My Name is Gina, 55 F from upstate New York, and I run a family owned pizzeria. My husband and I have been in the service industry for decades and over the past few years, We’ve noticed a huge increase in rude customers, rude children and a crazy level of entitlement.

One of the rules we have in our restaurant is that nobody is allowed to talk on speaker phone, play music out loud or have anything playing on speaker from a personal device. This is such a simple request and something that has always been the standard.

This was not even an issue or something that needed to be said before the pandemic. But now it seems parents feel attacked if their children cannot watch Bluey on volume. We have signs up asking people not to do this and we actually do enforce this rule (politely but firmly)

A few weeks ago, a woman was sitting with her 9 year old son who was watching cartoons on his tablet at full volume, while also scrolling tiktok on a phone. I nicely explained to the woman that we do not allow this, as it is disruptive to other customers and asked her to please turn off the volume.

The woman rudely replied that her son has both ADHD and autism so he needs to do this in order to sit down without making a fuss. I asked if she could please use headphones and she snapped that her son does not like to use them. I told her that this is not acceptable and to please either use headphones or set his devices to silent.

About 10 minutes later, I was in the kitchen and heard loud banging noises coming from the dining room. I came out to find the child furiously banging his fists on the table while the mom just sat there ignoring it. It was almost as if he was waiting for her to say something but she did nothing. I asked her to please stop him and she replied that he is on the spectrum and this is just his “normal behavior” if he doesn’t have a device to calm him down. The boy then stood up and started running around my restaurant, punching and kicking the other tables and chairs, and knocking things over. Another customer yelled at the mom to “CONTROL YOUR KID OR I WILL!” She launched into a what sounded like a pre rehearsed monologue about how autistic children deserve to occupy the same spaces as everyone else. I agree with this, but everyone still needs to behave appropriately.

I told the woman that if she could not get her son’s behavior under control that she needs to leave. She was furious and stared yelling about how it is illegal to discriminate against people who are on the spectrum and that she would report me. My husband came out, put her food into a togo box and just said to her “get out right now!” She looked genuinely shocked and said that kids should not be expected to just sit quietly and that the world needs to be more accepting of those who are different.

I love kids, my husband and I raised 5 of them, even one with special needs. But autism or not, nothing gives you the right to behave this way in any setting. If your child’s issues are so severe that simply sitting in a restaurant without a device makes them freak out and throw a tantrum, then maybe reconsider taking them there in the first place. I’m tired of rude kids and lazy parents who embolden them to behave this way, refusing to discipline them or set any kind of rules or boundaries. This is not about ADHD, autism, or any other condition. This is about entitlement, bad parenting and bad behavior as a result. Am I the asshole?