No one travels with babies for fun, visiting my terminally Ill mother over the several years of her decline was indeed a nightmare with young children, we would not have put ourselves through that otherwise.
I have encountered this many times flying so it’s not “no one”. It’s usually younger couples who either don’t know what they are getting into or just have the energy to deal with it.
On international flights from the US it’s common to hear the reason is to bring the baby to see extended family.
That’s not what the idiom “don’t do x for fun” is about.
The expression means that X is the best of unpalatable options to accomplish something else, where X is taken in a literal and narrow sense.
People don’t fly with babies for fun. They do it because visiting grandparents is fun, and driving isn’t a good option. Or, if it involves a trip across the ocean, the alternative would be sailing.
> Where is SO important that you need to take a baby with you on a plane?
I would guess that in most cases, someone is flying with an infant because they are going somewhere important and traveling with their infant was the best option available to them.
Traveling by air (or at all) with an infant is not fun and I can’t imagine that ever being anyone’s first choice.
So when you see frazzled parents at the airport with their young children, assume the best and be kind.
I flew with my six month old a while back with no issues. Gave her a bottle on both the ascent and the descent so her ears would pop and that worked perfectly.
She slept like a baby for most of the 5 hour flight and only cried once for maybe 60 seconds when she got hungry and I had to prep a bottle.
It definitely didn't seem like "babies experience a lot of pain" holds true at all if you plan for it
Good thing you spawned into the world as a fully formed adult and never had to be a burden on society, unlike all these other _kids_ and their greedy parents.
Can you truly not think of a long list of things that are important enough and far enough away that it makes sense to take a baby on a plane? I could start writing you a list, but it seems like you should probably think about it for more than two seconds first.
Do you seriously think that parents are flying with infants for the lolz? The vast majority are not. It’s a major operation for both child and parents.
“What is so important that you need to take a baby on a plane” and “Have you thought about driving instead?” have got to be some of the most clueless and unempathic takes I’ve ever read. Ironic considering that’s what you’re accusing parents of.
I mean sure, you have your lived experience, I can respect that. As for my lived experience, most of the families with children that I come into contact with on planes are going away for their first vacation together. Entirely optional.
As a thought exercise — next time you are are annoyed by being stuffed into a metal tube for 3-15 hours in close proximity to a child who is being annoying try asking yourself:
What’s it like for the child? What’s it like for the parent(s)? What would be the range of reasons that would motivate them to do this? Was I this painful to others at any point? Was it for ‘good’ reasons, or ‘bad’ ones?
Some introspection might at least help pass the time and take your mind of the inconveniences inflicted by others
Yeah and fuck them, right? Won't these parasite breeders learn that they have no right to take vacations? They should experience nothing but misery until their children are 5.
Unrelated, why are so few people opting to have kids?
Based on your judgy comments here about babies and parents, I'm really not buying that you are engaging all these parents traveling with babies in conversation.
What is so important that you need to get on a plane?
See this is what has bugged me so much about how common anti-natalism has become. It has become diluted but present everywhere.
Children are a part of our society. They are a part of your community. They are going to be around you, they are going to be where you don’t want them to be, they are just going to be present in general. And this can’t possibly be a safety argument, as planes I believe are the safest mode of transportation. If you’re worried about safety, then kids should never get in cars, which is also completely unfeasible.
So if it’s not about safety, then what is this really about?
Regardless of what it is, I as an adult have full autonomy to do that, understand the pain in my ears that I will experience, and will do my best not to disrupt those around me. I also don't become a small baby-sized fleshy projectile on impact.
This is the exact sort of take if you ever have a kid you will look back on and realize how ignorant it is.
You will not be worried about the baby in it's mother's arms if you crash land on a plane. In reality you don't want to be inconvenience. That's what happens when you live in a society full of different people though. Sometimes you have to wait as they load people in wheelchairs in planes. Sometimes a baby cries.
the discomfort in the ears becomes a non-issue if the baby sucks on something while it's happening because sucking helps readjust the pressure. having flown with a baby myself, we never had problems with that.
and if you want my personal opinion, anyone who feels crying babies are disruptive is an asshole. i am not saying that lightly. parents are not just flying for fun and letting their babies cry to torture you.
as a society we need to be more child friendly and supportive of parents. especially when they have a baby in distress. this whole idea that children should always be quiet and never bother adults is absurd, and only really found in western culture. that doesn't mean kids should be allowed to get away with anything, but a crying baby is not something that can just be stopped until the parents can identify the cause, and we should have some tolerance for that.
Children cannot fully understand what is happening to them for many, many years. This goes so far beyond planes. They don’t understand why they got jerked forward when you slammed the brakes on a car, or why the buckle burned their arm on a hot summer day. They don’t understand why they get a shot at the doctor, they don’t understand why the stove is hot, they don’t understand any of this crap until they get older and are exposed. The problem is that in order to avoid these situations, the only viable solution is to ask every parent to live in a lockdown-lite mode for 3 to 4 years every single time they have a kid. Is that reasonable?
Parents have lives and families and obligations. Kids are along for the ride until they can exert their own autonomy. That’s how it has always been and that’s how it will continue to be.
No one travels with babies for fun, visiting my terminally Ill mother over the several years of her decline was indeed a nightmare with young children, we would not have put ourselves through that otherwise.
People do travel with babies for fun and there’s nothing wrong with that! It is possible to have a good time traveling with young kids, even a baby.
Yep did 2 times NZ <> Europe with 2 and 3 kids. It's a piece of cake IMO.
Much harder to keep them entertained them at home lol.
> No one travels with babies for fun
I have encountered this many times flying so it’s not “no one”. It’s usually younger couples who either don’t know what they are getting into or just have the energy to deal with it.
On international flights from the US it’s common to hear the reason is to bring the baby to see extended family.
That’s not what the idiom “don’t do x for fun” is about.
The expression means that X is the best of unpalatable options to accomplish something else, where X is taken in a literal and narrow sense.
People don’t fly with babies for fun. They do it because visiting grandparents is fun, and driving isn’t a good option. Or, if it involves a trip across the ocean, the alternative would be sailing.
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Yes but seeing extended family is not "for fun". Family is important.
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It's incredible how many people are willing to treat young children as second class citizens because they don't want to be inconvenienced.
We have child-free hotels, child-free restaurantes, maybe now child-free airplanes...what's next, child-free cities?
Child free cities exist in the US. The villages has a population of 150K people. They genuinely dislike young people.
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> Where is SO important that you need to take a baby with you on a plane?
I would guess that in most cases, someone is flying with an infant because they are going somewhere important and traveling with their infant was the best option available to them.
Traveling by air (or at all) with an infant is not fun and I can’t imagine that ever being anyone’s first choice.
So when you see frazzled parents at the airport with their young children, assume the best and be kind.
I flew with my six month old a while back with no issues. Gave her a bottle on both the ascent and the descent so her ears would pop and that worked perfectly.
She slept like a baby for most of the 5 hour flight and only cried once for maybe 60 seconds when she got hungry and I had to prep a bottle.
It definitely didn't seem like "babies experience a lot of pain" holds true at all if you plan for it
If parents can't take babies on planes, they'll tend to drive instead, which is much more dangerous overall.
Because my elderly parents want to see their grandchild but are too old to fly
But that’s it: we don’t do other flights with the kids
Good thing you spawned into the world as a fully formed adult and never had to be a burden on society, unlike all these other _kids_ and their greedy parents.
Can you truly not think of a long list of things that are important enough and far enough away that it makes sense to take a baby on a plane? I could start writing you a list, but it seems like you should probably think about it for more than two seconds first.
Do you seriously think that parents are flying with infants for the lolz? The vast majority are not. It’s a major operation for both child and parents.
“What is so important that you need to take a baby on a plane” and “Have you thought about driving instead?” have got to be some of the most clueless and unempathic takes I’ve ever read. Ironic considering that’s what you’re accusing parents of.
I mean sure, you have your lived experience, I can respect that. As for my lived experience, most of the families with children that I come into contact with on planes are going away for their first vacation together. Entirely optional.
As a thought exercise — next time you are are annoyed by being stuffed into a metal tube for 3-15 hours in close proximity to a child who is being annoying try asking yourself:
What’s it like for the child? What’s it like for the parent(s)? What would be the range of reasons that would motivate them to do this? Was I this painful to others at any point? Was it for ‘good’ reasons, or ‘bad’ ones?
Some introspection might at least help pass the time and take your mind of the inconveniences inflicted by others
> going away for their first vacation together
Yeah and fuck them, right? Won't these parasite breeders learn that they have no right to take vacations? They should experience nothing but misery until their children are 5.
Unrelated, why are so few people opting to have kids?
Based on your judgy comments here about babies and parents, I'm really not buying that you are engaging all these parents traveling with babies in conversation.
What is so important that you need to get on a plane?
See this is what has bugged me so much about how common anti-natalism has become. It has become diluted but present everywhere.
Children are a part of our society. They are a part of your community. They are going to be around you, they are going to be where you don’t want them to be, they are just going to be present in general. And this can’t possibly be a safety argument, as planes I believe are the safest mode of transportation. If you’re worried about safety, then kids should never get in cars, which is also completely unfeasible.
So if it’s not about safety, then what is this really about?
Regardless of what it is, I as an adult have full autonomy to do that, understand the pain in my ears that I will experience, and will do my best not to disrupt those around me. I also don't become a small baby-sized fleshy projectile on impact.
This is the exact sort of take if you ever have a kid you will look back on and realize how ignorant it is.
You will not be worried about the baby in it's mother's arms if you crash land on a plane. In reality you don't want to be inconvenience. That's what happens when you live in a society full of different people though. Sometimes you have to wait as they load people in wheelchairs in planes. Sometimes a baby cries.
11 replies →
the discomfort in the ears becomes a non-issue if the baby sucks on something while it's happening because sucking helps readjust the pressure. having flown with a baby myself, we never had problems with that.
and if you want my personal opinion, anyone who feels crying babies are disruptive is an asshole. i am not saying that lightly. parents are not just flying for fun and letting their babies cry to torture you.
as a society we need to be more child friendly and supportive of parents. especially when they have a baby in distress. this whole idea that children should always be quiet and never bother adults is absurd, and only really found in western culture. that doesn't mean kids should be allowed to get away with anything, but a crying baby is not something that can just be stopped until the parents can identify the cause, and we should have some tolerance for that.
Children cannot fully understand what is happening to them for many, many years. This goes so far beyond planes. They don’t understand why they got jerked forward when you slammed the brakes on a car, or why the buckle burned their arm on a hot summer day. They don’t understand why they get a shot at the doctor, they don’t understand why the stove is hot, they don’t understand any of this crap until they get older and are exposed. The problem is that in order to avoid these situations, the only viable solution is to ask every parent to live in a lockdown-lite mode for 3 to 4 years every single time they have a kid. Is that reasonable?
Parents have lives and families and obligations. Kids are along for the ride until they can exert their own autonomy. That’s how it has always been and that’s how it will continue to be.
7 replies →