What would you guys do?

Big Arn

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OK, so we have a few families over, and the kids about 10 of them, aged 3-9 go downstairs to the arcade.

I go down there too, even though I have told my boys to keep everyone in line.

Everyone is doing fine, but there is one kid, who CONSTANTLY sucks his thumb. And of course, pulls it out of his mouth long enough to touch every machine in the basement. The parents know he does this, but don't seem to mind.

When you tell him to stop, he does, for about 10 seconds, then does it all over again.

I had to disinfect everything after eveyone left. :(
 
"You humans are a VIRUS..."

Human children are disgusting, smelly, destructive, disease-ridden little vermin, don't let them anywhere near your person or anything you own :D
 
Telling someone's child stop to sucking his thumb is not going to make him stop. How about giving the kid a lollipop, a ring pop maybe even chewing gum. That might make the kid stop.

Or having everyone wash their hands in Irish spring or any deodorant soap that taste bad.

Or have all the kids wipe down the machines before they leave?
 
Of course, the fantasy prick scenario would be asking the parents when you could send your kid over to THEIR house...to drool/spit on all of THEIR valuables. >;)

They're someone else's kids, unfortunately. All you can do is ask the parents to tell him to cut it out. Handing him a lolipop/gum might wind up with worse results.
 
This is one of those scenarios with no right answer. They're kids. Shit happens. I'd probably try to explain to the kid, in private what he's doing. You said you told him to stop, did you explain to him why he should stop? Kids don't automatically know what they're doing, sometimes you have to point it out. Something like

"Hey! When you suck your thumb, you get spit all over it, and then when you grab the games, spit gets on all the games. So what you should do is while you're playing the games, don't suck your thumb. What do you think?"

and see what he says.
 
I wouldn't tell the kid to stop sucking his thumb pre say. To me that's his parents job or choice. I would point out to him that when he sucks his thumb he gets saliva and possibly germs on his thumb that he then passes to the things and people he touches. I would point out to him that I would want him to wash his hands before playing the games and ask that he please not suck his thumb while playing the games. I would also ask that if he did forget and sucked his thumb while playing games etc that when he notices he once again go and wash up. Don't punish the kid but make him aware of his actions and that there are rules for your house that he should follow while there.

To be fair I guess I don't see this as a huge deal unless his thumb is wet with saliva when he touches the games. Sure it's not the best practice and I see your point but be realistic and imagine what likely touched the joysticks and buttons of the games we all played in the arcades BITD. Probably a lot worse than thumb sucking.
 
Dip his thumb in horse radish. It may not solve the problem, but at least you will get enough entertainment to keep you chuckling while you wipe off the games. :)
 
Tell the kid if he sucks his thumb and touches your games you're going to kick his dads ass...



















...i kid... i kid...
 
While disgusting, can you imagine all the germs at our favorite arcades back in the day? I don't even want to think about Chuckee Cheese! And you think their pizza is gross! If I survived that..... ;)
 
No one under 7yrs allowed in the arcade. Or just make the thumbsucker wear leather gloves! Better yet, have a sign that says that you have to be at least "this tall" to play the games!
 
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You used to play arcade games in public that had God knows what done to them, but did anything bad happen to you back then? :)
 
Easy.. find a game he will like. Put cayenne pepper on the joystick (you can clean it up later..). Let him play it. He probably won't suck his thumb much that night after that. Think of it like you're doing what the parents 'should' be doing, so it all washes out..
 
As a parent of a 2 year old myself...

I can tell you, kids are going to be kids!

"Stop" means "go" (If you're a parent, you know exactally what I'm talking about.)

I would chalk it up as a good reason to break out the rag and polish to shine up the games to their former glory and show 'em a litlle love.
 
Easy.. find a game he will like. Put cayenne pepper on the joystick (you can clean it up later..). Let him play it. He probably won't suck his thumb much that night after that. Think of it like you're doing what the parents 'should' be doing, so it all washes out..

Ok that's funny, cruel, but hilarious! Rep for you as well!
 
Ok that's funny, cruel, but hilarious! Rep for you as well!

Yeah...it reminded me of when I spread a bunch of Cayenne pepper around the aft of my boat to prevent cats from jumping up in to it...

IT WORKED!

Unfortunately it worked so well that my dogs decided to go walk around over there and then "clean" their paws.

They weren't too thrilled.
 
Tell him that if he sucks his fingers the spit might go down into the game and electrocute him and he will die. Either that or tell him if he sucks them again, your going to break them off and that if he tells his parents what you said, that you would break his dads fingers instead. Dont blink while your telling him either and get really close to his face. Its more dramatic that way.
 
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You guys are too funny. Not much you can do except wipe the games down after the kids leave, you should do that anyway. Thumb sucking is a problem/behavior that takes patients and diligence by the parents to correct, it won't happen in one evening in your arcade.
 
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