• Okay, I’m gonna bite the bullet and say it. This is disheartening. I’m not one to clutch pearls, but come on. Would you say this about anyone else? Dogs? Cats? Anything at all? Do you understand how fucked up it is? I just don’t get it. It was the same in Reddit, and it’s fucking same in here. Why do you hate children? You don’t wanna have them, that’s fine. Why would you say these things?

      Maybe you’re joking. Even after assuming that you are, this is in poor taste and a fucked up thing to say.

      • Sephtis-6@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        U don’t hate children but what i hate is that one child with shitty parents will ruin the entire flight for everyone else.

        • Cypher@lemmy.world
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          Do shitty parents and upset children exist? Absolutely.

          Yet everyone seems to ignore that maybe, just maybe, that child is being “shitty” despite having good parents.

          Maybe the kid has a medical issue causing pain and discomfort and there’s not a damn thing the parent can do except get on that flight to see a specialist.

          Maybe she’s fleeing domestic violence and needs to get to family to safe.

          Maybe the mother has postpartum depression and unfortunately cannot properly care for her child so she’s seeking help elsewhere.

          Fuck maybe the kid has an undiagnosed brain tumour that’s going to kill them. I know people that happened to.

          If you go around assuming everyone else who inconveniences you in the slightest is a shit person, you will be a shit person.

          So get over yourself. You might have a slightly less comfortable flight while that poor parent might be going through the worst time in their life.

          • TopShelfVanilla@sh.itjust.works
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            See, here’s the neat thing about things. You get to choose what you do and don’t care about. Empathy should not go so far as to cost. Your baby is not my problem and it’s your responsibility to keep it that way. I have my own, I didn’t take them to public places till they were able to have some self control. Is that always possible? No, but it’s really obvious if you are the type of person who doesn’t even try.

            • Cypher@lemmy.world
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              Part of using public transport is that you need to share it with the public, which is why I broadly detest it and cannot comprehend the fuck cars weirdos.

              That said when I do use public transport I fully expect noisy children, insufferable karens and the occasional nut job.

              Your concept of empathy seems to be severely lacking.

              • ArbitraryValue@sh.itjust.works
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                I expect

                noisy children, insufferable karens and the occasional nut job

                but that doesn’t mean I have much empathy for them.

                Being loud in public imposes a cost on the people around you. In our society parents with babies are generally allowed to impose such a cost, but so are raving lunatics…

              • rexxit@lemmy.world
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                Part of using public transport is that you need to share it with the public, which is why I broadly detest it and cannot comprehend the fuck cars weirdos.

                Couldn’t agree more. The anti car movement among young millennials and Gen Z is weird as hell to me. I’ve lived in a large city and taken well designed public transit for years. Compared to living in a small city and driving, it’s awful - so I left. There’s a literal loss of freedom and autonomy that comes with it, and I can’t fathom why the younger crowd wants to live in crowded apartments and post angry screeds to r/fuckcars. I like walking and hiking and biking too! I have no desire to do it in a city, so I have to drive somewhere uncrowded to do it. If public transit served those places, they would be crowded.

                • IncognitoErgoCvm@reddthat.com
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                  If you live in NA, you haven’t lived in a walkable city designed for people over cars. You can find clearer explanations of the rationale from Strong Towns or NotJustBikes.

          • Sephtis-6@kbin.social
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            Of course these things do exist but most of the time(at least in my experience) the problems are shitty parents.

            For example I had 2 kids crawling under my seat for the whole flight(takeoff and landing included) and the parents just watched something on the phone.

          • mnemonicmonkeys@sh.itjust.works
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            Yet everyone seems to ignore that maybe, just maybe, that child is being “shitty” despite having good parents.

            If you’re bringing an infant onto a plane, you’re a shitty parent.

            Maybe she’s fleeing domestic violence and needs to get to family to safe.

            You don’t need a plane for this

            Maybe the kid has a medical issue causing pain and discomfort and there’s not a damn thing the parent can do except get on that flight to see a specialist.

            You don’t need a plane for this

            Maybe the mother has postpartum depression and unfortunately cannot properly care for her child so she’s seeking help elsewhere.

            You don’t need a plane for this

            I think you can figure out the pattern for the rest of your points.

        • Mowcherie@lemmy.world
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          It’s usually the air pressure causing the kid some pain from mild barotrauma / airplane ear. They can’t help it. No amount of good or bad parenting changes the pressure differential in the inner ear.

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        You can train dogs and cats to be quiet and sit still. Not all of them will be happy doing it for a long plane ride, but you can do it. Babies on the other hand? Babies don’t give a fuck.

        Hungry?

        Scream.

        Tired?

        Scream.

        Happy?

        Scream.

        Mad?

        Scream

        You can do everything right and the baby will still scream.

        See, I have this speculation that early humans were fucking dumb, had no object permanence, couldn’t keep track of their kids, and generally pretended they didn’t exist unless they were being annoying. So their babies had to fucking scream as loud as a firetruck for their parents to not lose them.

        That’s the other thing too. The sound of a crying baby will drive anyone who doesn’t have antisocial personality disorder or has been driven deaf by the wonders of childcare completely insane. Why? Because while the sheer volume of a baby’s scream might not be as loud as a barking dog on an objective decibel scale, but when it comes to perceptual decibel levels, babies are loud. Our hearing sensitivity varies based on pitch. The higher the pitch, the more sensitive our ears are. On top of that, our brains are hardwired to have a reaction to a screaming baby, which can manifest itself as irritation, annoyance, frustration, and other negative emotions, because our primitive monkey brains are screeching, “WHY WON’T YOU TAKE CARE OF BABY!?” but we can’t do anything because it’s not our baby.

        That’s why people like to make jokes about dead babies, infant abuse, etc. Because babies are annoying as hell and literally everything they do is designed to make sure we know they’re there at all times.

        Edit: AND ONE MORE THING, have you ever wondered how a parent can love their baby when it’s quiet but hate it when it’s awake? Yeah, that’s almost certainly a result of primitive humans trying to take advantage of the fact that the annoying poop demon was finally quiet and wasn’t ear-fucking their monkey brain into guilt-tripping them anymore, so that they could ditch their babies when they were sleeping. So you can probably thank the negligent, sociopathic protohumans for babies being annoying as shit.

        • GreenMario@lemm.ee
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          I love this theory that early (and current) humans were so incompetently stupid that we evolved to fucking scream all the time just so they don’t walk away and forget us.

          Considering how many kids get left in locked cars in the summer, as well as no other species of animal has annoying ass babies I have to canonize this as the Truth.

          • Mossy Feathers (She/They)@pawb.social
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            Consider this as well: if you’re a primitive human and you have to take your baby somewhere, you’re going to be praying to whatever deity(s) you believe are watching over you that your baby understands the severity of the situation and doesn’t start screaming in the middle of the jungle. 'cause if it does, every predator in a 5 mile radius is going to hear your baby screaming and dinner bells will start going off in their heads. Our only major survival traits are our near-infinite stamina (if properly trained) and ability to magically fuse or deform useless objects into something useful. Additionally, the usefulness of both of those traits diminishes with the size of the group as a single human with a spear is far less likely to survive a tiger attack than two humans with spears. To put it another way, your baby will actively alert predators that you’re burdened with its existence and that you could be free food so that you get removed from the gene pool if you’re stupid or unlucky enough to travel alone.

        • SlopppyEngineer@discuss.tchncs.de
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          Babies evolved to cry all the time because their parents had this habit of making the species that just looked at the baby in a weird way go extinct.

      • Safeguard@beehaw.org
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        As a parent of two boys, i feel that much of the annoyance of no-children-having people is due to parents not putting boundaries for children in place.

        Children scream because of attention. It means they are not getting it.

        Start walking around with the kid to calm it down. Its your job as a parent. You cannot stay seated and act like “what are you gonna do? They are children ! They scream!”

        No. You are a bad parent for letting them just scream.

        Having said that, babies sometimes just scream without reason. Perhaps, and I mean this, if you have a baby that is prone to doing this, do not travel in confined spaces, or dine at restaurants until that phase of screaming is over.

      • SaltyIceteaMaker@lemmy.ml
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        No i wouldn’t think this about dogs and cats etc. As those are not annoying 24/7. Of course there are dogs and cats that are but the majority is well behaved… unlike Babies

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        Would you say this about anyone else? Dogs? Cats? Anything at all?

        What an odd comparison, given that pets are crated and put in (a warm/pressurized part of) the cargo bay. Is that better then hiding under a seat or the overhead bin? It seems about the same to me.

  • mister_monster@monero.town
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    I’m gonna be unapologetically that person one day. Get into a tube full of stinky humans and complain that babies exist in the world. People need to get over themselves.

    • DrM@feddit.de
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      Especially now that Noise Cancelling headphones are everywhere and work as good as they do. Since I’ve got my Sony headphones a crying infant becomes only a really minor inconvenience

    • MissJinx@lemmy.world
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      Tbf I don’t think babies are the worst. They cry, but that’s it. The kids that can talk walk and kick you are. And also let’s always remember that the major anger is not about the kids but the lazy parents that think everyone else should suffer so that THEY don’t have to deal with it.

  • ThePac@lemmy.ml
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    How anybody flies without noise-canceling headphones these days is beyond me.

  • ANGRY_MAPLE@sh.itjust.works
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    I don’t get the rage that some of these comments have from seeing this meme.

    It doesn’t say that anyone actually did or said anything, just that their expression dropped after seeing an infant board a plane.

    People are allowed to be disappointed. I mean, I don’t think that most parents actually love hearing screaming and/or crying either. Is a (probably) brief facial expression seriously the same as hating all children, or wishing for them to dissapear to some of you guys? Jeez Louise.

    I mean, normally I wouldn’t give a hoot either way. Kids on the plane, no kids on the plane, whatever. If I had a migraine that day though, yeah, I wouldn’t be thrilled. I wouldn’t be upset at anyone for the noise in the slightest, but I also wouldn’t be joyful about it.

    Are we certain that that’s the actual contect of the picture, or did someone just say it was? Is this the accurate, OG text on the picture? Did any one of those people actually say or do anything beyond a facial expression when seeing very small children board the plane?

    Some of you guys need to take a deep breath and just relax. I’m referring to both extremes with this.

  • _CottonCandyUnicorn_@lemmy.world
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    I had a man in his 60s tell me “if you board a flight without noise canceling headphones in 2023, that’s on you.”

    We were flying to Italy (from US) with our 5 month old to visit my Aunt one last time before she passed away a few months later. Baby cried here and there for a total of maybe 1.5 out of the 9 hours. We felt so guilty but people were incredibly nice at the end when we apologized for disturbing their flight.

    She’s a pretty good flyer overall but will throw her occasional 5 minute fits. I think about that man’s joke after working our asses off to calm her down.

    • Nioxic@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      Being angry at babies is what pathetic people do.they cant do much about their situation.

      Its on their parents but… as you say… sometimes you just gotta fly. With the kid.

    • ArbitraryValue@sh.itjust.works
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      I don’t know what kind of noise-cancelling headphones he has but mine wouldn’t help against crying - they reduce the volume of buzzes, humms, and other background noises, but I can definitely still hear shrieks quite well.

      • _CottonCandyUnicorn_@lemmy.world
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        Interesting. Not saying you’re wrong because, sure, I can hear some crying with mine too but with music or a podcast playing its a distant background noise that my brain just kind of ignores, I guess. But I like to do work on planes so now I’m wondering if I just got used to tuning it out when I’m zoned in. I’m also one of those weirdos that can sleep on planes. So… I Might be in a small group of outliers on this one.

    • beatensoup@baraza.africa
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      When you realize most of those judgemental passengers were those kids like 20 years ago (2003’sh). 😀

      As long as there is effort from the parent’s side to help the baby adjust, then people should be more human and acknowledge this is how humans grow up!

      • scubbo@lemmy.ml
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        No-one’s claiming that it’s unreasonable or unprecedented for kids to be noisy and disruptive due to (among other reasons) still-developing brains that can’t fully process social norms and responsibilities.

        We’re saying that, given that everyone knows that fact, the parents who choose to bring poorly-behaved kids onto planes are being selfish and irresponsible.

        The kids are mostly blameless in these situations - they’re still developing, they can’t (depending on age) be expected to be fully responsible. It’s the parents that are selfish shitbags.

      • Ataraxia@lemmy.world
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        I didn’t chose to be born nor did I chose to be a child. I have the right to be irritated though by other people’s mistakes. It is completely OK not to make humans. We are not just mindless beasts only good for reproduction. People have a right to find people’s poor life choices distasteful, lie smoking cigarettes and doing drugs.

    • PseudoSpock@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      Yeah, noise cancelling headphones delete the mechanical noise and the standard level of chatter. Screaming is left in that void to come right on through and into your brain. They don’t block angry baby screams, they make them stand out.

    • generalpotato@lemmy.world
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      Anybody that complains about children and babies can go fuck themselves. You shouldn’t have to feel guilty for being a parent.

      • PseudoSpock@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        Yes you should. That child is going to face pretty bad economic and climate times. The likelihood of them dying from climate change or starvation is going up. And because of covid damaging immune systems, dying of the increasing numbers of illnesses running around. Not to mention the return of once defeated diseases due to anti-vax movements.

        They chose to bring a kid into a world of misery because they were needy, or they thought it would be cute, or whatever. Selfish reasons. That’s who should go f themselves.

    • RealEarthHuman@lemmy.world
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      That’s irrelevant. Yes, we were all kids once. That doesn’t make children any less annoying to travel with.

      • dopeshark@lemmy.world
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        I used to think that way until I had my own baby. I understand the parents a lot more now. We don’t bring our babies in flights/places to annoy anyone (some parents might do it, Idk :v). It’s a complicated situation where we want to stay with our loved ones and at the same time don’t be yelled by strangers who can’t handle baby noises, trust us, we try to calm them down, if we could, babies wouldn’t annoy so much, but they kinda have a mind of it’s own 🙂 (stubbornness at its peak) I don’t expect anything to change, specially in the terms lf having patience with strangers, but… idk :v

        • r00ty@kbin.life
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          I think perhaps you misunderstand. Most people don’t think parents bring their kids along to deliberately disrupt travel. At least, I certainly hope that’s not what people think.

          But, intent is irrelevant. It doesn’t stop it being annoying for some/many people.

          As for the picture here. I suspect the reason more people are looking this way than usual. It looks to be a business class cabin. I know many people book business class because it more likely puts you at some distance from the noisier cabins. This looks like they probably have a dedicated business class boarding door. So they likely realise they’re coming to sit in the same cabin.

          If you book in economy, you’re used to and expect it more, I think.

            • r00ty@kbin.life
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              Yes, and I’m agreeing with you. But the animosity is a general illogical (but human) thinking of “Why did you bring them on MY flight?”

              Like I say, when people reflect, they’re not angry at the people, they’re angry at the situation they’re in. At least, I hope that’s what normal people are doing.

        • riceandbeans161@discuss.tchncs.de
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          1 year ago

          just stay home then

          you chose to have children, in this day and age where all they’ll ever know is suffering and pain

          so don’t make everyone else’s life worse because you just had to creampie someone.

          • Blank@lemmy.world
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            Believe it or not, we’re not all despondent nihilists, hell bent on self fulfilling prophecies of negligent apocalypse incapable of empathy and compassion for those who still gently carry that same flame that brought us all here, not yet lulled like so many into a dark shroud of self doubt and loathing by gluttonous corporations who grow fat on the grief and despair of those who are content to take what is given and slip through life soundless and meak, refusing to create change, however individual, however small, so sure that three hundred thousand years of humanity is unquestionably doomed to the darkness you choose to wallow in.

            Some of us want to fight and we love our kids (and yours) and this world, and yes, we even love you nihilists, and we’ll fight for you too.

        • ArcticLynx@feddit.de
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          1 year ago

          here’s a solution:

          don’t take planes for a few years until the child doesn’t cry for no reason anymore

    • Xariphon@kbin.social
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      One of the best things about moving here from the bad place was how their senseless, rabid hatred of young people didn’t carry over. It’s heartbreaking to see sentiments like this starting to spread.

      • GreenMario@lemm.ee
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        Come on. It’s not that bad. Plus “maybe don’t take babies on plane trips” doesn’t equal “kill all babies” or “fuck Dem kids”. There are many subtle levels.

      • bermuda@beehaw.org
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        I definitely recommend revisiting this post about 12 hrs later. It’s kind of wild in here. Saw a comment with 19 upvotes referring to children as “cum pets.”

        • Xariphon@kbin.social
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          I don’t think I could bear it. Activism for the rights and freedoms of young people has been such a big part of my life for such a long time that that kind of anti-child attitude burns my soul.

    • Anamana@feddit.de
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      And you think you didn’t annoy the fuck out of your own parents when you were one?

      • Ethalia@feddit.ch
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        That’s irrelevant. Yes, we were all kids once. That doesn’t make children any less annoying to travel with. Source: RealEarthHuman

        • Anamana@feddit.de
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          Huh? Maybe you should reread my comment

          Edit: I love it when people just downvote without providing context

      • oregoncom [he/him]@hexbear.net
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        I’m sorry your family was too broke to ever leave whatever shithole you come from. If your parents were good at your job you wouldn’t be threatening to hurt children.

  • NewAgeOldPerson@reddthat.com
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    This is one of those things I see people complain about everyone complaining. Like vegans or CrossFit people. I’ve met far more people complaining about complaints than actual incidents.

    Most of us get it. It’s kids. I’ve seen obviously not emotional support animals brought in by asshats. Kids aren’t my concern.

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    Maybe it’s different in the USA, but I’ve travelled a lot and don’t think I ever remember a long haul flight without multiple babies and young children. It’s just a fact of travelling.

    I recently did a 16hr flight solo and the other 3 seats in my row of 4 were parents and a toddler.

    That’s just part of flying and you should plan for it (noise cancelling headphones, sleeping tablets, ear plugs).

  • explodicle@local106.com
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    I don’t think hours of noise canceling headphones are a realistic solution for everyone, like people with autism or sensitive ears.

    What we should have is a “children’s section” in the back of the plane. If your party only contains adults, then you can only book in the adult section until it’s filled, and same with parties that have kids. Parents don’t want to disrupt everyone, but imagine this on a longer bus or train ride!

  • madcaesar@lemmy.world
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    In this picture:

    1 cute baby

    1 caring parent taking his kids on a trip

    And a bunch of entitled douchenoozles, not understanding that THEY used to be screaming babies too!

    Edit: The replies to this are wild lol this platform really is just single dudes circle jerking. If you really have no compassion for the parent in this picture, you need to take a deep look at yourself.

  • AItoothbrush@lemmy.zip
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    Spends hundreds of euros on a flight. Cant buy a noise cancelling heqdphone or earphone. I kinda assume a babys gonna cry when i fly because 200 people closed in an aluminium cylinder together isnt the most pleasant experience.