that parents should fucking ask me first before going out and leaving their son outside playing with mine ..

[ggirl]

kids are 10/11
playing happily which if fine
but I want to go out
ds's friends parents have buggered off somewhere so we have to wait for them to come home ......wankers

and i don't want to take their child with me

[Rooners]

Do you live near me, GGirl?

I have a similar problem! See my thread from the other day...

[CurlyhairedAssassin]

At the secondary school I work in there are trips to places like Paris for the year 7s and 8. They are not supervised by an adult at ALL times. There are times when the adults will sit in a cafe for an hour to give the kids a chance to wander round with their friends on their own - the kids know what time to appear back at the cafe and they have maps and mobile numbers of staff etc. I was a bit when I first heard they were allowed to do that but thinking about it, it's what children their age should be able to do. I know I would have relished the freedom at that age.

The difficulty in the OPs case is that neither she nor the boy knew where the parents had gone or when they would be back.

[EurotrashGirl]

I think 10/11 is old enough to leave them for a few hours to be honest.

[Rooners]

Oh and as it's aibu - YANBU with big fecking knobs on.

[adoptmama]

So he knew his parents would be back in an hour or so. He only wanted your son to stay so he wasn't bored (understandable) and also understandable why you would have felt mean leaving him kicking his heels without your son to play with.

But, in answer to your original post - YABU because the parents did nothing wrong in leaving a boy this age for that length of time and did not making any presumption upon you that you would be looking after him. They left their 10/11 year old playing outside his own house for an hour or so on a Saturday afternoon. Hardly makes them 'wankers'.

[Rooners]

If he's big enough to be left alone, then he is big enough to be trusted with a front door key.

Ergo they are a bit wankerish. Or just thoughtless.

[Rooners]

If he is locked out the implication is that should he have any outstanding needs, they will be met by the OP or some other random.

That is imo a wanker thing to do. If they are going to leave him he needs a key at least.

[Salmotrutta]

ggirl - I'd have felt like you.

I would have been uncomfortable leaving a 10yr old alone, locked out until their parent came home.

Even if the parents hadn't expected me to look after him I'd still have felt too uncomfortable about it.

Especially if you don't even know each other!

[susiedaisy]

Op yanbu.

[adoptmama]

Rooners, surely it is equally reasonable to assume that if he is locked out the expectation of his parents must have been that he won't have any outstanding needs, not that they assumed a neighbour would oversee him.

Would I lock my 10 year old out? No, I would leave her with a key incase she did need to get in. But I wouldn't label another parent a 'wanker' because they don't do the same as me. Likewise if my 10/11 year old happens to be playing with a friend, whose parents I don't know, I would not assume said parents will be doing anything to watch over my child if I do go out; so why do we assume these parents actually had any expectation the OP was going to take responsibility for him? I'm not that presumptive - what makes you think they were? Why are so many people accepting they had unreasonably assumed the OP was going to act in loco parentis just because they never told her they were going out?

I would have made the decision to allow my child to stay home/play out in this way because I trusted they would manage. It was reasonable of the boys parents to presume he would manage without needing adult assistance for an hour or two. It was reasonable of them to believe he would manage without needing any kind of medical assistance for some 'what if' accident. It is over-parenting to think that a child of this age always needs to be under the direct supervision/responsibility of an adult because they are so 'vulnerable' to harm.

[morefalafel]

At 10 we all used to play out. Dangers included :

• The big kids from the rough estate coming round and picking on you
  
• Cars going too fast round the corner, several accidents happened
  
• Everyone buggering off home for dinner and you not having anywhere to go
  
• Your bike getting nicked while you were finding somewhere to a) go to the toilet b) get a drink c) playing
  
• Not wanting to join in the last game of rounders because you effing hate rounders but have no choice because there's nowhere else to go
  

So although these do not apply to everyone and all situations, because I have been the 10 year old that is locked out and felt the arsehole-ness that is having to deal with the above, I would not leave a 10 year old to play out unless I was home. And I would probably knock on your neighbours door next time pre-emptively and say "We are planning on going out at xx time, so there'll be no one to watch the kids outside. Just letting you know."

Or something. YANBU.

[Rooners]

'Rooners, surely it is equally reasonable to assume that if he is locked out the expectation of his parents must have been that he won't have any outstanding needs, not that they assumed a neighbour would oversee him.'

I disagree. It is implicit that another adult would take charge should anything occur.

An 11yo is not an adult and thus will sometimes require the assistance of one.

I can see what you are saying but it is not really legitimate to presume in the first place that an 11yo won't have any outstanding needs for an hour or two in the late afternoon. Leaving them with access to a house is better than leaving them on the street.

Sending or allowing an 11yo into town alone is also different - the implication there is that they can access a way home at any time should they need to.

Unless he had his phone, and the parents were accessible in order to come home in case of emergency then it's not on.

[adoptmama]

Well here's a thought - maybe they did ask someone, and the OP just doesn't know about it?

OP posted at 3pm - hardly the 'late afternoon'.

[NotEnoughTime]

Where do you live kim147 if you don't mind saying?

[Itsaboatjack]

Jesus ...last time I post on aibu - why? I think you've actually started quite an interesting debate.

My dd1 is 9 and me and dh are disagreeing on how much freedom to start giving her. I grew up with a lot of freedom and agree with kim147, my dh is more on the conservative side opinion.

[LtEveDallas]

I always end up being the unpaid babysitter at our caravan. Any weekend we can end up with 6-8 kids coming in and out to use the loo, get drinks and memorably "Are you making enough dinner for me?".

It took a good few visits until I realised that the parents were sodding off as soon as their kids said they were coming over to play with DD.

I keep a lot of snack food now - couldn't be dealing with the whinging when I didn't. It use to piss me off, but now I accept it. If we do have to go anywhere we just go, but generally we are the only ones about. I do t even know half these parents, but they all seem to know my name.

[oldgrandmama]

From age nine, I was sent out ALL DAY during weekends, school holidays, with my small sister, packet of jam sandwiches, and told not to come back until tea time. Later, when I was a bit older, toddler brother came too. We roamed all over town - cliffs, beach, parks. My parents would have gone mad if they'd known what dangerous stuff we got up to.

But it was the 1940/50s. I don't think your neighbour's kid was too badly neglected when they left him to play outside

[kennyp]

i couldn't give two hoots what happened to people in their childhood in the 80s, 90s etcetc blah blah blahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

i don't think you're being unreasonable. i wouldn't want my children locked out with no access to a loo etc if i was out. irresponsibile in my opinion and nothing to do with learning how to be independent. independent to me is asking ds to walk to shop and buy milk. independent isn't leaving him locked out of the house with nowhere to go whilst i piss off for an hour.

[babyboomersrock]

I think some parents on here would have a heart attack if they saw what went on in my neighbourhood

But the children survive and they are certainly not mollycoddled. The parents can't afford to do clubs etc so the children just hang out outside

Yes - at age 6. With no adults. An adult may appear and tell them to get the fuck inside, it's tea time

Quite the idyllic picture you paint there. Children roaming free, parents cursing from doorways. Are the children all locked out, though?

I'm all for children having freedom. I'm also all for children having keys - as someone else said, if they're big enough to be left alone, they're big enough for a key.

[adoptmama]

I think that it is actually very useful to listen to people remind us how childhood used to be. The fact is that children can be outside without needing access to the toilet every 30 minutes. So yes, reminding ourselves that we played outside all day without needing an emergency toilet break is a good thing. Listening to calm voices remind us that we all survived playing unsupervised for hours at a time should be a wake up call showing us what are own children are in danger of losing.

I genuinely believe that to consider it 'child neglect', to mention calling the police or to say it is irresponsible to leave a child playing outside of his own home in the middle of the afternoon for an hour or two shows a total loss of perspective and an inability to properly assess risk. And all of these things have been said on this thread. What possible harm could come to him - really? Yes there are horrible, horrible tragedies. The murders of Susan Maxwell, Sarah Harper and Caroline Hogg are seared into my memory, particularly Susan Maxwell's as we were the same age. April Jones' murder haunted me - I too have a 6 year old who loves to play out on her bike. I wanted to grab her close and never let her out of my sight again. But I still let her play outside because, however great my fear is, I know and keep reminding myself, that I cannot imprison her because my fear is disproportionate.

Fair enough kennyp that you wouldn't want your children left like this, but just because you wouldn't make a particular choice in parenting doesn't mean it is irresponsible of another parent to do so. Very few parents are genuinely neglectful - intentionally or unintentionally. More perhaps are thoughtless, as perhaps this lad's parents were. But I really cannot see that - in terms of his actual wellbeing - they did anything wrong.

[figgypuddings]

Are the parents back home yet, OP?