Parenting

'Demonic' Kid Threw an 8-Hour Tantrum on a Flight & People Are Blaming the Mom

ParentingPublished Feb 16, 2018
By Jordyn Smith
featured-img-of-post-210741Shane Townley/YouTube

If you've ever flown with a young child, you know how stressful it can be -- keeping them entertained, constantly trying to thwart tantrums, and feeling a lot of guilt and embarrassment about the "disruption" your kid might cause other passengers. It's a lot to deal with for any parent, especially when things get catastrophic. After a passenger filmed the eight-hour-long tantrum a toddler threw on an international flight, the child's mother is facing the brunt of the blame.

Shane Townley captured the tantrum and posted it on YouTube in a video he titled: "Demonic child screams and runs through an 8 hour flight."

According to Townley's video, the flight was traveling from Germany to Newark, New Jersey. He says the child's tantrum lasted nearly the entire time. 

More from CafeMom: Let's Be Clear, This Woman Isn't a B*tch for Nagging -- She's a Fed-Up Mom

It begins before the plane has even taken off.-placeholder
It begins before the plane has even taken off.
Shane Townley/YouTube

It begins before the plane has even taken off.

The child's mom instructs him to sit down, but his screaming doesn't seem to stop.

The kid then starts climbing up on his seat to entertain himself.-placeholder
The kid then starts climbing up on his seat to entertain himself.
Shane Townley/YouTube

The kid then starts climbing up on his seat to entertain himself.

Townley says the mom tried to take action to keep her son calm at first. "Let's get the Wi-Fi going so we can get the iPad going," she can be heard saying to a flight attendant. Unfortunately, that doesn't work either.

Townley said the kid's screaming only quieted when he was allowed to run through the plane.-placeholder
Townley said the kid's screaming only quieted when he was allowed to run through the plane.
Shane Townley/YouTube

Townley said the kid's screaming only quieted when he was allowed to run through the plane.

But even that doesn't last long as he begins screaming even louder. While the kid remains off-camera for the next seven or so hours of footage, it clearly picks up the sounds of his tantrum. The noise even continues while the passengers deboard the plane. At the end, one woman can clearly be heard saying, "What a nightmare. Oh my God, eight hours of screaming."

Once the video went viral, people were quick to blame the kid's mom.-placeholder
Once the video went viral, people were quick to blame the kid's mom.
@BldyTpcl/Twitter

Once the video went viral, people were quick to blame the kid's mom.

Constantly having to entertain a child while traveling is a lot to handle, one admitted, but "that's your job as a parent."-placeholder
Constantly having to entertain a child while traveling is a lot to handle, one admitted, but "that's your job as a parent."
@ksuarez77/Twitter

Constantly having to entertain a child while traveling is a lot to handle, one admitted, but "that's your job as a parent."

Some even said the mom should never have taken her "misbehaving" child on a flight in the first place.-placeholder
Some even said the mom should never have taken her "misbehaving" child on a flight in the first place.
@MRoman09091977/Twitter

Some even said the mom should never have taken her "misbehaving" child on a flight in the first place.

But others showed a little more empathy for the boy and his mom and shamed Townley for recording her.-placeholder
But others showed a little more empathy for the boy and his mom and shamed Townley for recording her.
@Leaha_uk/Twitter

But others showed a little more empathy for the boy and his mom and shamed Townley for recording her.

It's obvious that no one on this flight was happy -- not Shane Townley, not the rest of the passengers, and definitely not the mom and her son.-placeholder
It's obvious that no one on this flight was happy -- not Shane Townley, not the rest of the passengers, and definitely not the mom and her son.
@bosseros6/Twitter

It's obvious that no one on this flight was happy -- not Shane Townley, not the rest of the passengers, and definitely not the mom and her son.

No one could blame people for being angry or annoyed at having to endure this kid's antics, but it's also important that we exercise a little bit of understanding. We have no idea what this mom and her kid have gone through, and while that ear-splitting scream was probably hell to hear for eight hours straight, that mom probably had to deal with it a lot longer than that.

Frequent flyers have been campaigning for child-free flights for a while now but no airline seems keen to institute these rules. The Daily Mail spoke with former Virgin Atlantic director Paul Charles, who explained that prohibiting kids from flights sets a bad precedent for discrimination. "It would be a bad decision by an airline to ban children," he said. "Once you did, would you start banning other types of traveler? It would be a mistake."

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