Hi all
I was just on the high street waiting for the bus. A woman had three kids - a little boy who looked around 4, a girl of a similar age, and a little girl in the pram - she looked about 16 months or so.
The little boy was being really aggressive - hitting his sister of the same age, then smacking hard on the baby's legs. The baby laughed, and when the mum went to intervene he went to smack her, hard, in the face and on the arms repeatedly.
The mum just kept going 'stop, she doesn't like it', and 'stop, be nice'. Seemed completely ineffectual. I know that maintaining control of 3 kids is hard, but I think it's terrible to let a little boy hit his siblings, especially a baby.
She looked really stressed and frazzled, and - again - I get that parenting three children must be incredibly hard. But I really wanted to say something. I think all this 'gentle parenting' stuff is no excuse for letting your son learn at an early age that it's fine to whallop people, especially women. It made me feel sad and worried about how that woman's partner must treat her if her son thinks it's OK and normal to try and whack his Mum and hit his sister. That's ultimately why I didn't say anything.
Should I have said something? Or would I have just made a hard day even harder? I am not a mother but I have a wonderful young godson and plenty of small children in my family and I have never seen children behave like this.