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• Thursday, November 10, 2005 05:54 AM

  Paris gets it right - at least on this issue

  As a Canadian who spends much of the year in France-and too much of my time in cafes - I see daily that it is possible to get children to behave AND have fun in cafes. I can count on one hand the number of times I've seen a child be truly annoying in a Parisian cafe - and some of those few were American (perhaps Canadian?) tots.

  Somehow the French have managed to find a decent middle ground. Admittedly I've often seen kids playing on the periphery of a "terrasse" something not possible in your usual starbucks coffee-as-toy-and-personal statement emporium. But more often than not these kids are stuck in a chair like the rest of us, talking in normal voices to each other, to their parents, even to waiters (who nowadays are much friendlier -even to children- than they ever get credit for- just remember "Bonjour" and "Merci" are not optional) The rule in place isn't "don't scream" or "don't run around" it's more like "Don't bother anyone" , "be polite" or "listen to your parents" and even small children seem to "get" at least one of these. And parents seem to interact more - and in a more mature way - with their kids: showing them stuff in the paper, asking them questions, and occasionally especting them to listen while someone else is speaking. Overall these kids are quite happy to be "playing grown-up" in public. They are learning to live in society - a concept that seems quaintly old fashioned in America. And they are NOT shackled into a stroller/straightjacket and allowed to wail for freedom.

  I suspect that the current generation of North American parents is so terrified of curtailing their little consumers' individuality and self-expression that they think it would be repressive - not to say impossible - to expect their children to behave in public. Well they're wrong - most of the rest of the world - and I suspect their own grandparents - know better.

  And if they can't control their kids they should leave at the first sign that they are bothering people or accept to be barred from places where adults should be able to get what they paid for - a few moments peace with some warm mud and a friend or a good book.

  BTW, those kids won't be setting fire to cars when they're thirteen, either- that's another issue altogether. One where France - and the French government - has quite literally blown it.

  —Cog Read Cog's other letters
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