Should I stay out of friends fall out - over adult and kid playfight!?

[Lovehols]

We had a group of friends over to stay who all know eachother - look after each others kids etc.

One of the lads was hyper and woudln't leave adult A alone. His parents just let him annoy adult A. Anyway a friendly play fight started as adult A tried to peel the kid off him.....but it resulted in the lads bum being tapped by adult A. Made worst by the fact that the boys shorts were coming down due to the messing about.

My friends have now fallen out about it- I'm devasted! Adult A deffo had no bad intensions, but its all so upsetting. I'm also upset that the lads parents were quick enough to have a go at adult A - but don;t control the lad. Who often runs about slapping peoples bums - which I do not agree with at all, bujt the parents don't do anythign about.

I'm not sure anyone can make me feel better I can see bother sides

An adult smacked a child's bare bottom?
Yes. I'd have thought that wildly inappropriate too.

Mind you, I'd have stopped the 'play fighting' in the first place, and certainly play fighting that resulted in a child's clothing coming off!

Oh, and yes they should stop their child smacking people's bottoms!

How old was the child in question? I mean, are we talking about a toddler here, or a child old enough to know better and back off from playfighting with an adult who was presumably making it clear he didn't want to?

Should never have gotten that far because the parents should have intervened.

What the fuck?? None of this makes sense

How old is the child in question? His parents cannot get annoyed if, after he has repeatedly run around hitting other people’s bottoms, his gets hit. Why is it ok for him to do it to others and not be done to him?

Were they visiting for half term?

A tap on the bum usually means that an adult has smacked the child but wishes to downplay it.

Parents should have controlled their kid, but the adult should have controlled themselves.

lad is 8

@Mammyloveswine

What the fuck?? None of this makes sense

Lol

should you stay out of it? Yes, also yes.

Had the adults been drinking?

I don’t understand why adult A didn’t tell the boy to stop or ask his parents to step in.
However annoying a kid is you don’t smack them though.

I’d stay out of it and maybe reconsider having alcohol while children are around.

So if I've understand this, the eight year old was annoying adult A, slapping his bum, etc. Adult A retaliated and did the same to him?

What a mess.

Kids parents out of order to let him carry on like that, annoying an adult.
And ever letting him slap people’s bums and think it funny,
Other parent should have dealt with it directly “that’s enough now Child A, I want to chat in peace, go and play with the other kids” and not tried to deal with it in ‘horseplay’
And should not have tapped the kids bum.
But parents A should have stopped it there: “whoah! All going too far” and not gone nuclear, given the circs and obvious non-malicious intentions.

So car crash communication all round, really.

Unless asked for your opinion, stay right out of it. If asked be honest.

Sorry, mixed up /reversed A and the others

They all need to grow up.

@JackieCollinshasnoauthority

Were they visiting for half term?

Aye. I expect so. But on the offchance they weren't, a) play fight is an oxymoron b) stay out of it.

You don't 'accidentally tap' a child's bum. That just doesn't happen.

My grandfather playfully smacks Dad's bum sometimes. She laughs about it. If me and DD are playfighting, we will smack each other lightly.

However, because child had been annoying this adult, it may not have been genuinely playful.

Playfight isn't an oxymoron. When you fight for real you intend to harm. When you playfight you are pretending to fight, you don't do real harm or intend to.

I would argue that what happened between adult and child here wasn't really a playfight.

I live in a parallel universe clearly ...

So an adult smacked a child’s bare backside?

Maybe it’s the half term phenomenon thing. But there’s a lot of perfect people around lately. Including the childs parents apparently, if they flew off the handle like that!

I’d try to stick up for A a little bit. But only a little bit because I’m a conflict avoidant wimp.