The Mouth: Sydney’s dining population is too small to ban children

Coming in the wake of debate after a mother was asked to remove her baby from a comedy show, The Mouth ponders whether Sydney restaurants have the right to ban children?

A few months ago there was a little kerfuffle on local social media (and yes, we know, only the government can be trusted to tell the truth online, but stick with us).

At issue was a Marrickville restaurant, Kin Dining, that had issued a blanket ‘no under-18s’ policy.

The idea immediately got a bunch of locals off-side, not surprising in a suburb where you sometimes can’t seem to move without tripping over a little Oscar or Matilda, though the owners have apparently stood firm, saying that theirs is an adult space and therefore should be adults only.

Our first instinct was to back the owners in completely – freedom of association and all that – but after some thought The Mouth is very much of two minds on this.

The beer garden of our own local pub is now so swamped with little Hugos and Annabelles that a working man and his dog cannot enjoy a simple Saturday afternoon schooner in the sun.

The owners of Marrickville’s Kin Dining caused a stir when they declared their venue had banned people under 18.

Poorly-behaved children anywhere are even more annoying than poorly behaved adults, if only because their antics never come with the redemptive possibility of scandal.

Yet … we are also constantly told that (a) restaurant world is in crisis and (b) so too is our fertility rate.

To put it another way, restaurants don’t have enough staff or customers, and Australia doesn’t have enough people (hence airport arrivals halls right out of the Ellis Island sequence of The Godfather).

Young mouths, even if they don’t run up big bar bills, not only add custom but they contribute to culture.

Is Sydney’s hospitality scene big enough to ban children diners?

Do we really think youngsters will turn 18 and suddenly start wanting to be involved in hospitality – as diners, chefs, or front of house – if they aren’t inculcated young?

The thing about restaurants and dining out is that, like the rest of our complex Western civilisation, it is a fragile thing that has only been around for a blink of an eye and could vanish just as quickly.

After all, a century ago the German philosopher Spengler noted that “when the ordinary thought of a highly cultivated people begins to regard ‘having children’ as a question of pros and cons, the great turning point has come.”

— The Mouth is an anonymous critic and bon vivant who pays his own way around Sydney and beyond.