The Screaming Toddler Airplane Rule

On a full flight, screen time limits do not apply

A packed airplane is many things—a metal tube of recycled flatulence, a bad restaurant in the sky, and a fragile ecosystem of humans fighting over armrests at 30,000 feet.

One thing it is not: A place to teach your shrieking three-year-old the virtues of digital detox.

Give the kid the iPad.

During last week’s Thanksgiving vacation cross-country flight, I found myself seated next to a nice-enough couple whose toddler had only one mode: full-throttle exorcist. From takeoff until somewhere over Kansas, this child produced primal howls that could have cracked the fuselage.

But then, three hours in—three full hours—the dad pulled out an iPad and popped on an Elmo video. The kid immediately stopped bawling, burst into a smile, and went all giggly, as if his Propofol had just kicked in.

Though the outcome pleased me, it exposed a disturbing fact: this dude had that iPad with him since before we took off! He could have soothed his child hours ago.

I didn’t say anything, but I was justifiably annoyed. My seat mate had allowed his demon spawn to torture the entire plane for 180 minutes because, presumably, he was trying to manage the kid’s screen time. Not okay!

Once I thought about it, I realized the dad also hadn’t suggested his son watch any of the several animated movies available on the seat-back TV right in front of him. What, he didn’t want to expose the boy to the worrisome political rhetoric in Smurfs, Big Hero 5, or Ratatouille? This was bush league, self-centered parenting.

Okay, I know I sound like a cold-hearted monster – the Grinch of seat 12D. But lest you think me unsympathetic, recall that I have two teenagers. I’ve done my time. I’ve managed diaper blow-outs in the middle of a Target, scraped baby vomit out of laptop keyboards, and juggled my own screaming in-flight gremlins way past the point of exhaustion at least a dozen times.

So I know the rules and the roles each of us is to play. Air passengers owe baby parents kindness, empathy, and help, if there’s any to be provided. In return, those moms and dads owe their fellow passengers an absolute commitment to keeping their squirming tots as tranquil as possible.

That’s all we ask. Not perfection. Not absolute silence. Just total focus on the job at hand. You don’t get to nap. You don’t get to work on the PowerPoint you owe your boss next week. And you don’t get to watch the new season of Stranger Things. It’s never easy, but that’s the deal.

Traveling with a baby is game day, and transcontinental holiday flights are the Super Bowl of air travel. You don’t show up at The Big Game without a plan. You gear up with stuffed animals, firetrucks, and dinosaur picture books. You pack vast quantities of snacks—including, but not limited to, Goldfish, Cheerios, Skittles, or Jell-O shots. And you come to play with whatever digital sedatives you got, including Elmo on an iPad WITH HEADPHONES! (Of course, these parents didn’t have any.)

Are iPads harmful to kids? Of course they are. They fry children’s attention spans and turn the wee ones into little dopamine truffle pigs. So, I applaud any attempts to raise a well-adjusted human being who can look others in the eye. Jonathan Haidt would be proud.

See the epilogue to Haidt’s book “Airplanes: The one situation to which none of the rest of the stuff in this book applies.”

But do that work at home. On a full flight, 200 strangers’ sanity trumps one youngster’s cognitive development. In this situation, you throw your child’s prefrontal cortex under the bus for the good of the many. “It takes a village,” as they say, and the village on Delta 742 votes for peace and quiet.

So, new fathers and mothers: we love you, mostly because we’ve been you. We’ll do our part, and you do yours. This flying sardine tin of recirculated germs is not a parenting laboratory. It’s the real-world jungle where your choices impact many, many others.

And in this jungle, the kid gets Elmo from liftoff to landing.

THE END

↓But keep reading ↓

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Recently on the Reasonably Happy podcast:

Rachel Heck was a golf phenom who qualified for the US Women’s Open at 15-years-old. That same year, she committed to play golf at Stanford where she won both individual and team national championships, and a slew of other awards.

But when it came time to turn pro, Rachel decided life on the road and in the spotlight wasn’t for her. Instead, she earned and accepted her officer’s commission in the USAF Reserve, the job to which she is committed today.

Click below to hear my recent conversation with this remarkable human who is serving our country.

That is all. Have a wonderful day!