Posted on 10/29/2023 6:26:14 PM PDT by Morgana
Many years ago my wife and I were given tickets near the front of the stage for a play in Seattle.
While we were trying to watch the play a couple of boys behind us kept kicking my wife’s seat and playing with her long hair. When the lights came on during the first intermission I turned around and their dad was working away on his laptop. I asked him to please stop his boys from bugging my wife. He politely apologized and sternly told his kids to knock it off. They complied with his orders and didn’t bother my wife again.
It was Steve Ballmer while he was serving as Microsoft’s CEO. I never met him before, but I was glad he was able to keep his kids under control. He seemed like a decent guy despite what people often think about Microsoft’s leadership.
How much do they not charge for children behaving well?
Cannot have it just one way.
And if they say no service, and they render service, it need not be paid for.
I think this is a made up story.....no way is that legal nor ethical .....
None of us were there so can’t pick a side.....myself, I’d rather see a family talking and interacting than the ones where each family member is zombified by a screen.
I respect him more for that. Interesting anecdote!
>>Eleven children sat at the table, ranging from three to eight years old.
>>’The kids were sitting at one end of the table and they were being so good,”
Eleven kids 3 to 8 were by themselves? I’m going with the restaurant’s version of the story.
If you allow the children to remain and then impose a fine at the end, then you are de facto allowing the behavior.
Something doesn’t up here from this story.
A much repeated statement from my Father, “ no one ever got in trouble from minding their own business”.
There’s more to this story.
Restaurants are not in business, by running off customers🤔
“ Nope it’s private property and they set the rules”
Business has laws. A hardware store or restaurant cannot charge patrons for wearing an ugly shirt or being obnoxious even if they write on the wall or menu that they can charge an unspecified amount for unspecified subjective behavior of patrons.
The rule they can follow is to kick them out.
Did you pay for the meal. A place with a rude manager like that, I’d be inclined to not pay especially if I did not touch the food.
There are no warnings. Corral your younguns
I'm in your camp.
Some parents think their little darlings can do no wrong. And the kids are the worst behaved brats I've ever seen.
This is why drive thru and curbside pickup works
Our kids loved to eat out, which we did rarely, but we told them, and they knew we meant it, that if they ever misbehaved in a restaurant that that would be the last time for a long time we went out. They believed us.
The other thing we did was train them to eat out in a safe environment like our church. When they were little, to make things easier for families on Wed nights, they had a Wed night dinner for a very modest cost. They were able to learn eating out in public table manners in a safe environment where their activity wasn’t such an issue to the other parents.
It must have worked because we actually got complimented once by a couple who was enjoying a nice meal at a very not fancy restaurant and when we walked in with the three kids (ages about 2-6), I could detect them sighing and rolling their eyes. When they got up to leave, they stopped and complimented us then. That sure felt good. I also made sure the kids knew how proud we were of them.
First, these parents are soft-pedaling their children’s behavior. No group of kids that age-especially including boys—is quiet. Second, nothing drives me up the wall more than going out to a nice restaurant and having selfish parents ruin my meal by bringing little kids. The owner is right—take them to Burger King. Third, the owner didn’t handle this properly.
My wife and I went to a Ruth Chris one time and a couple brought their infant, who started crying. Just plain selfish. We never took our little ones to nicer restaurants until they were 11.
I wish Target and Walmart and Kmart would do this.
How do you know the food is lousy?
Personally I’d visit this establishment and will visit. Out of control kids should be at home until they can behave properly.
the restaurant owner is okay by me.
Mommy and daddy are usually the only people enthralled by their offsprings capers.
Take the littles somewhere where they can be kids and leave the rest of us alone.
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