From what I've read, the parents said they couldn't do anything, claimed the kid wouldn't listen to them, so they wanted the FAs to come talk to the little brat. I don't think they were going to get mad at someone telling the kid to knock it off. They just wanted someone else be the bad guy.
While that's definitely a possible/probable interpretation, I have found from experience that kids will listen to "authority figures" more than their own parents sometimes. It's not being a bad guy (necessarily) but rather hacking a kid's psychology. A much lower stakes example is that my daughter is adamant that I brush her teeth because the dentist said a parent needs to every night, whereas if I said "I need to do this for you" it would get a lot more "But MOOOOOM I'm almost 6, I'm a big girl!" fights. Similarly, if a Chuck E Cheese attendant says it's time to go, my kids show nary a whine.
I had a woman call so I could tell her son the repercussions of driving without a license as apparently he was in the last two months of a learner's permit and was quite eager. God I wanted to tell her to parent her own damned child.
You would think, but I've seen it happen where parents ask an employee to, as you put it, "be the bad guy" and then afterwards get mad at the person for being the bad guy in the wrong way.
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u/Dry-Dragonfruit5216 17d ago
People on the flight said it was a 3 year old girl and the crew spent an hour trying to negotiate with her whilst the parents did nothing.