The Matt Walsh Show - You Think Your Loud Kid Isn’t Disrupting Everyone? Let’s Talk.
Aired: 2026-03-07
Duration: 16:59


=== Loud Kids Debate (03:46) ===

[00:00:00]  Okay, this week we talked about the issue of loud children in public.
[00:00:04]  We talked about a church in York, Pennsylvania that was getting a lot of, getting some good press because they posted a loud children policy where they were inviting families to bring their loud children to church and saying that all children are welcome and all this sort of thing.
[00:00:22]  This is supposed to be heartwarming.
[00:00:24]  I said I'm actually against it.
[00:00:25]  talked about on the show.
[00:00:26]  I'll show you what I posted on X.
[00:00:30]  I said, I don't love it.
[00:00:31]  I'm actually considerably less tolerant of loud kids in public now than I was before.
[00:00:34]  I had my own.
[00:00:35]  Your children should not be allowed to disrupt a church service or any other public gathering.
[00:00:40]  If they're being unruly, remove them.
[00:00:42]  If they're old enough to know better, take them out and discipline them.
[00:00:44]  If they're too young to control themselves, then again, remove them.
[00:00:46]  I've had to do this many times in many situations.
[00:00:48]  It blows my mind when parents just sit there and let their kids totally disrupt and irritate an entire room full of strangers.
[00:00:55]  A lot of comments, a lot of conversation around this point.
[00:00:59]  And I'll read some of the comments now.
[00:01:01]  This comes from Matthew Cordes, who says, oof.
[00:01:07]  You've already lost me, Matthew.
[00:01:09]  You've already lost me as a grown man typing the word oof.
[00:01:13]  Think about what you're doing.
[00:01:14]  You're a grown man typing the word, not even oof, but O-O-O-F.
[00:01:18]  So oof.
[00:01:21]  You're typing the word oof as a grown man.
[00:01:24]  That's problem number one.
[00:01:28]  Problem number two is the rest of this.
[00:01:30]  Should your children be obedient and well-behaved?
[00:01:32]  Yes, as much as possible.
[00:01:34]  There's a difference between being unruly and making a little noise.
[00:01:37]  If you have children, you know that under a certain age, different for each child, they do not have any recognition of appropriate noise level.
[00:01:46]  There are two unmistakable sounds that signify a healthy church.
[00:01:49]  One, crying babies as they represent new life in families.
[00:01:53]  Two, singing men as they represent joyful and loving leadership and not stodgy piety.
[00:01:59]  Bring your sometimes noisy kids to church.
[00:02:01]  Help them learn to participate in the service appropriately, but don't be ashamed when they act like kids.
[00:02:07]  This is one of those things people do where I say something and then they react like they totally disagree, but then you read what they're saying or you listen to it and they're basically agreeing with you.
[00:02:20]  Should your children be obedient and well-behaved?
[00:02:23]  Yes, as much as possible.
[00:02:24]  That's kind of what I'm saying.
[00:02:28]  It's good.
[00:02:29]  Yeah, you want a church that is young and vibrant, young families.
[00:02:35]  Young families in a church are what you want to see.
[00:02:38]  That's a very good thing.
[00:02:40]  That's a beautiful thing.
[00:02:42]  I have a young family.
[00:02:43]  I have a young, big family.
[00:02:45]  I bring my family to church and that's what you want to see.
[00:02:49]  When I walk into a church and the average age of the congregant is 70, I know that this is a church that is in every sense dying.
[00:02:59]  This is not a vibrant church community.
[00:03:02]  And that's not what you want.
[00:03:06]  But this is a lot of the responses.
[00:03:08]  I'm getting to my point.
[00:03:10]  It's kind of this.
[00:03:11]  You set up this false dilemma, this false dichotomy, where either we have old dying quiet churches or churches that are loud and boisterous and the kids are constantly crying and making noise.
[00:03:26]  I'm saying that you can actually have the best of both worlds.
[00:03:29]  Like there's another, there's a third option where it's a church that is young and vibrant and energetic, but also during the church service, during the Mass, kids are quiet and well-behaved.

=== Crying Babies and Plane Jumps (03:43) ===

[00:03:46]  And if they're not, you take them out.
[00:03:48]  Like the crying, the crying baby thing in particular.
[00:03:54]  Like when I hear babies crying in church, that's what blows my mind the most.
[00:04:01]  Because that, you just, you take the, I don't blame a baby for crying.
[00:04:06]  We've had six babies, okay, at different times.
[00:04:09]  Well, twice we had two at the same time.
[00:04:12]  No one gets, I don't get mad at a baby for crying.
[00:04:14]  That's what babies do.
[00:04:15]  They don't have the other way to communicate.
[00:04:17]  Take them out.
[00:04:18]  Take them out while they're crying.
[00:04:21]  I've done this so many times.
[00:04:23]  I'm not asking anyone to do anything I haven't done.
[00:04:26]  Your baby's crying in church.
[00:04:28]  Take them out.
[00:04:29]  Calm them down where other people can't hear it.
[00:04:32]  And then bring them in.
[00:04:34]  Your baby's crying in a restaurant.
[00:04:36]  Again, like the first couple of moments of the baby crying, I don't hold that against you.
[00:04:42]  That's not your fault.
[00:04:43]  It's not the baby's fault.
[00:04:44]  It's not your fault.
[00:04:47]  But you're just sitting there and letting the baby cry and disrupting everyone else's time.
[00:04:53]  What you're saying is, okay, yeah, the baby's crying.
[00:04:56]  And guess what?
[00:04:57]  This is going to be all of your problems now.
[00:04:59]  So now I can't enjoy the church service or I can't enjoy my meal.
[00:05:03]  And so now none of you will.
[00:05:06]  I'm going to make it so that none of you can enjoy it.
[00:05:09]  That's what I don't get.
[00:05:11]  We were in a restaurant the other day, just a couple, couple of weeks ago, I was with my wife.
[00:05:15]  And there was a family that came in and they had a baby and the baby starts crying.
[00:05:22]  And like I said, for the first, I don't know, minute or something, I'm not getting annoyed because I get it.
[00:05:28]  Like, I don't, I don't blame you for bringing, you want to go out to eat, you have a baby.
[00:05:31]  There's no reason why you can't do that in theory.
[00:05:35]  But the minutes drag on and they're not taking the baby out.
[00:05:38]  Like they're just sitting there and letting the baby cry so that the rest of us have to hear it.
[00:05:43]  Take him out.
[00:05:44]  Leave the, go back into the lobby.
[00:05:46]  There are things you can do here.
[00:05:48]  There are solutions.
[00:05:50]  There are at least solutions that will make this only annoying for you and not for the rest of us.
[00:05:56]  That's the point.
[00:05:58]  If your kid's going to be annoying in public, it's understandable, I get it, but you should make it so that it's only annoying for you and not for anybody else.
[00:06:11]  I don't know why that's so hard.
[00:06:12]  I don't know why it's so hard.
[00:06:13]  I really don't.
[00:06:16]  Mr. Yano says, I agree in all situations where it's possible to remove them.
[00:06:20]  Somewhere like a plane, I think, is different.
[00:06:22]  Now, obviously, me and my spouse would try every possible thing to keep the child quiet.
[00:06:27]  Fortunately, I'm past that phase, but I sympathize with young parents, especially on planes.
[00:06:30]  Yeah, on planes, I do.
[00:06:33]  On planes, I do sympathize with the, I mean, it is annoying to hear a baby crying on a plane, but I don't get mad at the parent.
[00:06:40]  I actually feel, I feel really bad for the parent in that situation because, yeah, in that case, there's nothing you can do.
[00:06:45]  That's just the way it is.
[00:06:46]  You can't obviously leave the plane while it's in the sky.
[00:06:49]  And I'm not going to sit here and say that families with kids under a certain age just should never fly anywhere.
[00:06:55]  I'm not going to say that.
[00:06:56]  I think that's unreasonable.
[00:06:58]  I'm talking about just being reasonable.
[00:07:00]  It's unreasonable to say that if your baby cries on a plane, you should like jump out of the plane.
[00:07:06]  It's unreasonable to say that you should never fly if you have a baby.
[00:07:09]  I think that's unreasonable too.
[00:07:12]  So I think you should come prepared.
[00:07:14]  You should be as prepared as possible if you're going on a plane.
[00:07:16]  You should have everything ready to try to keep your children entertained and satiated so that they don't cry, but if it happens, it happens.
[00:07:25]  But in situations where you can remove the child, then that's what you should do.

=== Consider Your Behavior (09:29) ===

[00:07:30]  I mean, that's it.
[00:07:31]  Ditch your old wireless contract and trade up to PureTalk, my wireless company, the one that actually respects your time, money, and intelligence.
[00:07:38]  For just 25 bucks a month, you get unlimited talk, text, and data, no contract, no cancellation fees, and no waiting for overseas representatives.
[00:07:45]  They provide fast, simple service.
[00:07:48]  Make the switch.
[00:07:48]  Go to puretalk.com slash walsh and you'll save 50% off your first month.
[00:07:52]  That's puretalk.com slash walsh.
[00:07:53]  Switch to a wireless company that shares your values.
[00:07:56]  PureTalk, America's wireless company.
[00:07:59]  UK all day says, of course, Matt, run off people in the church with families and kids.
[00:08:04]  Churches are shutting down the doors because they can't get people to come anymore.
[00:08:09]  Now I have a four-year-old and I don't let her disrupt church and I do remove her if she gets carried away or starts talking loudly during prayer.
[00:08:16]  Then why are you disagreeing with me?
[00:08:18]  That's all I'm saying.
[00:08:21]  This happens all the time where I say something and people disagree even though they agree.
[00:08:28]  All I'm saying is if your kid's being loud, remove them.
[00:08:31]  And you're saying, yeah, Matt, you're running them off.
[00:08:33]  I mean, if my kid's being loud, I remove them.
[00:08:35]  Okay.
[00:08:36]  Then what are we talking about?
[00:08:37]  Sounds like we're on the same page.
[00:08:40]  What's the debate here?
[00:08:43]  Yet if I go to a church and they make a comment about my child being loud, when I obviously try, then I won't feel welcome.
[00:08:50]  To me, a sanctuary is exactly that.
[00:08:51]  It should be treated as such.
[00:08:53]  But don't forget that children being brought up in church is our future and the only way Christianity survives.
[00:08:59]  I don't know.
[00:09:01]  Like I said, as I said, we've talked about this earlier in the week.
[00:09:05]  I actually weirdly have become less sympathetic to these complaints by parents now that I am a parent.
[00:09:15]  And the longer that I am a parent, the less sympathetic I become to it.
[00:09:18]  It's sort of, so it's maybe the inverse of what you would expect.
[00:09:23]  But when you have parents that say, I felt so unwelcome because people said my children were being loud, you know, the first thing I think now is like, yeah, well, they were probably being loud.
[00:09:32]  I mean, it's look, there have been a few times in my life when we had kids out in public, maybe at church, maybe somewhere else, and I think that they were legitimately being like really well-behaved and not loud at all.
[00:09:52]  And somebody made a comment and I felt that like, actually, that's unfair.
[00:09:57]  You know, it seems like you just have a problem with kids being around you at all.
[00:10:00]  So that's happened a few times, but it's pretty rare.
[00:10:07]  I mean, my actual experience as someone who's has a lot of kids, a big family, my experience in actuality is that when you're out with a lot of kids and they're really being well-behaved, you're much more likely to hear people praising you for it.
[00:10:24]  I mean, you're much more, if anything, the annoying thing is the patronizing praise you'll get from other people.
[00:10:28]  And I don't think they mean it as patronizing.
[00:10:31]  So I don't get mad about it.
[00:10:33]  But I think you're more likely to hear people remarking on how well-behaved your kids are.
[00:10:39]  And if you never hear that in public, but instead you hear unfair comments about how your kids are loud, probably your kids are loud.
[00:10:47]  That's probably what they're doing.
[00:10:50]  And so maybe you should just listen to the feedback.
[00:10:52]  You ever consider that?
[00:10:53]  I mean, if you go to a church and, you know, afterwards, someone talks to you about how the fact that your kid was disruptive, rather than saying, I feel unwelcome.
[00:11:03]  This is not fair.
[00:11:04]  Everyone's being unfair to me.
[00:11:07]  Maybe instead of that, maybe take the feedback.
[00:11:10]  Maybe consider that actually maybe your behavior needs to change.
[00:11:17]  You ever thought about that?
[00:11:20]  I mean, I don't know.
[00:11:20]  It's something to consider.
[00:11:22]  Teachy says, bad take, awful take, stupid take.
[00:11:27]  Wow.
[00:11:28]  Reverend Rai Take that just said, if your kid's being loud, remove them.
[00:11:31]  And then when they quiet down, come back in.
[00:11:34]  The most reasonable thing on the planet, and this is how it works on the internet.
[00:11:39]  You could say the most reasonable thing ever.
[00:11:41]  It's not controversial.
[00:11:44]  I'm not taking an extreme position here.
[00:11:47]  Bring your kids to church.
[00:11:48]  If they're being loud, take them out, calm them down, bring them back in.
[00:11:53]  And I can say that and the response is terrible.
[00:11:55]  Oh, that's the worst take I've ever heard.
[00:11:57]  What?
[00:11:58]  This is shocking.
[00:11:59]  I can't even believe anyone would say that.
[00:12:02]  Really?
[00:12:04]  What's even the other option?
[00:12:06]  Like, what's the other take aside from the one that I expressed?
[00:12:09]  Nearly two hours in a quiet service is a long time for very small kids.
[00:12:13]  And you have to train them to be quieter and reverent when they're older.
[00:12:16]  We started that for all five of our kids when they were about one or two.
[00:12:19]  And by about four, they're perfect angels for the entire service.
[00:12:23]  We've always gotten a lot of good compliments out of on them, but it was only because we were allowed to keep them in the service for the first few years of their life and they were very noisy.
[00:12:32]  Well, I'm sorry.
[00:12:34]  That's just unacceptable.
[00:12:36]  Very noisy.
[00:12:37]  So you let your kids be very noisy in church for years?
[00:12:44]  So then it's just everybody else's problem is what you're saying.
[00:12:47]  You just expect everyone else to put up with it.
[00:12:52]  Sorry.
[00:12:54]  It doesn't work.
[00:12:55]  It doesn't work for me.
[00:12:57]  If your kid's being noisy, then you take, and this is an important point, part of it too, though.
[00:13:04]  If your kid's being disruptive in public, we keep just talking about church.
[00:13:06]  It's not just church.
[00:13:07]  It's anywhere.
[00:13:08]  Grocery store, restaurant, movie theater, anywhere in public where you can take them out.
[00:13:15]  So it's pretty much anywhere but a plane.
[00:13:20]  If they're being noisy, you remove them.
[00:13:21]  But an important part of that is that it can't be a reward because in some cases, like they're bored in church.
[00:13:29]  And so if you take them out, you're rewarding them.
[00:13:31]  And so you just have to make sure that it's not a reward.
[00:13:34]  And that's where consequences come in.
[00:13:36]  That's where punishments come in, depending on the age of the child.
[00:13:40]  You're not going to punish a baby, but as the kids get a little bit older, there's punishments.
[00:13:45]  There's consequences.
[00:13:47]  So what we have done with church and the way that we've gotten it so that now our youngest kids are three and they can both almost make it through an entire church service.
[00:14:01]  We usually have to take them each out like once.
[00:14:05]  And I think by the time they're four, by the time they're four, all of our, we'll be good to go.
[00:14:09]  We'll be past all this and all of our kids will be fine and we don't have to worry about it anymore.
[00:14:12]  But the way that we do it is that if I got to take you out and I got to take you back into the lobby or something, you're not going to go back in the lobby and like run around like it's a playground.
[00:14:23]  You're not going to get to go have fun.
[00:14:25]  We're not going to, you know, we're not bringing toys for you to calm you down because then we're rewarding because then you've learned that, okay, if I want to get a toy, I just have to be loud and disruptive.
[00:14:37]  So there's no toys.
[00:14:38]  Okay.
[00:14:39]  There's no snacks.
[00:14:40]  You see parents, they bring snacks and toys for their kids if they want to keep them quiet.
[00:14:45]  Terrible move.
[00:14:47]  Bringing a tablet or something, even worse, because not only are you forming, in that case, the tablet habit, but also you're training your kid that if they want to get a fun treat, all they have to do is be disruptive.
[00:15:00]  So it's got to be the opposite.
[00:15:03]  It's like, no, if you're disruptive, now you're going to, you weren't having fun before, now you're going to have less fun.
[00:15:13]  You were bored before, now you're going to be even more bored.
[00:15:17]  And so what I've done when it comes to church is I take them back and we go to the back of the lobby.
[00:15:24]  I say, okay, you see that little square right there, that little tile, stand right there.
[00:15:29]  You're going to stand right there in that spot.
[00:15:31]  You're not running around.
[00:15:32]  You're not talking.
[00:15:34]  You're not having a fun time.
[00:15:35]  You're going to stand right there.
[00:15:38]  And that's it.
[00:15:39]  And if there's got to be consequences when we get home, then there's going to be consequences there too.
[00:15:44]  The problem is that parents don't want to do this because it's annoying for them.
[00:15:49]  That's what so much of this is about.
[00:15:52]  Parents bring their noisy kids.
[00:15:54]  They don't take them out.
[00:15:55]  They don't have punishments.
[00:15:56]  They don't have consequences.
[00:15:59]  Because for the parent, it's annoying.
[00:16:02]  It's cumbersome.
[00:16:04]  The parent doesn't want to miss out.
[00:16:06]  When we were listening to the crying baby in the restaurant, well, it's because those parents wanted to eat their meal and they didn't want to have to miss out on their meal.
[00:16:13]  If one of them has to get up and take the baby out, then their food's going to get cold.
[00:16:16]  And now they got to miss out on the food that they paid for.
[00:16:19]  And they don't want to do that.
[00:16:20]  And so they stay there and make everyone else deal with it.
[00:16:22]  Well, that's just not acceptable.
[00:16:25]  Like it's your kid.
[00:16:26]  Sorry.
[00:16:26]  You're going to have to miss your meal.
[00:16:27]  Yep.
[00:16:27]  Guess what?
[00:16:28]  You pay for the meal.
[00:16:28]  It's going to be cold.
[00:16:29]  Sorry.
[00:16:29]  Sorry.
[00:16:30]  I guess your night is ruined.
[00:16:31]  That's the way it goes.
[00:16:33]  That's the way it goes.
[00:16:35]  That's the deal we make.
[00:16:37]  That's the sacrifice you're supposed to make so that you can raise kids who will be eventually productive members of society.
[00:16:46]  That's the sacrifice you are expected to make.
[00:16:48]  So in conclusion, get your kid under control.
[00:16:53]  Don't force the rest of us to deal with your parenting inadequacies.
[00:16:57]  Stop acting entitled.