Well-behaved children a benefit to all

At what age does the younger generation become fit for grown-up society?

This is no longer a question under serious consideration. Nowadays, Miss Manners might consider it more to the point to ask at what age it is no longer fitting for people to behave as if they were youthful society.

But there was a time in which it was taken seriously. That was in the days when a debut marked a change in a young lady’s life, not just another parental extravaganza in which the point of a ritual is cast aside to make way for heavy-duty partying.

Wait. Miss Manners should clarify that. She does not mean to suggest that every, or even many, young ladies had debuts, and she certainly did not mean to suggest that debutantes took anything seriously. But the concept existed, throughout society and at all economic levels, that entry into the adult social world was a privilege granted only upon being old enough to know how to behave socially.

Now it is only childless adults who think that. Parents of young children believe that the proper age to lead a full social life begins at birth. Off they trundle them to parties, restaurants, coffee houses and theaters without so much as asking the babies whether they actually feel like having a night out on the town.

Nor do they ask their hosts or anybody else who might be affected. And if the hosts try to head them off, they protest that they would have no social life at all if they were not permitted to bring their children.

Miss Manners is not entirely unsympathetic. She realizes that the social lives of parents are bound to be curtailed when the children are young, regardless of the baby-sitting possibilities, simply because they are going to want to spend time with their children. And even aside from the idea of amusing the parents, she loves multigenerational social events and ceremonial occasions and believes in exposing children to the civilized institutions of the society.

And then she hears what these theoretically charming events are like. Children are running wildly around restaurants annoying other patrons. Babies are not being hastily removed from earshot when they cry during wedding ceremonies. Children are not being hastily quieted by their parents when they talk during movies. Party guests are failing to pay attention when their children mistreat their hosts’ possessions.

When parents decide it is easier for them to relax when they are not riding herd on their children, other people decide that it is easier on them simply to ban all children.

And then everyone loses. The parents lose their social welcome, they lose the opportunity to use such excursions as an opportunity to teach their children manners and they lose chances to show off their well-trained children. The hosts lose the pleasure of making younger friends – which they don’t think they want now, but will regret when they are old enough to feel out of it because they don’t know the reigning generation.

And the children lose the practice of learning to behave properly. Or at least the debutante equivalent of learning how to keep their indiscretions from getting them thrown out of places they want to be.