Do you teach your children to follow commands from all adults, even if they are rude or illogical? I’ve noticed that some other parents are completely offended if they ask my child to do something and my child does not acquiesce.
I understand that in old school parenting (i.e. pre-stranger danger), children were taught to respect and adhere to the requests of all adults. When we are on play dates or with close friends, I have no problem demanding that my kids listen and respect what the other adults say.
It is the acquaintances and random strangers whose requests are sometimes bizarre or disrespectful that I take issue with. For example, on a recent trip to Disneyland, another parent rudely told my son “be quiet” on line. Let’s just assume for a moment that I thought it was inappropriate for a four year old to be excited in Disneyland while waiting on a long ride for a Star Wars ride. He wasn’t hurting anyone and he was waiting rather patiently but enthusiastically.
Even if I bought in to her perspective, the woman attacked my son with such a rude and accusatory tone that I had no interest in helping her. Instead, I moved into defensive, mama bear, snarky posture and told her that if my son’s volume was so bothersome to her, she could let us go in front of her and choose how far away from us to stand in line. She declined this option and choose instead to use mean words and shoot us dirty looks for the remainder of the what on line.
I’ve had some time to reflect on her request and my response and realize that this situation could have gone differently if she:
- Had addressed her concern to me, not my son, or addressed my son with kindness and respect.
- Offered a more thoughtful explanation, like “I have a hearing aid and the loud noise is really hard for me.”
If she had tried either of these approaches, I would have been way more receptive to her request. The way she demanded obedience from my son put me on the defensive and I reacted accordingly. If I had been more enlightened, or less defensive, I could have:
- Repeated her request to my son in a kinder and more respectful way. For example, “this woman would like you to speak in a quieter voice. You can either use your quite voice or we can leave. You choose, or I’ll choose for you.” Full disclosure: I didn’t really want to leave at that point since we had already been in line for a good 20 minutes.
- Asked more questions to get to the heart of the issue and try to brainstorm more mutually accommodating solutions.
Any other ideas on how to handle the situation? What would you have done?
2 Comments
at the playground, i found the best way to get other kids to be careful is to proactively compliment. Something like, “you really seem to be careful around the little ones. You must be a big brother…” The kids also seem more careful after you say that and no parent will be angry at you for complimenting their kid.
When people tell my child to do something or tell me to tell my child to do something I am usually quite forward I probably would have said to the person “Oh he is fine, He’s just excited for the ride” a moments pause would allow her time to explain her rudeness or reason for coming to an amusement park where children teens and adults are typically loud and then if she/he had something good to say I would talk to my child about being polite and respectful.
I often find myself in an opposite situation at the play ground my daughter is a little over one so I will help her go down the slides and walk across the bridges but the older kids will cut us in line or start climbing up the slide when we are about to go down or while she is standing on the grass run by and knock her down I try not to day more then, look out buddy or please wait your turn how much censure can you give a random child at the park who is just being a normal kid and not paying attention?