People who claim that they "hate" children.
I know many, many people who fall into this category - real life Cruella De Ville's who claim to dislike everything about children, complain that they're too noisy, messy, smelly, etc etc - seemingly forgetting that they too had to be children at some point.
How can you hate something that is just a phase of every human beings life?!
These people seem to spring up in a lot of places where it is quite likely that children will be found - such as a family oriented restaurant. It's clear from the fact that there's a ball pond inside that the establishment welcomes children, so why do you sit around rolling your eyes when you see children playing and making noise?
Furthermore, I really dislike restaurants that have "No Children" policies.
Obviously it's fair enough if we're talking about a bar with a restaurant attached, as a bar is not going to be the most suitable place for children to be - but other restaurants turning children away really irks me.
Yes I understand that rowdy children disrupting the peace and quiet that other diners may want to enjoy would be very annoying - but not all children are rowdy. Some children are more than capable of being quiet and polite at a dinner table, and enjoying a meal with their family. So why should the parents of these children be stopped from enjoying a family meal at a nice restaurant just incase their kids are disruptive?
ANY human being is capable of being rowdy - an adult can also be disruptive, loud, rude and downright annoying in a restaurant (in fact whenever I've disliked the company of fellow diners in restaurants, they have always been adults - never children!) - so how would a restaurant handle that situation?! They would speak with that person or ask them to leave. Surely the same can be done if a child is being disruptive - why ban them all just incase?!
I dislike the notion that just because I am now a parent, I have to stop going out to nice restaurants unless I have a babysitter - my partner & I really enjoy fine dining and we want our son to appreciate good food, so why should he not be able to come with us?
Just because we are now parents, do we automatically have to resign ourselves to family meals at Wacky Warehouse and McDonalds?!
On New Years Eve, Jon & I went for a lovely meal at my favorite restaurant - a Teppenyaki Sushi bar in Liverpool City Centre, one of the places where the chef cooks at your table - the restaurant is very glam, popular with the WAG crowd.
At the table next to us there was a family with 3 or 4 young children, aged between 18 months and 6 years old. Other than noticing how cute they were, you would never have known they were there - they were perfectly behaved and they all seemed to be having a fun New Years Eve meal together.
So why do some restaurants feel that its acceptable to discriminate against families and ban children from their premises?
One such restaurant, McDains in the USA, recently decided to ban children under 6 years old because the owner feels that "Parents who bring their offspring along for dinner do so because they are impolite and selfish".
While doing a quick Google search on the subject, I came across this e-petition by a woman named Lucy who states that she would like children to be banned from all British restaurants after 4.30 pm.
Lucy states:
"Children, especially those under the age of 7, create intolerable noise pollution, at extremely loud volumes and unpredictable frequencies. Other patrons of restaurants, bars and cafes have often had pleasant sessions ruined by such noise. Everyone pays the same amount of service, but many people's enjoyment's of the establishment are marred by other people's children's noise. This is obviously unfair. I propose that children younger than age 7 are vetoed by cafes and bars at all times"
So what do you think?! Are people like Lucy right.....should children be banned from restaurants?! As always, I'd love to hear from you!
posted on 29 July at 00:52
I agree to refuse entry to children. Not all of them are polite and quiet. Almost none is.