This is bizarre. Why wouldn't he want to spend time with his family?

Are you sure they weren't noise-cancelling headphones? You can buy those that cancel out the noise away from you while making the close stuff clearer.

Or he may have needed to listen to something for work the next day and wanted to be near his kids at the same time. It certainly doesn't sound like they were upset or in danger, I don't see what's wrong with it. It's not like we know this guy does this at every meal or what his situation was. Kinda sucks that he's now subjected to a message board tear-down.

Also, that picture is a terrible Photoshop job of putting headphones into it.

Well, when you do something unusual in public, you subject yourself to "message board teardown," as you stated it. It's not as if it's really hurting him to have people he doesn't even know comment on something he did.

Listening to something for work the next day is not an excuse to me, either. It's just indicative of the larger problem in our society, that a lot of parents focus too much on work and not enough on their children. And no one is suggesting they were in danger either. If you honestly don't see what's wrong with not giving the people you're with your full attention, we are just coming from two completely different places.

I know it seems like the in thing to do to judge other people's parenting these days. However, not knowing anything about the situation, I don't see why we have the right to judge, especially if the kids didn't seem upset by it.

Of course we have the right to judge. No one's saying he's a bad parent, people are just commenting on this specific situation.

wtf is with that picture?!?!?!?! nice photoshop job! haha

i think it's rude to wear headphones in a restaurant when you're with ANYBODY.

Snarky, you said that much more succinctly than I did. I also think it's rude no matter whom you're with.

They were not noise canceling - regular ipod buds.

When I do something in public, I do not expect people to throw away all common courtesy and subject me to message board smackdown, no. It saddens me that the internet has created that "freedom" and that people think it's just dandy.

Also, there are noise-cancelling ear buds that unless you took them out of his ear and studied them closely, you can't tell the difference.

What's so uncourteous about making general comments about a specific behavior on a website? If you were so concerned about common courtesy, I'd think you'd be a little more concerned about giving your full attention to those you're with. Also, we must define "smackdown" differently. I don't understand why you put freedom in quotation marks, either. I think people misuse quotations marks far too frequently.

It saddens me that someone is so rude to actual registered users, but then complains about common courtesy. It also saddens me (and most other registered users) that the Sugar network decided to allow anonymous comments.

It always makes me smile when anonymous users come back to argue, though, because they can't subscribe to comments. I wish I had the free time to come back and check just in case some one has commented on something I commented on!

I put freedom in quotes because I don't think it's very freeing.

I'm not concerned with his situation because I don't know it. I have no idea why or what caused him to have headphones on and what his other choices may have been. Still being at work and not seeing his kids at all? I don't know.

So it's ok for registered members to be rude but not anonymous. Gotcha. No worries, I'm at the point where lilsugar is either so uninformed or unprofessional that registering would be a joke anyway.

No, it's not OK for anyone to be rude to other commenters until others are rude first. How is it not freeing to have the right to say what you please?

So, it's "a joke" to register, but not to comment and then keep coming back to check on other's comments? Gotcha.

The behavior does seem odd, but I'd have to say that we don't have enough information to explain it.

Lilkimbo,

Forgive me, I misspoke. Yes, everyone has the right to judge anything and form their own opinions. What I meant was, I don't think it's wise to judge in this case because we know so very little about the situation. That dad could have been playing with his kids in the park all day and now they were enjoying some peaceful quality time together. Personally, I don't like jumping to conclusions and judging people prematurely. People have done this to me and jumped to completely wrong conclusions because they didn't have the whole story, and so I try not to do this to others. That's just my opinion. If you want to judge, yes, that's your right too.

In your statements are implicit judgments about me, so don't pretend that you don't judge people. I was commenting on this one action, not on his overall skills as a parent or his value as a person. And I think that you should give whomever you're with your undivided attention, as I already stated. I don't care if you've been with them all day, I think it's rude to be doing something else when you're with someone.

Again, anonymous users checking back in! It's priceless!

I don't know what you're talking about lilkimbo. You seem to have plenty of time to sit around and comment on the Sugar Network all day.

I love how when somebody cannot rationally rebut a person's comments, they attack how it is said: "ooh, you're using too many quotation marks," "you're anonymous" etc. Classic.

My point, which you obviously chose to ignore, is that registered users can subscribe, so they don't have to keep coming back and checking to see if someone has responded.

And I rebutted the comments and just added in some of the other things you mention.

I love how when somebody cannot rationally rebut a person's comments, they ignore the substantive parts and attack the person individually.

Classic.

And my comment about the quotation marks was because I was trying to understand what exactly was meant by freedom, since it was obviously not meant in the technical sense. If it's "classic" to try to better understand what someone is saying, consider me "classic."

Oh yeah, the "substantive" part of your argument was that "you have the right to judge people" even when you have no clue about their situation.

Your more direct point, regarding anonymous users checking back, was that you would love to have that kind of time on your hands. Clearly you do, with or without the luxury of subscribed comments, as evidenced by the incredible amount of time you spend commenting. That's not a judgment or an attack, just a fact.

No, I don't have the time to check back in on the off chance that someone might have commented back.

And you must have selective vision, because you missed the several comments in which I pointed out that I am judging the action, not the person.

Also, the part that I considered an attack had nothing to do with that portion of your comment.

You know what, though, you're right; I don't have the time for someone as rude and hypocritical as you. I'd suggest you re-read your comments if you honestly believe in common courtesy and not judging people.

I admire the PhotoShop effort! And, I think it's rude for anyone to wear headphones in a restaurant, especially a dad with his children — why not use the time to talk with the kids about their days?

Lilkimbo,

I doubt we would get along in RL, so I'm not pretending anything about that. Of course I love my family and friends, but we're not constantly talking to each other. Sometimes, we just like to hang out and chill, like sit and read in the same room for a while. I don't think my friends and family and I always have to give each other constant attention or chatter to get along. So, I suspect you would find me boring as a friend and I wouldn't enjoy your company either.

In my original comment, I wasn't even talking to you. I hadn't even read your comment. Just responding to the original post and trying to say that if we had all the info, we might not judge this guy so harshly.

Ok, you two. Enough. Geez, I know I'm a noob, but no one wants to see thread comments like these. it's a turn off all around. Let it go.

Anyway, I do think it's rude. Would he wear earbuds to dinner with anyone else? Why do people insist on treating children like they're not people?

And, FTR, I agree that it's possible to comment on an individual incident w/o judging the person's overall parenting or value.

Anonymous, I am confused as to why you would join a topic based chat website if you are against commenting on or judging situations that you were not a part of. Holding and expressing opinions on a chat website is not a "message board teardown,..." and Lilkim was not at all mean in expressing her opinion on the topic posed.

As to the topic at hand, I think it is rude to wear headphones, text, and talk on the phone when in the presence of anyone, especially during a meal. I think work can wait an hour until you are done dining with your children or anyone else for that matter.

Lil, I have seen dozens of your posts on MANY threads all within a short amount of time. Your idea of not being on here A LOT must be different than mine.

Read carefully, because you seem to be missing my simple point. As I have said, i think it's funny when people take the time to come back and check. I never said I was not on here a lot. To me, responding when you know someone has said something is not a waste of time. Randomly coming back to check is.

I am scared of the fact that you seem to be cyber-stalking me. It really makes me miss the old days when there was more of a community feel and I didn't hasve to be as concerned about these kinds of rude, anonymous, immature attacks. I am frightened by the fact that you keep responding.

I misspoke; I meant to say I'm frightened by the fact that you have made this so personal and that you have such recollection of what I've said in the past; I feel like I shoul go through everything I've said and make sure I didn't say anything remotely personal since you are genuinely making me fear for my safety.

For somebody who claims to be so proud of being a "registered user" of this site, you don't seem to know quite how it works lilkimbo. Nobody has to have any particular recollection of you; all of your comments are linked from your profile.

The irony here is that you keep on blasting people for making anonymous comments, but in your last post you seem to realize the value of anonymity. Once again, classic.

So, you have basically just admitted that you are in fact a registered user who is logging out to attack me, which is what I suspected all along, since only registered users can see profiles. If you can't see the obvious differences between the kind of anonymity I desire and the kind I dislike, you are even less intelligent than I thought, but I will explain it you anyway. I was referring to being a member of the community and having an identity in the community, which is entirely possible to do while maintaining anonymity regarding one's outside life.

You have, however, displayed another reason why I dislike anonymous comments: they allow registered users to sign in and out and personally attack people while hiding behind the anonymous tag. Again, classic.

I do think it's great that you berated me for mentioning something less than substantive, but you keep coming back to attack me in frighteningly personal ways. I've had members on here do some pretty scary things, so I'm fearing you might be one of those people. Please stop personally attacking me or at least have the decency to do it under your user name so I can pm you and we can stop monopolizing this board.

And lonebear, you're right, I wouldn'y enjoy the company of someone who would be rude enough to listen to music while we're eating out. I have no problem with sitting in the same room reading, though.

And I never said your first comment was directed at me.