Back Seat Battles

A reader recently sent the Gay Uncle a request for advice. She wrote: “Short of buying a bus, hiring drivers, or using duct tape, how can you stop the back seat battles/she’s touching me syndrome? Of course it is the 5 year old antagonizing the 10 & 12 year olds.” Gunc loves this question, and not only because it reminds him of his mother’s creative–and blind–administration of in-car justice with a plastic mixing spoon she kept in the driver’s side door pocket; or because it evokes his boyfriend Tal’s parents’ creative resolution of this issue, which involved encouraging their three kids to lean forward from their spots in the back seat, rest their chins on the rear of the front bench, and gnaw at the vinyl and padding there, creating a distracting trio of “chew holes”. He enjoys this query because the answer is somewhat counter-intuitive: the only real solution is to ignore your kids’ annoying little squabbles and let them find equilibrium. Of course, before you get in the car, you should lay down some expectations and ground rules–keep your hands to yourself, make sure all body parts remain inside the vehicle, give me that fifty grandma sent you for your birthday so I can afford to fill up the tank again. You can have the kids bring along one solitary something of their own to keep them focused on short trips–a book, an iPod, their Polly Pockets electrolysis salon. And you should certainly make your presence known as the voice of authority, reminding them of your expectations and rules in a positivist way (by stressing what you want them to do instead of what you don’t) before you set out. But if you’re constantly getting involved in their meaningless and petty fracas, then you’re validating it, and adding yourself into their dopey drama, and we all know that conflict is not usually eased through the incorporation of additional participants (see swarming bees, bench-clearing pro-hockey fights, Iraq). Remind them that the car is shared space, and tell them that you expect them to deal with this: to get along, to ignore one another’s needless needling, and generally to work shit out. Then turn up your music and drive. Of course, if you observe weapons being wielded, see your younger kid trying to put a chew-hole in the older one, or spot a stream of child blood spraying against the minivan’s side window, more drastic forms of intervention may be required. But give this a whirl. If the problem refuses to yield to this practice after a few weeks of consistent attempts, you can also start removing privileges that require you driving them around (going to friends’ houses, attending ballet class, obtaining fat/salt/starch/sugar slurry from fast-food drive-thrus) until such point as they can handle the rules of being the vehicle. Flight attendants don’t take any crap (and we’re paying dearly for our time on board their vehicles); why should your situation be any less bearable?