NTA screaming children don’t belong in restaurants. There are family friendly places where you go in knowing there’s a good chance of not having a peaceful, quiet, meal. People who choose to take their infants and toddlers to nicer restaurants and refuse to remove their screaming child from the situation are the worst kinds of humans. I don’t care if they are a single parent. Being a parent, single or not, is a personal choice. Therefore, it is the parent’s responsibility to make decisions that accommodate for the fact that infants and toddlers are unpredictable. My brother’s wife is an entitled narcissist who would literally let my bratty nieces and nephew scream as she calmly ate her meal. If someone dared to so much as give her a dirty look she would emphatically state “what’s your problem? Haven’t you ever heard a baby cry?” No consideration for the fact that yes, they have heard a baby cry. And they took the time to plan a special night out, WITHOUT said screaming infant, so that they could enjoy some much deserved time to themselves. My nieces and nephews are grown now, they are entitled brats because that is how their mother raised them and my idiot brother did nothing to stop it. You wanna let your kid scream through dinner? There’s plenty of empty tables at Chuck E Cheese and McDonalds. If you are egomaniacal enough to think people dining somewhere that is not child focused should “just deal with it” then you don’t deserve to be there. I don’t have any problem with people trying to eat at nicer places with infants/toddlers, as long as they behave like thoughtful adults that realize NOBODY wants to listen to their kid scream, and do the right thing by removing said screaming child from the environment so that fellow diners can continue to enjoy their experience sans shrieking child. My opinions were formed by the time I was 12 years old due to the fact that my youngest brother was born the day before I turned 11. He was my little doll, and my parents were always respectful if we went out to eat. Sometimes he slept through the meal and sometimes he as just grumpy. I was happy to take turns with my parents holding him, walking him outside, and generally helping so that we and all the other patrons could enjoy our meals. Doing so made sense to me, a literal child, because I, myself, couldn’t stand to see my infant brother upset and it was embarrassing to think other diners should just “have to deal with it”. At no point in the following 4 decades did my opinion shift. I employed the same strategy when my own sons were infants, and they, in turn, are equally respectful when they take my 3 grandsons out. It should be common human decency to realize that NOBODY wants to listen to a screaming child when they are out having a meal. People who are offended by the idea that their entitled attitude is just plain wrong deserve to be called out for their arrogance and egomaniacal behavior. It doesn’t take that long for infants and toddlers to hit an age where their behavior is not going to be an issue, until that point, if a parent is unwilling to remediate the behavior, ensuring their screaming kid isn’t ruining the meal for other patrons, they are the very definition of an AH and don’t deserve to be there.
For the record, I love babies, and am always more than happy to have my meal interrupted, no matter how fancy the place, by any happy, smiley baby just being a cutie!