Every time I travel by air, I always have this problem: crying babies. I never seem to get away from crying babies or unruly children. Ones who kick my seat the whole flight, the ones who need an infinite amount of diaper changes (and the parents think its ok to do so on the tray table....ewwwww?????!!!). Oh and there are the parents who weigh 300 pounds and don't think they should buy a seat for their 2 year old. 2 year old children are NOT lap children.
So I'm reading CNN.com this morning and I come across this article, which I think you should read before responding to what I will inevitably ask you all.
Fly and cry
Read it? Okay good. So I TOTALLY get it. I can be sympathetic and I definitely don't have a problem with the parents that really do try to calm the child down. I'm usually wrapped up in a book, my iPod, or my own fear of the plane crashing, that I'm not always paying attention to the wailing child in the back. The problem is, I've come across parents who just let the child cry, kick, and throw tantrums. The parents who EXPECT 200 other passengers to just suck it up and be ok with a crying infant. So maybe my biggest problem is that I (the childless passenger) should be expected to not have a problem with 2 1/2 hours of continuous crying, because, well, babies cry right? On the other hand, I DON'T agree with the other extreme, where everyone else thinks babies should just be banned from "..planes, movie theaters, restaurants, and any other public place for that matter." Uh hello? That's too much. I may joke about that, but in all seriousness, people with children have the right to go out and live a LIFE. Do WE expect them then to just sit at home in the dark caring for a crying child?
I think it comes down to compromise. Please don't allow your child to kick my seat on a full flight when I just want to enjoy my InStyle magazine and if I see that you're trying to calm the kid, then I can definitely be more sympathetic. If you aren't, I WILL say something and it will probably piss you off. But I feel that it's fair. That's really only on a plane, where I can't get off and take the next one (like a bus or train) or sit somewhere else in a restaurant if it was THAT bad.
What do you guys think about this? Do you fall in either extreme?
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