To think neighbours should have had their son apologise?

I'm sorry this happened.
It is not normal.
My DS would be made apologise, clean your garden and kept in his room for a month.

Great generalisation 👏

Presumably that’s your experience. It’s certainly not mine; the parents I have encountered are continuously trying to instil good behaviour and manners in their kids. I wouldn’t, however, assume that ALL English parents are like the ones I’ve meet, that would be ridiculous.

You could extend this to lots of other teaching we do with our kids though. I ‘enforce’ saying please and thank you (with my just turned 4yo). Is he genuinely thankful when I give him something? I’m not sure, he’s probably happy but not necessarily grateful as such, however, I want him to learn social etiquette. So, from an early age Ive said please or thank you, every time he asks without saying it and he repeats it.

A 12 year old throwing stones at other children because they didn't get invited to a party of someone they aren't even friends with is not typical behaviour so expecting a typical response of remorse and apology in a typical timeframe is probably not something the child is capable of. Really in this situation it is the parents I would be expecting to apologise and reassure that they will take steps to prevent such dangerous behaviour reoccurring.

I think you should have called the Police!

That's not "childish pranks", but Yobbo territory.
The parents are a disgrace

A boy died from getting hit on the side of the head wrong with a rock when I was a kid.

OP and her child could have been seriously hurt. A 12 year old boy often has a strong throwing arm.

Wanting an apology and some assurance it won't happen again isn't a power trip, it is perfectly normal. Your repsonse is bizarre.

@PrincessFairyWren Completely disagree. A child of that age should be taught to acknowledge their wrong doings with the person. It is common decency but also part of reparative justice considering that this could be considered a criminal act. Bar significant SEND, (and even then, if it’s within their capacity and development the child still needs to understand wrong doing/crime), the child has to take responsibility

I’d certainly take my child over to apologise, as would most decent parents. I personally wouldn’t call the police, they won’t do anything but have a word, and it will certainly inflame the situation. If you didn’t have to live next to them maybe, but I think it will make things 100 times worse.

Nah @PrincessFairyWren OP isnt u9set child wasnt "punished infront of her"
She's upset she could have been seriously injured and there seems to be no awareness or acknowledgement of that.

Which honestly lS concerning.
And as a parent even if I addressed it privately id have spoken to OP post fact and explained what steps were taken because I would understand how serious it is.

There is no world in which I believe these parents handled this appropriately.

And its long past a forced sorry...

A 12 year old throwing rocks because he hasn’t been invited to a party, really isn’t normal.

I’d have phoned the police, tbh. His parents sound awful too.

Of course the boy doesn't care whether you think it's wrong or not. A 12 year old throwing rocks about a birthday party is not a well-adjusted child and, chances are, his parents aren't either. My sons had their challenges as 12 year olds but throwing rocks is way beyond what they'd have even have thought to do. A forced apology won't stop this boy doing it again. Next time call the police or move. Frankly I would consider moving and certainly have nothing more to do with him.

I think you are concentrating on the wrong thing, your STBX wanting you to move countries?

Are you for real?

What?!!! I marched my DS when he was about 8 round to my PIL’s neighbours as he and his cousins were throwing gravel and it fell near his car. No damage was done, but that’s not the point. Cousins got a bollocking from BIL as they had already gone home, but I took mine round and made him apologise. The neighbours thanked him for the apology. I couldn’t care less if he genuinely felt remorse, he was certainly going to be made to apologise. What he did was wrong and he should understand that and apologise.

There is nothing wrong with being shamed when you have done wrong and you are old enough/capable of understanding.

There's also another stating similar things.

I actually explained to Polish man I worked with how we were taught to say please and thank you... parents death grip 😂 and other manners i was taught and he told me they weren't taught that in Poland and he wanted to bring his children up like that. I dont know why people have started making out were rude, horrible people

I did not say that the child should not be punished. I was merely responding to the poster of what was a forced apology supposed to do.

I think that the child should be punished, I never said that I didn't. After this has taken place, I also think that the child should have the opportunity to reflect on his behaviour, in a supportive environment so that he learns from it. Punishment and reflection are two different processes. Then the child needs to have support on how to make better decisions in the future.

The fact of the matter it appears that the child reacted because he was hurt because he didn't get to attend a party of someone who he considered a friend. The behaviour is very wrong and could have lead to serious injury. But forcing the child to come an apologise, as an act of power, and letting the OP and her children gloat over him, before he has had the chance to reflect and respond, will not led to improvements in behaviour.

The OP is also upset the the child wasn't punished in front of her so that she could determine if she was satisfied that it fit her criteria of what she deemed fit. It doesn't even make sense to me that she didn't see the value in allowing him to de-escalate so that he could get more value in the lesson in the behaviour correction. The parents seem to have stopped the behaviour and will deal with it in doors, not as some public spectacle.

The whole post reeks of the OP being insulting to British culture anyway, and I'm not even British.

Also, @ShuffleShuffleSpin is there any reason why, when he turns up in your yard, you can’t just tell him straight that we don’t trust you anymore after you threw rocks at us. You are not welcome here anymore and you need to go back home. Clearly communicate your boundaries. If he escalates then respond accordingly.

I'd be giving my 3 yr old a stern talking never-ending 12 thats awful and Im shocked at the parents!!!

the same time, he still wants to come over to our house (he just shows up in our garden sometimes)

No way would that continue.

I'd either preempt this or If he turns up i'd explain its not convenient for him to play today and escort him home.
I'd then speak to the parents and say something like

Hi dave/sue,
Can i have a word? In you go tommy i need a private word with your mum/dad.

sue / dave, you know tommy threw stones at me and my children while we were in our garden. I dont understand how you and tommy think things can continue as they did before....His behaviour wasn’t an accident or careless—it was deliberately and extremely dangerous.

What’s really concerning is that he showed no real remorse, and neither did you. You actually seemed unfazed despite the seriousness. I was shocked that something so serious as this didn’t seem to register as unacceptable to you.

Because of that, we don't feel comfortable having him over anymore hei want to be clear he’s not welcome in our garden or around our children.
His behaviour crossed a line, one of us could have spent the day in hospital because of it. We have to put our safety and wellbeing first.

I hope you can understand this is not about being dramatic, but about having a safe and respectful environment for my children.

Any lame apology after this and I'd thank them but say it's too little too late and your position wont change but you sincerely hope hes learned from this and its a life lesson for him.

Personally I strongly dislike insincere apologies. Any time someone has flippantly apologised and it meant absolutely nothing I feel rather irate and would have preferred they not bothered if they couldn’t be genuine. And sometimes sorry is just a word offering a free pass to people who want to avoid being held accountable for their own behaviour or who don’t want to take personal responsibility or who want to do what they want anyway and have no consideration of others.

I wonder how much being made to apologise when you are not sorry contributes to what I described above. Is making children apologise when they don’t mean it teaching them to have negative traits, to be dishonest and insincere?

So, I do think you are a bit unreasonable to expect the parents to make their son apologise. Yanbu to expect that they teach him to behave better, show consideration for others, have empathy, regulate his emotions better. But how they choose to teach him and discipline him is their decision and they don’t have to align with you or your methods.

Do you and your children deserve an apology. Absolutely yes! But you deserve a genuine apology with genuine remorse. Not a forced apology.

1. throwing rocks is not normal behaviour at all from a child or adult.
2. my son similar aged is at a UK school. If something like this happened , the child would face sanctions. They would have a conversation with a senior member of staff to reflect on their behaviour and discuss how to control their temper. They would be asked to apologise and if the behaviour was part of a pattern they would be temporarily or permanently excluded. Their parents would come to school to discuss it.

Your comment about British culture is stupid and insulting to be honest.