http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/09/na.../09bakery.html

November 9, 2005

At Center of a Clash, Rowdy Children in Coffee Shops

By JODI WILGOREN

"CHICAGO, Nov. 8 - Bridget Dehl shushed her 21-month-old son, Gavin, then
clapped a hand over his mouth to squelch his tiny screams amid the Sunday
brunch bustle. When Gavin kept yelping "yeah, yeah, yeah," Ms. Dehl whisked
him from his highchair and out the door.

Right past the sign warning the cafe's customers that "children of all ages
have to behave and use their indoor voices when coming to A Taste of
Heaven," and right into a nasty spat roiling the stroller set in Chicago's
changing Andersonville neighborhood.

The owner of A Taste of Heaven, Dan McCauley, said he posted the sign - at
child level, with playful handprints - in the hope of quieting his
tin-ceilinged cafe, where toddlers have been known to sprawl between tables
and hurl themselves at display cases for sport.

But many neighborhood mothers took umbrage at the implied criticism of how
they handle their children. Soon, whispers of a boycott passed among the
playgroups in this North Side neighborhood, once an outpost of avant-garde
artists and hip gay couples but now a hot real estate market for young
professional families shunning the suburbs.

"I love people who don't have children who tell you how to parent," said
Alison Miller, 35, a psychologist, corporate coach and mother of two. "I'd
love for him to be responsible for three children for the next year and see
if he can control the volume of their voices every minute of the day."

Mr. McCauley, 44, said the protesting parents were "former cheerleaders and
beauty queens" who "have a very strong sense of entitlement." In an open
letter he handed out at the bakery, he warned of an "epidemic" of antisocial
behavior.

"Part of parenting skills is teaching kids they behave differently in a
restaurant than they do on the playground," Mr. McCauley said in an
interview. "If you send out positive energy, positive energy returns to you.
If you send out energy that says I'm the only one that matters, it's going
to be a pretty chaotic world."

And so simmers another skirmish between the childless and the
child-centered, a culture clash increasingly common in restaurants and other
public spaces as a new generation of busy, older, well-off parents ferry
little ones with them.

An online petition urging child-free sections in North Carolina restaurants
drew hundreds of signers, including Janelle Funk, who wrote, "Whenever a
hostess asks me 'smoking or non-smoking?' I respond, 'No kids!' "

At Mendo Bistro in Fort Bragg, Calif., the owners declare "Well-behaved
children and parents welcome" to try to stop unmonitored youngsters from
tap-dancing on the 100-year-old wood floors.

Menus at Zumbro Cafe in Minneapolis say: "We love children, especially when
they're tucked into chairs and behaving," which Barbara Daenzer said she
read as an invitation to cease her weekly breakfast visits after her son was
born.

Even at the Full Moon in Cambridge, Mass., a cafe created for families, with
a train table, a dollhouse and a plastic kitchen in a carpeted play area,
there are rules about inside voices and a "No lifeguard on duty" sign to
remind parents to take responsibility.

"You run the risk when you start monitoring behavior," said the Full Moon's
owner, Sarah Wheaton. "You can say no cellphones to people, but you can't
say your father speaks too loudly, he has to keep his voice down. And you
can't really say your toddler is too loud when she's eating."

Here in Chicago, parents have denounced Toast, a popular Lincoln Park
breakfast spot, as unwelcoming since a note about using inside voices
appeared on the menu six months ago. The owner of John's Place, which
resembles a kindergarten class at recess in early evening, established a
separate "family friendly" room a year ago, only to face parental threats of
lawsuits.

Many of the Andersonville mothers who are boycotting Mr. McCauley's bakery
also skip story time at Women and Children First, a feminist bookstore,
because of the rules: children can be kicked out for standing, talking or
sipping drinks. When a retail clerk at the bookstore asked a woman to stop
breast-feeding last spring, "the neighborhood set him straight real fast,"
said Mary Ann Smith, the area's alderwoman.

After a dozen years at one site, Mr. McCauley moved A Taste of Heaven six
blocks away in May 2004, to a busy corner on Clark Street. But there, he
said, teachers and writers seeking afternoon refuge were drowned out not
just by children running amok but also by oblivious cellphone chatterers.

Children were climbing the cafe's poles. A couple were blithely reading the
newspaper while their daughter lay on the floor blocking the line for
coffee. When the family whose children were running across the room to throw
themselves against the display cases left after his admonishment, Mr.
McCauley recalled, the restaurant erupted in applause.

So he put up the sign. Then things really got ugly.

"The looks I would get when I went in there made me so nervous that I would
try to buy the food as fast as I could and get out," said Laura Brauer, 40,
who has stopped visiting A Taste of Heaven with her two children. "I think
that the mothers who allow their kids to run around and scream, that's
wrong, but kids scream and there is nothing you can do about it. What are we
supposed to do, not enjoy ourselves at a cafe?"

Ms. Miller said that one day when her son, then 4 months old, was fussing, a
staff member rolled her eyes and announced for all to hear, "We've got a
screamer!"

Kim Cavitt recalled having coffee and a cookie one afternoon with her
boisterous 2-year-old when "someone came over and said you just need to keep
her quiet or you need to leave."

"We left, and we haven't been back since," Ms. Cavitt said. "You go to a
coffee shop or a bakery for a rest, to relax, and that you would have to
worry the whole time about your child doing something that children do -
really what they're saying is they don't welcome children, they want the
child to behave like an adult."

Why suffer such scorn, the mothers said, when clerks at the Swedish Bakery,
a neighborhood institution, offer children - calm or crying - free cookies?
Why confront such criticism when the recently opened Sweet Occasions, a
five-minute walk down Clark Street, designed the restroom aisle to
accommodate double strollers and offers a child-size ice cream cone for
$1.50? (At A Taste of Heaven, the smallest is $3.75.)

"It's his business; he has the right to put whatever sign he wants on the
door," Ms. Miller said. "And people have the right to respond to that sign
however they want."

Mr. McCauley said he had received kudos from several restaurant owners in
the area, though none had followed his lead. He has certainly lost customers
because of the sign, but some parents say the offense is outweighed by their
addiction to the scones, and others embrace the effort at etiquette.

"The litmus test for me is if they have highchairs or not," said Ms. Dehl,
the woman who scooped her screaming son from his seat during brunch, as she
waited out his restlessness on a sidewalk bench. "The fact that they had one
highchair, and the fact that he's the only child in the restaurant is an
indication that it's an adult place, and if he's going to do his toddler
thing, we should take him out and let him run around."

Mr. McCauley said he would rather go out of business than back down. He
likens this one small step toward good manners to his personal effort to
decrease pollution by hiring only people who live close enough to walk to
work.

"I can't change the situation in Iraq, I can't change the situation in New
Orleans," he said. "But I can change this little corner of the world."

/

Gregory Morrow wrote:

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/09/na.../09bakery.html

November 9, 2005

At Center of a Clash, Rowdy Children in Coffee Shops

By JODI WILGOREN

"CHICAGO, Nov. 8 - "... what they're saying is they don't welcome
children, they want the
child to behave like an adult."

It were not that long ago that this was the norm. Children were
expected to display a certain decorum based on adult behavior. Small
children incapable of this would not be taken to a public place they
could disturb. Even when i was growing up many theater's had special
sound proof viewing rooms for mothers with small children to sit in or
remove themselves to if the children got unruly.
---
JL

On 2005-11-10, Gregory Morrow gregorymorrowEMERGENCYCANCELLATIONARCHIMEDES@eart hlink.net wrote:

wrong, but kids scream and there is nothing you can do about it. What are we
supposed to do, not enjoy ourselves at a cafe?"

That's fscking right, bitch! If your enjoying yourself means making
everyone else miserable, you ain't got shit comming!

Ahem... That pretty much sums up my stance on the subject.

nb

Back to the old adage "children should be seen and not heard."

Can't say I blame the business owners who are doing these things. In
my trade one frequently sees store signs such as "unattended children
will be sold as slaves" "no children under 12 allowed" and "dogs
welcome, please keep children on leash."

If I want to see a bunch of loud kids being ignored by their parents
I'll go to the park, public beach or grocery store. I either did
something right or got lucky, my kidlet has always been well behaved in
restaurants and the like. Alas if she did opt to be a brat we were out
of there or at least one of us was while the other got the meal wrapped
& paid the check.

Jessica

"notbob" wrote

On 2005-11-10, Gregory Morrow
gregorymorrowEMERGENCYCANCELLATIONARCHIMEDES@eart hlink.net wrote:

wrong, but kids scream and there is nothing you can do about it. What are
we
supposed to do, not enjoy ourselves at a cafe?"

That's fscking right, bitch! If your enjoying yourself means making
everyone else miserable, you ain't got shit comming!

Ahem... That pretty much sums up my stance on the subject.

Get this:

"We left, and we haven't been back since," Ms. Cavitt said. "You go to a
coffee shop or a bakery for a rest, to relax

YEAH lady, you got it! and I don't find it relaxing with screaming kids
running all over. Okay with you? I mean, it doesn't have to be like
a church, for pete's sake, but it's not a playground, either.

nancy

One time on Usenet, notbob said:
On 2005-11-10, Gregory Morrow
gregorymorrowEMERGENCYCANCELLATIONARCHIMEDES@eart hlink.net wrote:

wrong, but kids scream and there is nothing you can do about it. What are we
supposed to do, not enjoy ourselves at a cafe?"

That's fscking right, bitch! If your enjoying yourself means making
everyone else miserable, you ain't got shit comming!

Ahem... That pretty much sums up my stance on the subject.

Funny, you fixed on the same part of the article that really got to
me as well. Parents like this woman (and others quoted in the article)
make the rest of us look bad.

Back when my son was a small child, Miguel and I would take turns
removing him from a public place if he started fussing -- we didn't
like hearing it, why would anyone else? Sure, it's a pain having to
disrupt your meal and/or plans, but it's part of the child-rearing
responsibility package. And by 3 years old, he was a model restaurant
patron. Go figure. If parents don't like having to deal with it, then
perhaps they shouldn't have had children in the first place!

Grumble, grumble...


--
Jani in WA (S'mee)
~ mom, Trollop, novice cook ~

On 2005-11-10, S'mee wrote:

Funny, you fixed on the same part of the article that really got to
me as well. Parents like this woman (and others quoted in the article)
make the rest of us look bad.

I blame my generation, the 60's boomers. They were the first to rebel
with, "Do your own thing, man" and "whatever" and "It's your bag".
These kids grew up, had kids, and that's when I first became aware of
parents becoming incensed over adults other than themselves
disciplining their children. "How dare you discipline my child?!? Who
do you think you are?". This to an adult who is entrusted with a room
full of kids for 6-8 hrs. Then corporal punishment was abolished.
The beginning of the end. It's gone downhill ever since. These
run-amok kids are the one's that will be terrorizing their own parents
in another ten years.

nb

at Thu, 10 Nov 2005 00:51:25 GMT in
. net,
(Gregory
Morrow) wrote :


http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/09/na.../09bakery.html

November 9, 2005

At Center of a Clash, Rowdy Children in Coffee Shops

I'm going to voice an alternative opinion. Naturally, people hoping for a
quiet meal are not happy when confronted with screaming kids. And kids,
once past a certain very young age, should have picked up enough social
graces to restrain themselves. IMHO certainly a 4-year-old should be able
to be reasonably quiet. If parents of kids in this age group have their
children screaming in public places, there's been a lack of training and
discipline. Furthermore, the parents of such older screamers have no right
to demand that their children be given free rein to shout and misbehave in
public.

However, restaurant owners and patrons could also do with being more
tolerant of very young children. It's unfair to expect children below a
certain age to be perfectly behaved. IMHO a 2-year-old can't be expected to
be able to maintain fully disciplined behaviour.

And it's unfair to exclude children from establishments simply on the
grounds that they might misbehave. There are many reasons for this. First
of all, there is no way kids are going to be able to learn the social
graces without being exposed to environments where those kinds of social
graces are expected. If every establishment they visited is similarly
packed with loud, boisterous kids, they're going to expect that this is the
social norm and never really learn to behave, certainly not at a reasonably
young age. Second, the risk is high that exclusionary policies will
relegate kids only to lowest-common-denominator places. Shut off from
higher culture, they get no chance to develop a more broad-minded, cultured
background from a younger age, and miss out on a critical developmental
opportunity that means later they may develop a disdain for or at least
ignorance towards high culture. Most importantly, it sends a terrible
message to young kids: that they're second-class citizens. Even fairly
young kids pick up, if often unconsciously, cues that they're not welcome
and each event where that happens will eat away at their self-esteem.

So I think exposing young kids to high-end restaurants, theatre, opera,
etc. pays off enormously in the long run in the development of kids with a
larger world-view and better understanding of culture. It is imperative,
however, for parents to maintain discipline and have some sensitivity to
others in the establishment. Once a kid starts misbehaving, you immediately
take him outside until he regains his composure. And if he persists, the
evening is over! It's ridiculous to have a kid screaming at the top of his
lungs without end and have the parents sitting there doing nothing about it
or worse still, acting like everyone else should put up with it. That goes
back to the picking-up-social-graces bit. If the kid gets no cues from his
parents that this sort of behaviour is not tolerable, he's likewise not
going to learn to behave.

However, if staff and/or patrons make moves to expel a kid permanently at
the *first* sign of trouble, it is they that could use the attitude
adjustment. A kid may, yes, explode momentarily, but if he brings it under
control in short order, then I don't think he should be admonished or his
parents excoriated. If you do so you are sending another terrible message:
that there can be no forgiveness for certain offences, even if they are
relatively minor.

I'm sure a lot of the resentment and hostility is not directed against kids
but against that group of insensitive, undisciplined parents who refuse to
take action when their kids are turning into little devils. I've seen
first-hand what happens when parents exert no discipline: you create kids
who are literally the limb of Satan! And again, no discipline is another
terrible message to give a kid: it implies that fundamentally you don't
care enough about them to teach them very much. In that sense, blatant
misbehaviour is usually a kid crying out for attention - attention he's not
getting from his parents. Really, the kids should be pitied, not condemned.
It might be fair to lay the blame on parents, and it's tempting to do so,
but it's not productive. Such accusations only make people defensive.
Better I think as the friend of such parents is to try to offer your help
with the kids. Then by setting an example you might at least be able to
send the parents a message, and if nothing else the kids might have someone
who pays attention to them. One might claim that as a friend it's not your
responsibility to raise their kids, but if they're not doing it, who will?
In times past people could turn to extended families for support with
child-raising, but todays era of the nuclear family has broken those sorts
of bonds and perhaps friends need to step in to fill that social void.
--

Alex Rast

(remove d., .7, not, and .NOSPAM to reply)

[snip]
"The litmus test for me is if they have highchairs or not," said
Ms. Dehl, the woman who scooped her screaming son from
his seat during brunch, as she waited out his restlessness on
a sidewalk bench. "The fact that they had one highchair, and
the fact that he's the only child in the restaurant is an indication
that it's an adult place, and if he's going to do his toddler
thing, we should take him out and let him run around."

BRAVO! One ****ing parent brave enough to teach her toddler that it
isn't the center of everyone else's universe is interviewed out of that
whole herd of clucking hens.

Mr. McCauley said he would rather go out of business than
back down.
[snip]

That _is_ his prerogative but I have a feeling that his business will
eventually increase as the clucking hens move further afield to find
other places that allow such antisocial training as each feels they are
entitled...

The Ranger
==
"The Irish believe wiff a most-'oly furor that eatin' food shoul' be a
test of courage. If we can't boil it t' deff, fry it in a vat o' grease,
or stuff it in an animal intestine, we're posit've it shouldn't be
eaten."
-- John Woolery, London Underground, 1992

Alex Rast wrote:

at Thu, 10 Nov 2005 00:51:25 GMT in
. net,
(Gregory
Morrow) wrote :


http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/09/na.../09bakery.html

November 9, 2005

At Center of a Clash, Rowdy Children in Coffee Shops

I'm going to voice an alternative opinion. Naturally, people hoping
for a
quiet meal are not happy when confronted with screaming kids. And
kids,
once past a certain very young age, should have picked up enough
social
graces to restrain themselves. IMHO certainly a 4-year-old should be
able
to be reasonably quiet. If parents of kids in this age group have
their
children screaming in public places, there's been a lack of training
and
discipline. Furthermore, the parents of such older screamers have no
right
to demand that their children be given free rein to shout and
misbehave in
public.

However, restaurant owners and patrons could also do with being more
tolerant of very young children. It's unfair to expect children below
a
certain age to be perfectly behaved. IMHO a 2-year-old can't be
expected to
be able to maintain fully disciplined behaviour.

And it's unfair to exclude children from establishments simply on the
grounds that they might misbehave. There are many reasons for this.
First
of all, there is no way kids are going to be able to learn the social
graces without being exposed to environments where those kinds of
social
graces are expected.

"No way"? should not these "social skills" be developed in the home and
not left to commercial establishments to instill them?

I have several acquaintances that do not even try to have structured
family meals, the kids eat what is available when they want it,
microwaving or other wise heating as the situation warrents, ordering
pizza and calling it a meal or otherwise just not practicing the more
traditonal forms of the family meal.

These are the kids of working parents, who prefere to 'hanging out' with
their friends to a sit down meal with family.

The one family i know that still insists there kids not only come home
for dinner but require them to dress for it can be criticized for a
number of other things but not their childrens manners.
---
JL

--

Alex Rast

(remove d., .7, not, and .NOSPAM to reply)

On Wed 09 Nov 2005 07:43:58p, Thus Spake Zarathustra, or was it Alex Rast?

Newsgroups: rec.food.cooking
Subject: At Center of a Clash, Rowdy Children in Coffee Shops
From: (Alex Rast)

at Thu, 10 Nov 2005 00:51:25 GMT in
. net,
(Gregory
Morrow) wrote :


http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/09/na.../09bakery.html

November 9, 2005

At Center of a Clash, Rowdy Children in Coffee Shops

I'm going to voice an alternative opinion. Naturally, people hoping for
a quiet meal are not happy when confronted with screaming kids. And
kids, once past a certain very young age, should have picked up enough
social graces to restrain themselves. IMHO certainly a 4-year-old should
be able to be reasonably quiet. If parents of kids in this age group
have their children screaming in public places, there's been a lack of
training and discipline. Furthermore, the parents of such older
screamers have no right to demand that their children be given free rein
to shout and misbehave in public.

snip

Very well expressed, Alex, and I don't disagree at all with your premise.
However, for the most part, I shall continue to seek out "adult only"
venues. It's enough to endure the rowdy ones in other inescapable
situations without having my meal ruined in a nice restaurant. Since I
don't particularly like childre, it's better left to other to train them.

--
Wayne Boatwright *¿*
_____________________________________________

A chicken in every pot is a *LOT* of chicken!

Alex Rast wrote:

And it's unfair to exclude children from establishments simply on the
grounds that they might misbehave.


Nope, it's a GREAT reason...

Thats because a child in an establishment is a HUGE unknown
quantity...the kid might act up, it might be just fine, in any case
even the presence of a kid creates a lot of tension for many people,
you have to make all this extra accomodation for them. If adults act
up you can toss them out, no problem. With a misbehaving kid there is
always the potential for a lot of extra drama, e.g. the fact that your
establishment might end up being mentioned in the _New York Times_, the
fact that you might have some angry jerk parent on your hands...

There are plenty of places for kids to go act up, they are welcome to
go there...they don't have to infest each and every place that exists,
many of which us adults frequent in order to try and enjoy ourselves.


Besides which this place mentioned in the article is a BUSINESS...a mom
coming in with her kid for a treat is in most cases a PITA from a
financial standpoint, e.g. they don't spend much, they take up lots of
extra room with those friggin' Humvee strollers, kids are are a real
turn - off for many from an aesthetic standpoint, etc....



So I think exposing young kids to high-end restaurants, theatre, opera,
etc. pays off enormously in the long run in the development of kids with a
larger world-view and better understanding of culture.


Yep, AFTER they have learned proper behavior at HOME...

We had to learn proper behaviour at home, only later were we permitted
to go to restaurants, church, movies, etc. When I was a kid (I'm 51)
even events such as weddings, funerals, etc. were primarily adult
functions, kids were rarely taken along even to these types of
things...

The thing that gets me about these yupmoos that are complaining is that
they a

1) stay - at - home moms...

2) they are financially well - off (daddy usually has a big - cheeze
job at some broker or lawyer firm downtown) and thus are very well -
indulged materially. They want for nothing. At a very early age they
have all the nice things that money can buy, unlike earlier generations
they don't have to postpone gratification for *anything*...

3) these kids are *endlessly* exposed to other social settings via pre
- school, play dates, and myriad other things...

4) quite a few of these moms have part - time nannies or helpers (or
even full - time)...


My folks both worked, we were working class, and yet us kids knew
proper manners at an early age. SO what is this problem with this
particular mothering set? All these wonderful advantages and their
kiddies can't even behave decently in a public setting? I think the
problem is with the mothers - they themselves have been over - indulged
and they have never heard the phrases, "No..." and "You can't...".

There should be no reason why a business owner should have to put up a
sign asking patrons to use their "inside voices", there should be big
outrage on either side about this, and there should be no article in
the national press about this...but there ya go.

--
Best
Greg

"Michael "Dog3" Lonergan" wrote in message
...
"Gregory Morrow"
gregorymorrowEMERGENCYCANCELLATIONARCHIMEDES@eart hlink.net looking for
trouble wrote in
ink.net:
Many of the Andersonville mothers who are boycotting Mr. McCauley's
bakery also skip story time at Women and Children First, a feminist
bookstore, because of the rules: children can be kicked out for
standing, talking or sipping drinks. When a retail clerk at the
bookstore asked a woman to stop breast-feeding last spring, "the
neighborhood set him straight real fast," said Mary Ann Smith, the
area's alderwoman.

I think the breast feeding would depend on the establishment. Talking or
sipping drinks is perfectly acceptable in my book.

Standing & talking during story time is not being considerate of the patrons
who would like to listen to the story. As for kids sipping drinks in a
bookstore, that's an invitation to lost inventory and sticky messes,
Chapters/Starbucks notwithstanding. Breastfeeding should be ignored in the
same way as bottle feeding would be.

Gabby

Nancy Young wrote:

YEAH lady, you got it! and I don't find it relaxing with screaming kids
running all over. Okay with you? I mean, it doesn't have to be like
a church, for pete's sake, but it's not a playground, either.


Been to church lately? In my experience, religious institutions are the
worst for tolerating bad behavior in children, um, er, for putting up
with parents who don't take the monsters to the cry room when they start
to fuss.


Ideally, the parents would take their kids to church, and one of them
would exit with the baby whenever it got noisy. That could be
squawling, or it could be the happy vocalizing of a pre-verbal toddler.
Ideally, before the child had any real understanding of behavior
modification, s/he would have some pre-conscious understanding that
noise doesn't happen in that place. This wouldn't be a foreign concept
since it would be reinforced with the idea that food never happens in
the living room and running never happens in the department store. The
older members of the congregation would then coo and tsk and say nice
things about liking children while the parents pace up and down the
foyer or front lobby (I like the word and concept of "cry room.") with
the kid.


The reality is somewhat different. Parents (some of them, I'm not
making accusations) have the idea that children will grow into an
attention span and grow into an ability to stay still and quiet the way
they grow into walking and talking. They think those things just happen
and don't realize all the ways they encourage them. They think that the
religious service will somehow foster quiet in the kids. So they bring
the kids and let them yell.


None of that bothers me too much. What gets me is the handwringing of
the clergy and the board of directors. The newsletter is filled with
pleas for parents to keep their kids quiet. In one instance, they had
this idea to put toys in the back of the room so the kids would play
quietly by themselves during the service. But not once did anyone take
responsibility for telling the parents to remove the children! What's a
religious congregation for if it's not to give advice and help to young
parents who could benefit from the wisdom of those who have been there
ahead of them? But the board and clergy know that if they insist that
kids who are being active and noisy be removed, the parents will
effectively boycott, and they need the money.


--Lia

This is exactly the thinking that got us to this point! I'm only 40 but buy
the time I was 3 I was expected to sit at the table during the meal at home
and behave- sounds terrible nowadays for sure. Before that my parents would
have got a babysitter- I was taught control BEFORE being in public
situations like restaurants. I would have known what would HAPPEN to me if
I didn't behave- this is what is lacking today. Besides, I go to a
restaurant to enjoy my meal- not to help you raise your child. FRC