Please Stop Asking Me to Teach Your Kids Proper Etiquette
by kev on June 18, 2008 

11 Comments

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Dear Parents of the World,

How are you all doing? Great? Glad to hear it.

Look, I’ve been meaning to talk to you about this for a while, but the time never seemed right. I appreciate the fact you all value my child-rearing skills. I know that when there is an awesome resource (i.e. me) out there in the world, the wise thing to do is take advantage of it. And all of you have been taking advantage of it big time.

I’m flattered. Really, I am. However…

I know you don’t want to hear this, but the time has come for you to no longer use me as your parenting crutch.

I know, I know. But you can do this, people. I know you can.

The next time your two children are running up and down the aisles of a grocery store, you be the one to stand in their path, look down at them and say, “if you do not stop this behavior, I am going to kill Santa Claus.”

The next time your teenage daughter leaves the house wearing an outfit one can only assume was found in a dumpster behind a strip club, you be the one to tell her, “you look like a cross between Christina Aguilera and Danny Devito, and I mean that in the least flattering way possible.”

The next time you take your 10-year-old son to the gym with you and he proceeds to play on all of the cardio equipment, you be the one to tell him the large man on the treadmill is hungry and will eat him if he doesn’t leave immediately.

Don’t wait for me to do these things, people. You do them.

It’s time to start teaching your children the proper way to behave in society. Stop waiting for good Samaritans like myself to do it for you.

Don’t wait for me to key the words “learn how to park” into the hood of your teenage daughter’s car. Teach her how to park. Teach her that it’s rude to her fellow drivers when she takes up two lanes with her car.

Don’t wait for me to throw an orange at the head of your teenage son when he doesn’t hold the door open for an elderly lady walking behind him. Teach him manners. Teach him to respect his elders. Teach him that oranges hurt if they are hurled at your head with great velocity.

Don’t wait for me to grab the cell phone out of your teenager’s hand and stomp on it so that the rest of the movie theater patrons can watch the film in peace. Teach him proper cell phone etiquette. Teach him that only inconsiderate jerks talk incessantly on the phone in public places. Teach him that people like to bring bodily harm to inconsiderate jerks.

Parents of the world, I have faith in you. I believe with my whole heart you can teach your children these things without my help.

You can do this, buddy! I know you can.

(And if you can’t, I’m going to beat you with a bag of oranges. I’m serious.)

Sincerely,

Kev

11 Responses »

1. Foxy Lady
   
   June 18th, 2008 at 1:28 pm:

   Parents: Please teach your children that dropping the F-bomb in public is inappropriate, rude, and disgusting, before Kevin is forced to be the one to run up with a bar of soap and a roll of duct tape for their perverted mouths.

2. Foxy Lady
   
   June 18th, 2008 at 1:29 pm:

   Edit: Make that the F-bomb, ANYtime!

3. JennyPenny
   
   June 18th, 2008 at 2:02 pm:

   Thank you, Foxy Lady! Thank you, thank you, thank you! At least half of the time when I am in public — except when I go to church — I hear that disgusting word uttered. If a child of mine said that word in my presence they would ingest so much soap they’d have bubbles coming out their ears on their 80th birthday.

   Parents: please teach your children that when an adult speaks to them, whether it be to greet them, impart wisdom/information to them, or ask them a question, they are supposed to respond in some way other than a glare, a grunt, or a sneer. An actual verbal response would be nice, and it wouldn’t hurt to tack on a “ma’am” or a “sir.”

   And yes, your kids can do this even if they’re only three years old. Mine did.

   Now Kev … what got you riled up, man? Did you go to the mall and people-watch for, like, five minutes?

4. Heath (aka Yasumichi)
   
   June 18th, 2008 at 2:21 pm:

   Ugh I know, watched a kid curse up a storm down at the pier when I was with my mother and he couldn’t have been more than 12 >.< Technically its the parents faults on the launguage thing though. Kids imitate…people know this. So why do people laugh when their little daughter drops a curse word.

   However I have a bit of a foul mouth too…working on that…But I don’t do it in front of kids. Get a clue parents

5. Erin
   
   June 18th, 2008 at 4:45 pm:

   Do you really take kids to task in public or do you just form the words in your head and glare at the culprits? It would be great to actually scold misbehaving children but I don’t have the nerve. Then again, exhausted parents trying to quiet a screaming child might welcome a little outside intervention–like the Santa Claus threat. If they don’t immediately behave just tell them they are the ones who killed Santa. That would also be a great money-saver at Christmas. “Sorry, dear, you killed Santa last year, remember? And Mommy and Daddy are too poor to buy any presents.”

6. Alice
   
   June 18th, 2008 at 7:01 pm:

   Yeah! Everything you just said! I’m running this blog off and passing it out to folks.

7. Skip DeKades
   
   June 20th, 2008 at 2:00 pm:

   You might also call on parents who lead large groups of children on a trip from Las Vegas to Washington, D.C. to get their kids to listen, get on board the plane, stow their luggage, sit down and shut up, instead of gabbing and gigglng and standing in the aisles so that other passengers can’t board. (I just went through this.)

8. Corrina
   
   July 12th, 2008 at 4:05 am:

   I’m going to start carrying big, fat oranges in my purse.

9. Dear Moms of the World: I’m Still a Nice Boy : Special Kind of Stupid - The world is full of stupid. We're just here to document it.
   
   August 7th, 2008 at 12:10 pm:

   [...] open-letter to lazy parents telling them to teach their children proper etiquette wasn’t an example of my being [...]

10. argentumvulgaris
    
    September 2nd, 2008 at 2:31 pm:

    Let’s face it people, those days are gone. We’re dealing with a generation that has been exposed to Television bringing up a generation that has been exposed to the Internet, in my books, that’s a recipe for disaster.

    I used the F-word when i was a kid, I knew if I used it in front of my parents my ears would ring for a week. So I didn’t.

    Today if you make your kids ears ring, they will divorce you, they will take you to court and sue you, they will even send you to jail.

    So, I took another slant, don’t use the F-word in front of me, your mother or another adult, if you must use it, use it appropriately with your evil minded friends. I figured, that if I said “don’t” I was being a hypocrite, so I gave them a few hints on how to avoid that ringing in their ears.

    I never heard my kids say the F-word.

    AV

    argentumvulgaris’s last blog post: Surgery

11. Lechar
    
    September 20th, 2008 at 8:32 pm:

    You’re like the Super Nanny…with oranges.

    It’s a clever discplining technique. I will adopt it in the future.

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