Regarding kids on planes.

We flew with our 20-month-old son for the first time a few weeks ago. Despite the fact that my brilliant wife had planned it all out and had every potential problem accounted for, I got more and more anxious as the day of our first flight approached. Thankfully, my boy is a natural world traveler, and handled the whole trip beautifully and with almost no loss of his toddler composure whatsoever. All told, it was a fun trip and a nice experience.

Flash forward to last weekend. I was listening to an NPR quiz show, and when the host asked a question to which the answer was airline flights that do not allow children to board, the audience actually applauded. I could practically smell the DINK self-congratulation through the radio speakers, and it made me consider why I was so anxious to fly with my son in the first place. While my son did great and, as far as I know, didn’t bother anybody, the sentiment behind that applause was precisely what I was so afraid of in the weeks leading up to the trip.

Every couple of weeks or so, I see the same discussion pop up in various venues: how irritating and selfish it is for people to fly with children, and what the parents who would subject other passengers to their spawn might be thinking. For those of you who are wondering what I’m thinking, let me illuminate you. The same questions and demands always seem to arise, so as a parent, allow me to address them in a hypothetical scenario.

I will preface this by saying I am about as far away from a “daddy blogger” (do those exist?) as one can be, and honestly don’t have any strong opinions about parenting anyone or anything other than my own child. I am a quiet, nerdy, and somewhat self-involved guy who became a father at thirty, and am still trying to figure out this whole fatherhood thing. I get annoyed with other people fairly quickly, and can definitely sympathize with the feeling of strangers ruining your day simply by existing. But if you had a kid, you’d understand. Yes, I know, that cliche that is worn through enough to be both useless and infuriating. Just bear in mind that your luxury of not being responsible for the life of a tiny larval human affects your ability to empathize with what I’m telling you.

Okay, so, for the sake of argument, we’re going to assume that you aren’t one of those knobs who think they’re in a movie theater instead of using public transportation, and you haven’t already started being a jerk to me just because I’m boarding the plane with a baby. Let’s say everything has been going fine up until we’re an hour into a four hour flight, and for some reason, my child gets upset and starts crying. This is a straw man, true, but it's a straw man composed largely of arguments I've heard countless times before.

Wonderful. A crying baby. I will let this parent know what I think about that by giving them the stinkeye, and perhaps I will make a snide remark to my companion that’s just loud enough for the parent to hear.

While I appreciate your subtle attempts to get me to realize that my child is being irritating, I have news for you: I’m already aware of that. You know how that grating cry makes you clench your jaw? How it spikes your adrenaline, and makes you want to do something, anything, to just make it stop? I’ve been dealing with it for a lot longer than you have, and unlike you, I am actually required to figure out what that something may be, regardless of where we are or what ungodly hour of the night it is. So, yeah, I get that you’re annoyed. I am at least twice as annoyed as you are (because I guarantee that I have you beat when it comes to thinking “not this crap again”), and what’s more, I’m already embarrassed before anybody around me even starts to get upset. If you really want to insert yourself into the situation, stop making bitchy faces and comments at me, and use that energy to make a funny face or silly remark at my child. That might actually work, at least for a time, and I’ll be your new best friend for the rest of the flight.

I’d rather not. I don’t like children. But you don’t seem to care about my obvious discomfort, so I guess I’ll just confront you directly. Can you please get your child to be quiet? I’d really like to get some rest.

Shit, yeah, why didn’t I think of that? Hold on a second.

Excuse me, Colin? This nice grown-up over here would like you to stop crying, and feels that I have a greater responsibility to them than to you. So, let’s be quiet, what do you say?

Hmm... well, golly, that didn’t seem to work. Would you care to ask him yourself?

I’m about to do just that. If you can’t control your child, I’m more than able to do it.

Yes, I’m sure that if a stranger elbowed me out of the way and got into my baby’s face, it would frighten him into at least a momentary silence. If you attempt it, you’ll have plenty of time to congratulate yourself on your success as you plummet towards the ground, after I have bodily forced you down the airplane toilet.

Look, it’s just really inconsiderate when parents don’t do anything to quiet their screaming children.

Has it occurred to you that I’m trying to do something, and you just aren’t recognizing that fact?

Now, I will say this: there are plenty of parents who literally sit and do nothing as their children run wild, kick seats, or throw increasingly frantic temper tantrums. These are the parents who placidly ignore their child, continuing to read their book, talk to their spouse, or simply stare off into space, hoping that their child will settle down on their own. Feel free to give those parents all the grief you’d like. At best, they are either irresponsible or distracted, and could use the wake-up call. At worst, they are selfish and/or stupid, and deserve the grief they get. Just bear in mind that while there may be an overlap in the Venn diagram of “irresponsible, selfish, stupid person” and “parent,” making a broad correlation may not be the most intelligent conclusion.

That being said, let me explain something about parenting that you, having no experience or interest in the subject, may not fully appreciate. If a child is old enough to be in, say, first grade, then a parent can “do something” to make them behave. Maybe. If, on the other hand, the child is a toddler, we’re basically dealing with a chimpanzee. Adept parents have an arsenal of tactics and implements to distract and pacify, which may or may not have any effect, depending on how tired, hungry, sick, or bored the toddler is. To which their reactions, by the way, will differ from child to child, depending on their burgeoning personality, much like how the particulars of your annoyance may vary from that of some other sanctimonious cock on a different flight. If the child is an infant or a newborn... well, here’s something that many of us parents take for granted. We assume it’s common sense that you can’t in any way discipline or reason with an infant, but I have realized that a lot of non-parents don’t actually know this. So, in plain terms: crying is the only way an infant can communicate any sort of problem, from excruciating pain to wanting a hug. The only thing I can do is try things until I hit the right button to make them stop. And sometimes, that button doesn’t exist. Sometimes the kid is melting down for no other reason than that it’s meltdown time.

So, in short: if my child is crying and I am talking softly to them, or holding and rocking them, or giving them toys, or trying to feed them, or doing anything at all that somehow involves them, and you ask why I’m not doing anything about my kid, don’t be surprised if I look at you like I want to punch you in your unhelpful throat.

Well, I don’t understand what possible reason you have to bring children that can’t be controlled on an airplane in the first place.

There’s a whole world of possible answers to that question, and the correct one is about as much your business as your reason for flying is mine.

It’s not the same thing. Whatever my reason is, I’m not taking away from the enjoyment of other passengers. Honestly, children under a certain age shouldn’t even be allowed to fly. You have other options for traveling.

I’d be all for adults-only flights, if I could still get a regular flight and it would get you out of my business.

If an airline feels it would be profitable to segregate families into their own flights, there’s nothing stopping them. However, the fact that such a supposedly sensible idea isn’t widely implemented should say something to you. Perhaps the airlines don’t agree that you deserve more special treatment than I do for the same ticket price, or perhaps they don’t care, but the math doesn’t add up because you aren’t the majority you think you are.

In any event, I found this attitude to be petulant even before I had any skin in the game. Oh, you’re forced to share a plane with people you’d rather not? You might not get peace and quiet while sharing space with the general public? How utterly tragic for you. I weep for your predicament, as I watch you hold up the boarding line by completely ignoring the size limitations for carry-on bags, and then stage a daring conquest of my armrest once you finally do sit the hell down. It seems to me that demanding everyone conform to your needs (as opposed to, I don’t know, buying your own goddamned plane and doing whatever you want with it) seems a lot like what you claim that my child and I are doing.

What’s that, you say? Buying your own plane is a ridiculously unrealistic request? I don’t see how it’s any more unrealistic than expecting that, instead of a four-hour flight, I should take my baby on a car or bus trip that will be at least three times that length, cost approximately the same when gas and food are factored in, and exponentially increase the attendant hardship on both of us. Or to not travel at all, because your convenience trumps whatever reason I might have to take him with me when I fly.

Let’s just put it this way: I agree that an adults-only flight would be an elegant solution to both of our problems. In the event that the airlines agree with you, I’m more than happy to take my child on a plane meant specifically for us. Otherwise... well, you have an opinion. How nice for you.

Whatever. I chose not to have children, and you did. I shouldn’t have to put up with your children, and that’s that.

And there’s the rub. Most of what this argument boils down to is the fact that, unlike me, a lot of travelers do not like children, have no patience for their antics, and are not interested in why they do what they do. They feel that parents are selfish for expecting a little leeway, and are harassing others by attempting to integrate their children into the world around them. Some go as far as to consider the act of having children to be selfish, considering the state of our society and world, but most just feel that since they did not choose to be responsible for a child, they should not be expected to make allowances for those who did.

I don’t really have a good answer to that. I actually agree with, or at least understand, a lot of that mindset, and accept that people will make whatever value judgement they choose regarding me and my life choices. I recognize that there are hordes of genuinely bad parents out there that personify the behavior which leads to this conclusion, ruining things for those of us that aren’t that way. That’s fine. My only response is that I am attempting to raise my son so that he won’t turn out to be the kind of smug butthole that would automatically refuse the benefit of the doubt to the parents of a small child.

And that’s really what I’m getting at: the benefit of the doubt. I understand the necessity for child-free zones, but the rampant attitude of “all parents are undesirable because I might be momentarily bothered” is troublesome, especially because in this instance we’re talking about basic transportation, a fairly vital service. It goes back to that cliche of not understanding if you’re not a parent yourself. One of the most visceral lessons that being a father has taught me so far is that there are a lot of people in this world that never outgrew the need to have everything their way, right now, me me me me me. I’ve met a lot of adults that I now recognize are not all that emotionally advanced past my son, for whatever reason. Yes, a lot of them are parents. A lot of them aren’t, though. Furthermore, that’s an immaterial argument, because we’re not talking about banning selfish people from planes. We’re talking about banning children.

This is what I’m getting at: at any given point in time, my son is being selfish because, uh, he’s two. How old are you?