this post was submitted on 17 Aug 2023
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"You used to be a child once, so you aren't allowed to be frustrated at any behaviours of children or choices of their caregivers" sure is a perspective.
Yes, I was once a child. And if my parents had taken me on a flight before I was sufficiently mature not to yell during it, they would have been being irresponsible and selfish. "Babies scream, sometimes there's nothing you can do to stop them" is true, but doesn't imply that you should be allowed to take them anywhere.
What about ugly people or people with body odour? Do we not allow them to travel on planes, too? I can easily block noise with earplugs. Can't really plug my nose or keep my eyes closed all the time.
Why is everyone else responsible for your comfort? Wanting all families banned from airtravel just because wearing earplugs is asking too much is in my opinion a lot more selfish than bringing a child onto a plane.
Neither of those things you described are intentional life-choices that people have planned, so no, it is not the same thing at all.
This is a circular argument I've seen a lot of times on this thread (from several people), so I'm going to respond to it just once and then stop engaging here because this whole thread is not convincing anyone. Both sides of this issue believe that that argument supports them:
The thing is, one of these groups of people is knowingly introducing a factor that will cause distress to hundreds of people and is saying "fuck all of you if you aren't prepared to adapt to my choices", and the other group is saying..."please don't do that". The latter feels way more reasonable to me.
The key point here seems to be that air travel is considered to be a fundamental inalienable right, something which should not and cannot be denied. Parents are saying things like "well without air travel, how are we supposed to go on holiday", to which the answer is...maybe you're not (or you go by car/boat) until the baby's a real human? Maybe that was something you should have thought about before you had a child? Maybe, just maybe, it should be the cultural and social norm that a choice that you made does not permit you to inflict the negative outcomes of that choice on a tube of strangers?
Body odour is - thanks to deodorant - very much a choice.
You are right, air travel is no fundamental right. Same as air travel in complete silence.
They get called out all the time.
Remember the story of Andre the Giant that took a shit on a plane and they had to make an emergency stop?
They should do the same when a baby starts to cry.