Slope Stroller Overabundance Making One Guy a Shut-In
Longtime New York Press columnist Jim Knipfel has a new rant about Park Slope stroller culture that sets the bar high for future diatribes on the subject. This is how it begins: This morning as I was leaving the bank, a woman recklessly pushing her armor-plated double stroller down the sidewalk veered sharply and unexpectedly…
Longtime New York Press columnist Jim Knipfel has a new rant about Park Slope stroller culture that sets the bar high for future diatribes on the subject. This is how it begins:
This morning as I was leaving the bank, a woman recklessly pushing her armor-plated double stroller down the sidewalk veered sharply and unexpectedly into an elderly man walking with a cane. He, in turn, fell into me. I was able to catch him and hold him upright and he seemed to be okay. Just a little flustered. The woman, of course, had said nothing, apparently considering an apology or even a simple excuse me unnecessary under the circumstances. She was a mother after all, and therefore privileged, so she simply continued careening on her way.
Knipfel says that the number of strollers in the Slope, as well as the neighborhood’s dog breed preferences (it’s really mostly the strollers, though) mean he can only leave his apartment for more than 10 or 15 minutes at a time, because he finds the situation out on the streets too harrowing and exhausting. The writer says that for the past year he’s been counting the number of strollers he sees in the Slope (“I’m averaging 1.45 strollers per block. Think about it—there has been at least one stroller, and usually more, for every block I’ve walked. It’s insanity.“) Knipfel takes issue with the air of entitlement that he sees a lot of the neighborhood’s parents displaying and notes that he sees a good number of kids being pushed around who look too old for strollers. Also, he says, it’s not a subject that can be broached in polite, public Slope discourse: “The child-free adults in the neighborhood mutter and complain about the problem, but only behind closed doors, and usually in whispers. They don’t dare say a negative word when they’re outside, for the simple reason that they’re terrified, most of them. Indulgent, affluent parents are too powerful a lobby (and what’s more, those strollers can really hurt when you get rammed).”
The Statistics of Contempt [Slackjaw]
Photo from dailyheights.com
Knipfel is a professional misanthrope. He’s completely over the top. That’s his schtick.
So what’s with all the wantabes?
There’s definitely something unhealthy going on with parents right now – but these endless discussions are less to do with that and more to do with the complete poverty of ideas of the people who obsess about them.
No ideas of your own? Nothing original or positive that defines you? No problem, you can find something like validation by attacking someone else. You can make your life just as much about NOT having kids as parents can make their lives about having them. The only difference is that no matter how neurotic parents get – and let’s face it – wouldn’t you be if every coffee-house idiot with an ibook were critiquing your every move – they are still more than the people who get off on criticizing them will ever be.
That’s because no matter how bad you might think they are, it’s ultimately not about them. It’s about the human beings, you know, the “crotch fruit” they are raising. They will inherit the earth. They will care for you in your old age. They will find the solutions, ply the science, solve the problems, make the art, the flims, write the poems, and play the music.
Let’s hope they do a better job than people who’s major contribution to the world at large is whining about strollers while simultaneously disappearing up their own egos in the comments section of the Brownstoner
oh god i feel so bad for these stroller moms. chatting on their cell phones, drinking $5 soy lattes and gossiping with other stroller moms. living in a 2 million dollar brownstone. life’s a real bitch!
fuck those yuppie stroller pushing pussies. half those fucking parents shouldn’t be parents. they can’t handle their little shits. those pussies belong in the suburbs driving their gas guzzling suv’s.
When I was in Copenhagen, A great city by the way, In DECEMBER. Mothers left their children/babies outside a cafe in the cold while they dined inside. I guess this prepares them for a lifetime of cold winters because I was freezing my ass off. Now if someone did that here in Park Slope all the mommy’s at Tea Lounge would force the death penalty at those Crazy Scandinavians. Whatever. We are a nation of do gooders and the I deserve it now people, when will it stop. It is time to wake up we are not that great.
My parents raised 3 children, 6:09, and they comment all the time how different things are today. Parents today totally let kids get away with things in public that previous generations never did. My parents did bring us to the country club, restaurants and bars often and nice ones at that. There was nowhere my parents could not take us even from a young age. We behaved fine in public. Not perfect but we did know to stay in our chair and not bother other patrons.
The problem today is it’s taboo to discipline a child. If you even speak firmly to a kid, other nearby mommies get very judgemental about it. So it’s impossible for parents to do a good job with it – their discipline becomes too inconsistent to be effective. They will discipline children at home but not in public in front of other parents. So it teaches nothing and does nothing.
I am laughing so hard, 6:02. With pity and sympathy yes, but that was too funny.
5:54 – people have been raising families with help – extended family or cheap domestic labor. It is actually a historical anomoly for parents to be alone in their homes taking care of their children by themselves – something that is not made easier by people like you, who actually have the GALL to complain about parents taking time off or getting tax breaks to raise the generation that will support you in your old age.
Have you ever been to another country? It is COMPLETELY NORMAL to bring children to restaurants and bars and EVERYWHERE ELSE in every country except this one. And guess what, people actually LIKE children in these countries, and welcome their presence – and even, GASP, help the parents look after the children while the parents are spending money at their establishment.
This country sickens me.
When they said New York was the city that never sleeps, I had no idea they were talking about being kept up all night by the baby crying in the upstairs co-op!!!
For the love of GOD!!!!!!
I am way late to this thread but:
“10:18 – here here. Most of these “entitled” parents are probably so exhausted and stressed … Their whole focus is not on their own entitlement, but on getting from point A to point B without killing themselves or their children – not an easy task.”
“12:52 – being a mom is the hardest thing to do on the planet. everyone one everywhere is expected to and should help them.”
You know, people have been raising children all over the world for thousands of years! It’s not like you are the first people in the world and are entitled to all the help in the world, and that the act of pushing your spawn down the street is a life or death issue. It’s simply the fact that you feel like you are better and more deserving of EVERYTHING (tax breaks, extra time off) including space for your Hummer-sized strollers just because you managed to get some sperm to meet your egg at the right time.
And to 11:22 who said that NYC cabs should be equipped with childcare seats, I really want to have a thoughtful response to that but I am too busy laughing. Get over yourself.