SAN FRANCISCO - In December, a mother filed a lawsuit against McDonald€™s claiming that the fast-food chain made it difficult to say no to her children. McDonald€™s has responded this week with a request for dismissal because parents have the freedom not to purchase Happy Meals for their kids, Reuters reports.

The plaintiff, Monet Parham, accused the restaurant of luring children to eat its food with toys, saying that McDonald€™s has violated California consumer protection laws with its advertising. Some localities like San Francisco have banned toys with kids€™ meals if the food is not healthy enough, while Florida wants to make sure toys can stay with any children€™s meals.

Parham says in her suit that she does regularly tell her children "no" when asked to buy Happy Meals, McDonald€™s wrote in its court papers. "She was not misled by any advertising, nor did she rely on any information from McDonald's," the company said.

If the lawsuit is allowed, it would open a whole can of legal worms, said McDonald€™s. "In short, advertising to children any product that a child asks for but the parent does not want to buy would constitute an unfair trade practice," said the fast-food chain.