No Kids Allowed

There’s a restaurant in Chicago that has taken a bold stand, and I fully support their position. I hope to see it spread nationwide.

Dan McCauley, the owner of a local café, A Taste of Heaven, caught two kids literally climbing the restaurant walls while the parents just sat nearby doing nothing. He told the family that they were no longer welcome to dine there. The next morning, he posted a sign in the window reading “Children of all ages have to behave and use their indoor voices when coming to A Taste of Heaven."

The sign has provoked many reactions, both for and against his position. Some parental groups have even called for a boycott of the café.

As I stated, I support Mr. McCauley’s decision, but I don’t think it’s enough. Consider:

- Children are noisy. I hate going into a restaurant and being subjected to their shrieks and cries. There is also some real concern that extended exposure to the high-pitched decibels can lead to serious health risks like tinnitus.
- Children are messy. The sight of their food-covered faces puts me off of my meal.
- One of my friends was hit by a fork thrown by a child, and had to have stitches. Clearly, children pose a physical danger to other patrons.
- As a parent, it shows a frightful lack of personal responsibility to allow your children to negatively impact others’ dining experience.
- Children’s Advocacy Groups are merely pushing their own opinions on the rest of us, without considering the societal impact of their recommendations.

It’s obvious, isn’t it? We should ban children completely from restaurants. I imagine that we could even expand the ban to all public places. How much damage is caused by children in grocery stores and malls? Anything that is broken is lost revenue, and employees have to spend more time picking up after the kids, which impacts efficiency. All of this is passed on to the consumer in the form of higher prices.

Don’t even get me started on kids in cars. They are a dangerous distraction to the drivers. Their demands for attention, spills, and yelling can lead to accidents, driving up both insurance and health care costs. We should no longer allow children in cars.

Places where children gather together in large groups, such as day care centers, schools, summer camps, and parks, should be closed down immediately. They are nothing more than disease reservoirs. If one child gets sick, they all get sick, and spread the illness to their families, who pass it on to coworkers, etc. The children are creating hazardous conditions for any patron, but especially for the employees, who have a higher exposure rate.

Children are expensive, too. In fact, the top three governmental expenditures every year are: #1, Social Security; #2, various family support programs such as Welfare; and #3, the Department of Education. By way of comparison, the Department of Defense ranks #4 in spending. Obviously, families with children cost society more money than those without. We should eliminate the tax credits for kids, and instead impose a tax penalty, to recoup some of that money. It’s only fair to ask them to shoulder the burden of paying for the system they are driving to the breaking point. In addition, individual families should be sued, with the money going to bolster Planned Parenthood programs to help people break the habit of live births.

Obviously, some families will insist that they have the right to take their kids with them anywhere they go. They’ll whine about “free markets”, “property-owner rights” and “individual choice.” It is equally obvious that these people are selfish, and have no concern for others. Therefore, I will be petitioning my city council to turn these suggestions into laws.

After all: It’s because of the children.