Never again

[ruadisneyfan2]

Children model the behavior of their adults including entitlement, rudeness & lack of civility. DCL's lack of policing guest rude & unsafe behavior is a lesson to kids that you can get away with anything.
After 16 DCL cruises going back to 1998, it's been the last 8 years or so that we've seen more abhorrent parent behavior. One fight so bad at the fireworks that a man was beating another with his belt claiming the man blocked his view--took quite a while for DCL staff to respond; a couple so drunk & loud in Skylight Lounge that that they were falling off their stools--the bartender kept serving them as other passengers fled & the cruise director ignored them; parents sitting in the adult pool next to the pool bar late in the afternoon with their empty beer buckets around them watching their two kids fling deck chairs--no DCL stuff ever appeared; etc.
We have sailed on multiple other lines at various times of the year; DCL is the worst. IMHO It's because Disney markets the "perfect family cruises", the codeword for parents to leave their kids in the clubs all day, have dinner with the kids on their tablets then send them right back to the clubs until bedtime (they DCL staff even come get them from the dining room); this leaves the parents time to relax without a thought or care to what the kids are doing. There's even a kid's club on CC & parents can leave on an excursion in port while the kid stays onboard in the kid's club!

DCL has marketed this way from its inception. So why is it only the last few years that behavior is so much worse? Parenting (or lack of) has definitely changed.

We started cruising DCL back in 2007. Our kids were 6 & 9. It was never all about dumping our kids on someone else to go relax without them. We were happy to enjoy time off with our kids. We didn't even hang out at the adult pool til our kids were teens. That was probably our 8th Disney cruise. If people want an adults-only vacation, they should let the kids stay with grandparents and go take an adult vacation. If you're going to take your kids on vacation, parenting never stops. It doesn't magically end at age 18 either.

 

[Mango7100]

We just disembarked the Wish. I’ve concluded the problem is pretty much never the kids it’s the parents.

Last night in the theater I sat in front of a kid around the age of 3 who kicked my chair the whole show and coughed and sneezed incessantly. I turned around several times to ask him (in a polite nice voice) to please stop kicking, but he was too little to really pay attention. The problem was clear—parents were in some sort of family reunion and had seated all the young kids (all age 8 or below) together on one end of the row and adults on another end, so the adults were too far away to supervise. And by the way parents kept chit chatting among themselves loudly during the show, which was almost as distracting as the kicking and coughing.

But that doesn’t come close to the woman at the show the day before who walked in late after the show start time wearing some sort of extremely bright flashing strobe light hair accessory for pirate night and sat right in the front near the stage where her light flashed nonstop for everyone to see. Finally a cast member confronted her about 15 minutes into the show but it was a painful 15 minutes and if I wasn’t in the middle of a row I would have gotten up and had a word with her myself.

Then was the mother who threw a fit when the lifeguard asked her to take her swim diaper wearing 1 year old out of the pool per pool rules. She left but then returned a minute later having removed the swim diaper and declared her baby to be potty trained. She also kept letting her baby jump into the pool from the edge even though lifeguard kept saying that wad not allowed either.

At Hero Zone, at the basketball court there were too few basketballs for the number of players and a grown man snatched to ball out of my 9 year old son’s hand and made him cry. I intervened and got his ball back but yeesh.

Of course there were also lots of responsible parents who followed rules, paid close attention to their kids etc. But the bad behavior of a few can really negatively impact the experience. It does make me wonder what the solution is. In several situations the cast members tried to intervene with mixed results. Probably just have to suck it up and accept that any time you travel there will be some bad eggs.

The lifeguard should have called in backup to have the woman and baby removed or should have shut the pool down for sanitation reasons if a non-potty trained baby was in it. By not doing so do it only reinforces bad behavior and signals that people can do what they want. I’m sure the lifeguard didn’t feel like upper management would be supportive and they would get in trouble…

 

[ruadisneyfan2]

The lifeguard should have called in backup to have the woman and baby removed or should have shut the pool down for sanitation reasons if a non-potty trained baby was in it. By not doing so do it only reinforces bad behavior and signals that people can do what they want. I’m sure the lifeguard didn’t feel like upper management would be supportive and they would get in trouble…

Crazy that a CM would get in trouble for enforcing rules. If that’s the case, that rules are not allowed to be enforced, then don’t bother having rules. It only ticks off the huge majority that are following the rules. I’d rather DCL piss off the the few who were breaking said rules.
Such a cowardly stance by DCL.

 

[slindamood]

I' sorry to hear that some cruises are not relaxing due to some guests. This is not necessarily a new or post Covid thing.

My DD's family (DD, her DH, and children age 4 and 1) took the Norway cruise sailing out of Dover England in 2016. She had been on probably 10 Disney cruises starting in 2001 so was familiar with the usual ambience - meaning generally well behaved children and adults.
She reported at the time that this cruise was different - it had a "crazy party atmosphere" that prior cruises did not. She simply added that the Brits on the cruise really liked to party day and night.

 

[brentm77]

I've never understood Adults acting like children on Disney cruises. I had a women with a huge crown on her head sit in front of me in a theatre. I have a hard time wrapping my head around a middle aged women dressing like a princess to start with, but if you are going to do it be courteous.
I'm not sure if there is a solution. I think your last sentence sums it up.

100% agree. Adults talking in the theaters has become a thing too. In what world do they think that is appropriate? I can't imagine being so mean to other people. Also peeps, don't sing - nobody paid to hear you sing over the actors.

But the worst was the lady who made a scene because she arrived late and tried to use the stairs as a chair. When told she couldn't do that, but she could stand at the back, she argued and finally said, "my daddy would never let me stand at the theater!" Lady, you are 40, what does your daddy have to do with this? And did he let you treat employees like garbage or disobey basic safety rules when you didn't make the effort to show up before a show started?

 

[RedHead0186]

100% agree. Adults talking in the theaters has become a thing too. In what world do they think that is appropriate? I can't imagine being so mean to other people. Also peeps, don't sing - nobody paid to hear you sing over the actors.

OMGosh, yes! And people being on their phones! Seriously, if you can't be without your phone for the 2.5 hours or whatever it takes to watch a movie, you have issues. And yes, a whisper to someone sitting next to you may be okay every once in a while, but please don't carry out full blown conversations while the movie is happening.

 

[DCLMP]

I' sorry to hear that some cruises are not relaxing due to some guests. This is not necessarily a new or post Covid thing.

My DD's family (DD, her DH, and children age 4 and 1) took the Norway cruise sailing out of Dover England in 2016. She had been on probably 10 Disney cruises starting in 2001 so was familiar with the usual ambience - meaning generally well behaved children and adults.
She reported at the time that this cruise was different - it had a "crazy party atmosphere" that prior cruises did not. She simply added that the Brits on the cruise really liked to party day and night.

I almost want to take a Norway cruise just to see this. I love people watching.

 

[ruadisneyfan2]

We sailed to Norway on 9.1.19 out of Dover. There was no crazy party crowd at all. It was the last sailing that our kids sailed with us. Even then it was only because of the itinerary. They were 19 and 22 and so happy to be able to eat in Palo.
They were quick to notice that it had very few kids on it, a lot more older cruisers, and it definitely wasn't sold out.
We got a great VGT rate with connecting cabins and balconies. So nice!

 

[Chipmunkmaniac]

I ve zeen wayy less crazy behaviour on the classics. Wonder they are too small/boring for these peeps