Can’t We All Just Get Along? No!

JP, cover your ears (or your eyes; this is a blog; oh wait, you’re three–you can’t read; continue with your business): New York HATES you. And let’s not even get into how they feel about Matt’s darling child Sasha. Don’t feel too bad, though, kids: they really hate me.

We’ve been running a lot of hate-as-love about parenting on this site of late, but this article in last week’s Times delved so deeply into the antipathy against city parents that I thought it merited attention.

What’s the new crime? Hyperactivity in restaurants? Nope. Fucked-up kid names? Uh-huh. No, the newest grip is none other than: TOO LOUD PARENTING. A crime so awful I’ve put it in ALL CAPS WITH MULTIPLE EXCLAMATION POINTS!!!!!!!!! That means it’s really bad. Here’s a taste:

“We see them everywhere. And if we’re being honest, we have all had the same frightening and ignoble urge to smash their heads in with a brick. I am speaking about those smug and uber-informative moms and dads who do their parenting in public places — aggressively and at the top of their highly educated lungs. They are easy to recognize, decked out in natural fabrics and larded up with the self-importance that comes from foisting “teachable moments” on an unsuspecting public.”

First: I do this. Second: it has nothing to do with wanting other people to notice how good a parent I am. Third: It’s because I’m usually so frustrated with my child that my “aggressive parenting” is a substitute for not yelling at my son in public. Cause people don’t like that much either.

To her credit the fucking moron journalist who penned this screed is a parent and she admits to having done very same thing:

While I may desperately wish that they would shut up, or at the very least use their “inside voice,” it is not because I am morally opposed to displaying one’s parenting skills for the approval of strangers. I myself was a young mother once, and I remember quite clearly the thrill of maternal showboating. What bothers me about this generation of parental windbags is their painful lack of subtlety; when they speak to little Cassidy or Aidan, it is at an almost nuclear volume.

Not that she’s taking any real blame. The difference between me and her? Style:

I may have been a showoff, but I like to think that I did it with panache. I spoke softly and intimately to my children, as if my words were intended only for them, as if I were indifferent to the gentle Madonna-in-blue-jeans image I presented.

And for this she wants to smash my brains in with a brick? Wow! That’s the kind of passion I can really get behind. I would like to say one thing, though, to all those Jew New Yorkers so upset about the behavior of urban children and their satanic parents: deep breath, friends. Can we really be such a bother?

Let’s have a look at Brooklyn, aka, Land of Obnoxious Babies. According to the Census, only about 11 percent of households have children under 6. That’s not a lot of screaming, menu-chucking, badly-named little miscreants. Surely there have to be other things we can all bitch about.

That said, I do love the hate. So, to all our DadWagon readers (and wayward journalists)–keep spewing. Makes me happy.