A new survey reported by Fox News found that 75% of adults support some kind of adults-only dining experience in restaurants.
Suggestions included child-free sections, restrictions during late-night hours, and quieter environments centered on the dining experience rather than family activity.
Predictably, the outrage machine immediately framed this as another example of society becoming “anti-child.”
But that misses the point entirely.
I don’t think most adults hate children. In fact, many people genuinely enjoy seeing healthy, happy families in public spaces. What people increasingly resent is the modern refusal to parent.
There is a profound difference between a child behaving like a child and a child running wild while adults stare silently into their phones, pretending nothing is happening or don’t care how their children are behaving.
Most people understand that babies cry. Toddlers have meltdowns. Parenting is hard. Grace for those realities has long been part of civilized society.
What has changed is that many parents no longer seem willing to correct, discipline or train their children at all.
For years, our culture has romanticized “gentle parenting” in ways that often amount to permissiveness without boundaries. While advocates insist gentle parenting is about empathy and emotional regulation, too often its practical application looks like endless negotiation with toddlers, the elimination of consequences and a fear of ever telling a child “no.”
Children are not born naturally selfless, disciplined or emotionally regulated. Those traits must be taught.
That requires parents willing to embrace authority, correction, structure, and yes, sometimes discomfort. Biblically, this is understood not merely as discipline, but discipleship — the intentional formation of character, virtue, patience, gratitude and respect for others.
A child who learns that the entire world must immediately accommodate his impulses does not magically become a considerate adult.
Instead, we are raising generations increasingly unable to handle frustration, conflict, sacrifice or delayed gratification. That affects far more than restaurant experiences.
It affects friendships, workplaces, churches, communities, and ultimately, marriages and families themselves.
The modern collapse in marriage and declining birth rates are often discussed purely in economic terms. Certainly, finances matter. But culture matters too. A society that teaches children from infancy that personal fulfillment and emotional regulation are supreme should not be surprised when adults struggle with covenant, sacrifice and commitment.
Marriage requires compromise. Parenthood requires self-denial. Family life requires maturity.
But many young adults today were raised in environments where boundaries were minimal, discipline was stigmatized, and personal desires were elevated above communal responsibility. We should not be shocked that lifelong commitment or even having children at all now feels oppressive to people conditioned to believe discomfort or thinking outside themselves is intolerable.
Truly loving children requires rejecting this cultural drift.
Children thrive with structure. They crave stability, even when they resist it. They become more secure — not less — when parents lead with calm authority and clear expectations.
Good parenting is not harsh. It is preparation.
Scripture makes this principle unmistakably clear. Hebrews 12 reminds believers that God Himself disciplines His children “for our good, that we may share His holiness” (Hebrews 12:10). The passage continues: “For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it” (Hebrews 12:11).
The reason for discipline
Our Heavenly Father does not correct us because He is punishing us, but because He loves us too much to leave us immature, selfish and spiritually undisciplined.
Likewise, Proverbs 13:24 teaches that loving parents do not abandon correction: “Whoever spares the rod hates his son, but he who loves him is diligent to discipline him.” Biblical discipline is not abuse or uncontrolled anger. It is loving formation. It is teaching children that they are not the center of the universe and that wisdom, self-control, obedience and respect matter.
A culture terrified of correction is a culture that will eventually lose the ability to form virtuous adults.
And perhaps the restaurant survey is revealing something much deeper than irritation over noisy dinners. Perhaps Americans are reacting to the broader exhaustion of living in a culture where fewer adults are willing to tell children that other people matter too.
The answer is not banning children from public life.
The answer is raising children capable of living well within it.
This column first appeared in The Christian Post.
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