I've never been rammed by a stroller either. That isn't to say that it doesn't happen, obviously, or that there aren't some really obnoxious people out there who happen to be mothers who happen to have children in strollers. But I think that there's a peculiar tendency for people to be eager about sharing their stories about obnoxious women with strollers, and then painting all mothers or even all women with that broad brush.
I mean, if I posted on this forum with a specific example that seemed to confirm a broader negative stereotype, I'm sure I'd be (rightfully) corrected by other posters, and perhaps even get into trouble with the mods. So why is it okay to hate on "large strollers" and use as the only evidence some anecdotes that are more about obnoxious people than about strollers?
I've been following the anti large-stroller trend with a lot of interest since it really started in full force about 5 years ago (back then it was 100% about the Bugaboo, now that there's a wider assortment of high end strollers it's expanded), and I really have to say that I think it's a subject heavily influenced by both misogyny and class. Both of which our culture supports criticizing, so people get away with perpetuating the stereotype of women with children in strollers as being bad females: taking up space, "entitled," and somehow automatically poor mothers.
Quote:
Originally Posted by nextcommercial  Last night a woman had a giant stroller in Wal Mart... while also dragging a shopping cart and holding the baby (who was old enough to walk). THEN... she was parked next to my van, and put her cart behind my van while she unloaded her groceries into her car even though she knew I was trying to leave. It took a long time before she put the baby in the carseat........ then slowly folded her stroller up.........put it back in the trunk of her car......... then she moved her cart out of my way AND gave me a nasty look because I was in HER way. I have done that faster with four kids.
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Not to pick on you, because every anecdote in this thread and on every other message board I've ever read about this subject and in countless articles follows basically the same theme, so I'm just using it as an example. But while that is totally obnoxious (though I would like to say that it's very rare that I let my 2.5yo walk in a store like that, though she is more than capable of walking herself. And running. And picking things up off the shelf. And helping to rearrange the shelves.), that story doesn't really have much to do with strollers. It's just an obnoxious woman who happened to have a stroller.
Oh yeah, and another vote for umbrella strollers being awful. We have an expensive one at my parents', and have run through a string of cheap ones at our house, and they're uncomfortable and break easily. My parents were really enthusiastic about the real strollers we have, and went on at length about how when I was a baby all the strollers were awful umbrella strollers and they would have given their right arms for a stroller that was big enough to be comfortable to the kid and easy for the adult to push.
But I have to disagree with the umbrella stroller thing. When I was a Nanny I found it to be really uncomfortable. Maybe I am just too tall? I always had to hunch over to push it and the larger stroller was much more comfortable for me to use. It was fairly big but obviously I didn't buy it 
