I know I've probably said this before, but when I was a small child, I was taught to be quiet in the damn library.
Me too! Now the library is just as rowdy as any street corner, and the librarians don't say anything about it!
It's because everything these days has to be "people-friendly". The trouble is, though, that it seems that people are only really people when interacting with other people- if you just want to sit quietly and read a book, you don't count as a real person, just as a stick-in-the-mud spoilsport who is ruining everyone's fun.
Today there was a little boy who was screaming "I won! I won!" at a volume that was loud enough to be painful at the other side of the library, and noone made any attempt whatsoever to shut him up or at least explain the concept of his indoor voice.
I don't understand how parents can tolerate that! I suppose they must learn to tune it out.
I don't know either. I couldn't tolerate it; one of the many reasons why I'll never be a parent.
That's very sad that nobody tried to at least explain indoor voice to him. Of course if they had, hopefully it would have been in a very quiet voice to try to get him to follow suit so you may not have heard it across the library. I always remind my daughter before we enter a library that she needs to use her "quiet whispery voice" and I demonstrate. She hasn't always remembered, but she has been reminded.
It would have had to have been very quiet if they explained it to him; I heard nothing, and I can hear the library staff talking in normal conversational voices from across the library.
When it started I was on a computer near the children's area, and noone, unless they were using sign language, said anything. It continued for a few minutes after that as I got offline and moved across the library to read.