Parents: What’s ok in your home isn’t always ok in public
Oft-quoted Professor Jonathan Turley of George Washington University Law School was once heard as saying that parents should be held strictly liable for the actions of their offspring. While I do not necessarily endorse that approach to parental liability, I certainly wonder why parents allow their children—or put their children in a position—to do the risky and/or annoying things that children often do.
American society is extremely protective of its youngest members. Children are protected from their stupidity (and that of their parents) to a far greater extent than adults.
Under the doctrine of attractive nuisance, a property owner can be held liable for injuries to a child, even if the risk of injury was obvious. With respect to most laws on statutory rape and the provision of alcohol or tobacco to a minor, adults are expected to establish the actual age of a minor, even if the adult reasonably believes that the minor is an adult, and even if the minor lies or provides false identification regarding his or her age. In short, the law places the burden on all adults—not just a child’s legal guardian—to protect that child from harm.
But where are the parents when bad things are happening to their children?
Given the current state of the law, It is no wonder that parents place more and more responsibility on society as a whole to raise their children. Yet, I must protest on grounds of basic human decency…
PARENTS: PLEASE SAVE THE REST OF US FROM EXPERIENCING WHAT GOES ON IN YOUR HOME.
In particular, I’m thinking of bathroom behavior. I don’t care if you allow your kids to watch you relieve yourself in your own home, but have some compassion for everyone else using the public restroom. The rest of us do not want little eyes peering through the cracks and underneath stall doors. Even in a public restroom, a person is entitled to a little privacy.
Let me illustrate with a story. I noticed the startled look on a man’s face as he exited a public restroom one day. I asked if everything was ok—apparently he was grossed out. As it turned out, he was using a urinal, and a man came up to use the urinal alongside him. Not so strange, right? Right– except the man had a small child sitting on his shoulders the whole time.
Come on, that really crosses a line.
Here’s a suggestion: If you, parent, are using the restroom, have your child stand in front of your stall door. If the kid moves, yell at ’em. If your child is using the restroom, you stand in front of his or her stall door. If the kid gets outta line, yell at ‘em. That would make all the rest of us so happy that you became a parent 
So very, very happy.