When you see a child being badly treated in public

[Freaking0ut]

Or and about this afternoon, a young woman walking along with a child of about 5. They went to cross the road at the traffic lights. I didn’t see what he did (I’m not sure he actually did anything), but suddenly she was screaming at him, right in his face. She had him by the wrist and was dragging him over the road, he was crying and cowering alongside her. It was absolutely awful. Someone else shouted at her that she shouldn’t treat her child like that and she screamed at them not to tell her how to parent (with a whole load of fucking this and fucking that’s thrown in).

I don’t know what, if anything we can do? I don’t know who she is, so what can child services do even if I did report it? We are in a Wales and I believe the law will be changing soon around treatment of children, whereby her behaviour would warrant police intervention. I’m just so sad for this little boy I’d appreciate any advice. Thank you.

Sorry that should say ‘out and about’

Hopefully someone who recognises her will have seen her and will report it. That poor child.

That's so hard .Have been in similar circumstances and I'm always afraid that the child will get it worse at home if I intervene .

So watching with interest .

She sounds like my mother.

Unless you can take action that would benefit the child I would do nothing. People sometimes tried to intervene when I was young and we were punished for it when we got home.

If you didn't see what he did, how do you know he hadn't done something dangerous, like step in front of a car, or cross the road when the red man was showing? I'm not saying her reaction was appropriate, but in the heat of the moment, reacting to a potentially dangerous situation can trigger a reaction in us all that we'd not immediately be proud of. My 5 year old will cry when she's been told off, either because she's realised she was wrong or being a silly billy and is upset about her behaviour or because she doesn't like being told off. It's so hard to know what to do in situations like this, but when you only see a snapshot in time it is hard to know whether it's a systemic issue or not.

Really really difficult. I did on one occasion tell a father that the way he was talking to his child was really upsetting to listen to. To this day I don't know if it was the right thing to do. The Dad was in Asda with the little boy and one yr old ish baby, he was trying to fit shoes onto the baby and the baby was screaming and struggling, the Dad was taking it all out on the little boy calling him useless, telling him to help and hold the baby still, on and on it went, the Dad's stress all directed at the little boy.
I hope I didn't make it worse for the child, but I just felt I had to say something.

I’d watched them walking on the pavement on the opposite side of the road. They’d caught my attention because the mother was being quite loud and using some bad language. He was walking along with her, holding her hand. He definitely wasn’t playing up. The green man was showing and traffic had stopped so I don’t think it was the case that he had stepped out and she had reacted in shock. Even if he had, the way she reacted was totally out of order, it really was. She was screaming in his face.

I have a five year old. I know how they can push your buttons and I have previously shouted at my son when out and he has behaved badly, so I understand how these things can happen when stressed etc. But this was on another level entirely. And his reaction made me think that it probably wasn’t the first time. Urgh awful.

I see this loads where I live, some really really awful parenting and I never know what to do. I know I can't intervene much without making it worse for the child, as I reckon that kind of shit parent would take it out more on the child at home. I mean if you can be that way in public then what happens at home. They are strangers with no real way of reporting.

I get the whole snapshot of a moment in time and understand that. But I see kids being called cunt, being dragged, shouted at and what do you do?