then walks out picks her up and says thank you... i'm so stunned i for once was speechless.

belledame222 said...

well, THAT is just rude...of -him.-

yeah. i mean, i guess in one sense if one really believed in the whole "it takes a village" thing; but, one, he doesn't know you from a hole in the wall, and two, hello, MOVE OUT OF THE DOORWAY. it's not -that- hard. just stand aside!

Anonymous said...

I adore kids. They tell you so much about their parents that it is almost frightening. Klew in parents. They reflect everything about you, despite your denial. There it is for whoever can read the script. I sort of like Jung's idea that kids reflect whatever the adult denies in him/herself. I finally figured it out with my parents that they tried to make me what they were not, but wanted to be. Not my script, despite the death bed prescription. Sorry dad, sorry mom. Not doing it.

Anonymous said...

Via your recent post on the pile-up I ended reading reading a long while this AM and ended up having to sign up with LiveJournal in order to leave a response on a blog there with a good entry comparing the distaste of many for children with distaste for the elderly and the disabled, points that were well made.

Alice Miller...great writer, look forward to reading your post on her.