Have you heard of the “no kids allowed” movement, also known as the “brat ban” movement?  It’s alive and well in the U.S. and could quite possibly become the next new trend in marketing of services.  Complaints about screaming, disruptive children have launched a movement to have children banned from the first class cabins of some airlines, restaurants, theaters, and the like.  Businesses are taking notice and responding, some by banning children altogether, others during certain business hours of "child-free shopping."

As parents, we try to teach our children good manners and respect for others.  For anyone who has ever exclaimed, in sheer desperation, “Behave!,” you know that it means very little to children.  And anyone who argues that it’s the parents’ responsibility to make their children behave doesn’t understand what I wish every parent knew – we are not our children and they are not us.  Children are not robots to be programmed or pets to be trained.  As many of us were surprised to learn when our children were just infants, they are their own persons from the very beginning of life, with temperaments, desires, needs, and all.  Moreover, anyone who is evenly mildly familiar with child development (and if you’re already a parent, that’s you), knows that a normal developmental stage for young children involves the natural frustration in trying to express a feeling or a need but not yet having the means or vocabulary to do so.  Hence, the crying, and sometimes screaming and tantrums, that come along at this stage.   Children are not doing it to offend the adults around them, nor are they trying to embarrass their parents, as much as it may seem like it at times.   

So, do I expect people without children to understand all this?  No way.  I would like to believe that we’ve learned from our history of intolerance toward others.  Certainly, the only respectful thing to do when a small child is disruptive is to leave the theater or restaurant.  I’ve seen this happen time and again.  It’s common courtesy. A wholesale ban of all children is not only a reaction to disruptive children, but all children because, well, they’re children.   Banning cell phone use in yoga class and spas is one thing; banning a human being is quite another, and yet there are plenty of people who would argue that their civil rights are violated by the ban against cell phone use while driving in some states. 

Let’s say that we don’t blame the children, we blame the parents. “Shame on them for raising their children without manners!”  “Shame on them for taking a small child to the theatre or fancy restaurant!”  Just last week my husband and I went to dinner at an expensive restaurant without the kids.  We hadn’t been out together, just the two of us, in a couple of months and we were looking forward to a quiet dinner with adult conversation.  Soon after our wine and appetizers arrived at the table, a couple came in with a very young toddler and was seated a few tables away.  My first thought was, how will they enjoy their dinner in such a lovely, quiet restaurant?  Then I remembered a similar occasion of my own.  After several months of cloistered parenting and desperate to get out of the house, we bundled up our 4 month old in her infant car seat carrier and brought her to the neighborhood Thai restaurant for our first meal out in months.  We wedged the infant car seat carrier into the booth, where our daughter sat quietly throughout dinner.  I don’t know about you, but I’ve experienced many more rude, loud, ill-mannered adults than children in my day. Adults should know better; children often do not.  The very idea of creating formal ‘no children’ policies brings to mind the segregation laws of the 1940’s and 50’s.  Even if you’re not old enough to have lived through it, surely you’ve seen the photos and heard the stories of “Whites only” drinking fountains, restrooms, and restaurants.  And if banning children becomes a trend, it would give new meaning to the notion of “Adults only.”

As for me, I’m calling for a No Obnoxious, Loud, or Otherwise- Offensive Human Being policy to be instituted everywhere – immediately.  If, after reading all this, you still disagree and respond with “just get a babysitter,” I’m going to scream and throw a tantrum!