To refuse to get my child out of the car to apologise?

[LionEggMeg]

I was leaving a supermarket yesterday with my children. As i herded them towards the car, the littlest, who happens to have very poor auditory issues, ran ahead and opened his car door against the door of the next car, and jumped in, oblivious, and put on his seat belt. The owner of the car next to us said "did he bang that?" and looked but there was no damage. She got in the car with her child, but then her friend, about to get into the passenger seat, said "please get him out of the car to applogise." I refused, I said i would speak to him about it and in all likelihood he wouldnt have known he had done it. She was quite insistant, and i continued to refuse politely and put the others in the car and I said he is 6 and has [a form of] autism. She said 6 was nothing but would "let him off". I did speak to him and he was very sorry and I am sure he wont do it again, but I dont think there was anything to be gained by humiliating him in front of a stranger, and it wasnt even her car!

aibu?

I'll leave you to enjoy this then.

Is it some kind of free for all where PAs are allowed?

Yanbu for not making your DS get out of the car to apologise (as long as you apologised on his behalf of course - as you said you did). What I do find unreasonable on this thread are people saying they can't see why someone would make a fuss about their car being dinged anyway, as it's 'only a car'. I worked bloody hard to buy my car, and would go ballistic if someone damaged it and had that attitude. And maybe people should be aware that a lot of people these days lease their cars, so would be financially penalised for damage, however minor it is.

You can't win here, it seems.
This is quite a gracious post but all it gets in return is a terse "Good."

Thinnestofthinice

OP I have no idea what you are getting out of this thread now so I am politely not replying and continuing it further. Am honestly done smile as I said this morn before I very stupidly got embroiled in this thread again and wasted my own time on it (which is my own failing), enjoy your day (now evening) smile

Re the car door thing. I would be furious if anyone carelessly pranged my car door. And so would the majority of people.

??

I would be furious if someone pranged my door too but only if it caused damage. In this case, it didn't. I wouldn't expect an apology from a child, I would expect it from their parent. In this case, an apology was given. This seems so simple.

I have no idea what you are getting out of this thread now so I am politely not replying and continuing it further. Am honestly done

It's Long overdue but thank fuck for that.

You just added to it.

Cara, we're allowed to add to it. It's not a closed thread.

Thinnest said she was done. She's still allowed to add to it too.

Why so goady? Are you the thread police?

Peace and love, please! We think everyone can make their points without PAs - we don't want to have to zap the thread but we will if it's just going to descend into bunfightery.

I was deleted, agog