A man has sparked a debate after he told his sister, who brought her breastfeeding child, to leave the Michelin star dinner he had paid for.
In a viral post shared last week to the popular Reddit forum r/AmITheA**hole, user u/restaurantdinner49 explained that he had made a dinner reservation at a high-end restaurant with a strict dress code and age restrictions for children under 14 years old.
When he made the booking nearly 10 months ago, he was planning on using the dinner to propose to his girlfriend Jessy in front of their family and friends. Since then, he’s already asked his girlfriend to marry him. Instead, they were going to use the dinner to announce his fiancée was pregnant, after two years of them trying to have a baby.
The man took to Reddit to share his frustration with his sister, who he said ruined his plans to celebrate their long-awaited pregnancy by bringing her breastfeeding son to the high-end restaurant.
“Dinner was yesterday,” the 32-year-old man wrote in his Reddit post. “My sister Emily decided to bring my nephew Kit with her, who is still breastfed and is currently teething (he is six months old).”
“Instead of celebrating Jessy’s pregnancy a lot of people were feeling uncomfortable due to my nephew crying nearly constantly,” he said, adding that the owner of the restaurant even asked them to leave, considering children were not allowed in the establishment and his nephew was disturbing other guests.
“I had no choice but to ask Emily to leave,” he admitted. “She was hesitant at first, however I have reminded her of the rules of the place and in no way or form she contacted me to ask if it would be OK to bring Kit with her.”
He continued: “She has tried to defend herself by saying he is young but her boyfriend, who is also the father, could have stayed with Kit since he finishes work at four. I have also told Emily how disappointed I was with what she did, as she ruined the dinner by bringing Kit in the place not made for kids.”
After her brother said she ruined their fancy dinner, Emily left the restaurant. Later that night, his mother and aunt told him that he needed to apologise to his sister. Meanwhile, his fiancée is also upset because “she felt like everyone paid attention to Kit and were trying to calm him down, instead of congratulating us or discussing the wedding – what the dinner was about,” he said.
The viral post received thousands of comments from fellow Reddit users. Many people agreed that his sister was in the wrong for bringing a young baby to a Michelin star restaurant. Others were confused as to how her child was allowed there in the first place.
The original poster clarified that he had made the reservation with the owner several months before his sister had her baby. The owner wasn’t present when she arrived with her six month old son, and he believed that the restaurant staff must have assumed it was approved by the owner.
Some Reddit users also wondered whether it was considered age discrimination to turn children away from a high-end restaurant, although a majority of commenters fought back against claims of discrimination.
“Gosh I hate people who are so obsessed about kids that they call everyone who doesn’t particularly like them or want them around a children-hater,” commented u/justnotmything94. “Nothing about this is discrimination. It’s a fact that children make a lot of noise and are erratic, so they simply don’t fit into certain environments.”
“I admit to indulging in a Michelin meal once every couple of years. If someone brought a child, let alone a crying baby, to one of those restaurants and interrupted my experience, I would be livid,” wrote u/RighteousTablespoon. “I don’t understand why some people can’t accept that certain environments are simply not appropriate for children.”
“If I was dumping the amount of money a Michelin star place charges, and there was a teething baby there, I’d be pissed off,” said u/Squigglepig52.
One person commented: “You gave Emily the rules that no children were allowed, and she brought her baby anyway. That’s just rude.”
“Here is one of life’s rules,” said u/Holiday-Book6635. “When your child acts out, which inevitably they all do, you leave. Been there, done that a thousand times. Life does not revolve around your screaming child.”
