-
Posts
-
This afternoon I witnessed a scene that I found quite disturbing for a number of reasons and it gave rise to a question.
If you see another person’s child misbehaving or doing something that could bring harm to themselves or another person and the parents are not in the immediate vicinity, is it acceptable to tell that child off? And as a parent, how would you react if a stranger told your child off?
I’m not a parent myself, I know how I’d like to think I’d react, but of course the theory and the reality are often quite different. Any thoughts?
If anyone did anything to save my child from harm i would be immensely greatful jen jen, as long as they werent purposely adding to any pain in doing so, how could you possibly be anything than greatful.
difficult one to answer this i have never personally smacked,slapped any of my kids(3) but im glad i didnt cos they are big lads now they might slap me,but when i was at school teachers were allowed to hit you be it slipper,cane,or my particular hatred when they used to pull you by the sides of your hair,also coppers could give you a cuff round the ear,but its all pc now,its not often im lost for words i just dont know tbh,maybe some kind of discipline,lines,detention,grounding,unplug their x boxes etc who knows?
Without knowing the full scenario Jen.. I would say YES it is acceptable to tell off a child. especially if they were about to cause mischief to themselves and others.children get up to all sorts,a simple telling off and a glower to acknolwedge the deed should suffice.
Like Cosy, I Never smacked. a firm look into the eyes.and a shake of the head would sort it.
all bairns are different though.. and nowadays your liable to get cheek back.
Its a shame we have to ask this question isn’t it… I remember when I was a child being aware of all adults and not misbehaving if any were around. If I was told off one thing was sure, if my mum found out I would be in big trouble!
What would I do nowadays… hmmm well have to tell you I had a situation recently where a group of young people were misbehaving, I was on my own and it was early evening… and guess what… I walked on by, I didnt intervene because I was scared. Crazy isn’t it!
If the children were younger Jen like the ones you describe probably I would say something… but I would not be at ease doing so.
As ever there are two sides to this scenario and I witnessed them both. Here’s one side:
You’re out shopping and busy looking for something and your 5 year old daughter is getting bored and is running around the store, she runs out of your sight for a few minutes. When she returns, she’s in floods of tears and tells you that an old woman has shouted at her. Her sobs make her incoherent…what do you do?
Mrs T, I don’t think it’s crazy to be scared of telling off young people at all, I can cope with being given a load of backchat but these days you never know what weapons they may be carrying. I have on occasion had to throw boisterous young people (teenagers larking around) out of the shop, but the other day I had a stern talking to from the Shopping Centre management about the risks I was taking and told that I should call for security as a first resort…I’d always thought of calling security as a last resort!
Our town doesn’t have much violence, at least I haven’t witnessed much, but the other evening I was on my way back to my car when I witnessed 6 youths laying into one of our local characters, a young man with learning disabilities and a quirky personality. I didn’t dare tackle them, neither did anyone else around at the time, but I was the only one who got out my mobile phone and called the police. Not tackling them is one thing, ignoring it is another.
@jen_jen wrote:
Mrs T, I don’t think it’s crazy to be scared of telling off young people at all, I can cope with being given a load of backchat but these days you never know what weapons they may be carrying. I have on occasion had to throw boisterous young people (teenagers larking around) out of the shop, but the other day I had a stern talking to from the Shopping Centre management about the risks I was taking and told that I should call for security as a first resort…I’d always thought of calling security as a last resort!
Our town doesn’t have much violence, at least I haven’t witnessed much, but the other evening I was on my way back to my car when I witnessed 6 youths laying into one of our local characters, a young man with learning disabilities and a quirky personality. I didn’t dare tackle them, neither did anyone else around at the time, but I was the only one who got out my mobile phone and called the police. Not tackling them is one thing, ignoring it is another.
Actually Jen… I think usually I would say something whatever the age… it was just on this occasion it was twilight and there were no other people around and i suppose I felt vulnerable…. they were probably OK kids… it was just my feeling of vulnerability that stopped me on this occasion. Have kids myself who have loads of pals who are a delight
i think we would all want to stop a child hurting themselves esp if their parent/carer wasn’t there…….the problem can often be when you try to explain to the adult what you did and why………..sometimes they don’t want to listen or may be incapable of seeing what you were saying because of their attitude to life in general……..we see this a lot in school.
I think it’s a natural instinct to stop a child being hurt…most of us probably wouldn’t give it a second thought until after the event, and only if you get an earbashin from the parent you would probably think why did I bother. Nowadays you have to be careful …accussations are flung around like empty sweet wrappers…even in schools children cannot be handled unless there are 2 adults present
I witnessed a very dsiturbing scene a while ago…and I didn’t do anything even though I felt like shyte after for not
Opposite the shop there is a bus stop and there was a young mum with a toddler in a buggy and another maybe 3 yr old with her. She had been sitting at the stop for ages and the kids were playing up. All of a sudden she started striking the baby in the buggy, it was so awful to watch, other passers by just walked past her too, the 3 yr old was climbing up the bench and running around…I really wanted to go over there and calm the situation down, the woman was obviously not coping and I am not giving her an excuse for hitting her child, but I have been depressed after my youngest was born, infact during my pregnancy it started and I really felt for her and the child…cusotmers in the shop were saying how awful she is and should be reported…but they didn’t do anything either….problem is no one knows if its so bad at home and then one day it pops up on the news about another baby dying
Get involved in this discussion! Log in or register now to have your say!