To find this annoying?

[Rockaby]

I am in very early days of surprise pregnancy. I am tired, I have a very clingy, whingey toddler today and I'm a bit at the end of my tether tbh.

Recently, our local park has become frequently inhabited by teenagers. We try not to go there now, as there simply isn't much room when they are there and, though they're usually reasonably polite if I ask them if my toddler can have a go on whatever it is they are sitting on, it's just a little awkward being there when they are iyswim. We have other parks in the area, so we just go there instead.

Yes, I know there really aren't enough places for teenagers to go and that is shit for them, I was probably just like them at that age etc. However, this particular park has a huge grassy area with loads of seating areas, which are never in use, and also a large skate park where other teenagers hang out sometimes, but which I have never seen busy.

Occasionally they swear a bit, but it's fairly harmless and usually one of them will say "language", and they will stop for a bit at least, so it's ok.

Today, we ended up going to the park in question, as we were passing, and there were a few teenagers there. One swore and I didn't think anything of it, but then she kept going. I love a swear, but this was silly - every other word was fuck and she was doing it as loud as she could, while standing right next to DC. So I asked her politely to stop swearing. She looked at me as if I was quite bonkers, but did stop and then threw DC and me daggers the rest of the time we were at the park.

Now, looking back, I feel like a total grumpy old woman. I hate confrontation and wouldn't normally do this sort of thing. Would you have asked her to stop, or just ignored / left? We'll continue to avoid this park tbh. It's getting horribly run down now anyway, which could be to do with teenagers using it more now, or just coincidence.

There's no harm in asking her to stop, as long as you weren't rude about it.
I would have smiled and said "sorry, could you stop swearing so much, my toddlee repeats everything he hears at the moment, thanks"
Teenagers get a bad press but they are usual just bored, nowhere to go, feel like they aren't welcome anywhere.

The park facilities are there for small children. You should not have to go there in fear of horrid teenagers. No you are not a grumpy old woman. You are a sensible Mum. YANBU

I wasn't rude but I wasn't chummy. I was so stressed by the very idea of confronting her that it came out very teacherish !

YANBU. A park is for little ones anyway . I can understand the hanging around bit as it's what some teens do but they should be corrected for swearing. if it's a real problem, contact the council

Thanks. It isn't a huge problem for us as we'll just go elsewhere. I am going to contact the council about the state of the park though, it is horrible now.

I think park facilities are there for the whole community, not just small children.

You did the right thing!
I'd like to think in that situation I would tell them to take their bad language elsewhere

The bit they hang out in is the children's play area of a larger park area. Sorry, that wasn't very clear in the op. I don't know who the playground is 'for' strictly speaking though.

In Bristol there's an age guideline given on the boards for play parks.

Constant swearing is not on. It can be intimidating saying something. I've never had to. I was blessed at birth with the sociopathic stare which tends too resolve these problems for me.

No age limit displayed on the play areas here. They sound useful, as does the sociopathic stare .

Thanks all for the reassurance .

You weren't being U at all to ask her to stop and she did which was the main thing. She might have looked at you like you were bonkers because she was embarrassed? I've asked before and they always do (including one time when one lad told his mate to 'stop fucking swearing, there's kiddies over there' )
Teens will always congregate in parks though, most of them are still just kids themselves and assuming that they're there to cause trouble or are running the place down just reinforces the message that they're not welcome.
Many of our local teens campaigned and fundraised for one run down area to be made into a skatepark, most of the objections centred around the fear of large groups of young people in one place - they got it in the end and now there are certain parents of young children who complain that the skatepark is full of teenagers! 🙄🙄
They can't win sometimes..

Thanks canary.

I would never make anything like those sorts of assumptions. I hate ageism of any kind. I think I was quite careful to say it could be down to the teenagers using it more now, but that's not because they are teenagers; it's simply because the park is now more heavily used and even then I'm not sure - it could just be coincidence, as I said in my op I think, that it's showing it's age a bit more these days. Hope that clarifies .

I think English people are generally more uptight than Irish people about swearing so I find myself disagreeing with how bad it is, usually.

But that sounds full on and i think I'd have said something, too.

walter I'm Irish . The girl I spoke to was English!

I swear a lot though, just try my very best never to do it in front of little children. This girl wasn't even making an effort not to swear. If anything, i would say she was going out of her way to swear as much as possible. That's what I found a bit rude.

I hate when kids are off school I tend to avoid places like parks and soft plays. The last time I had a go at some teenagers was when they were playing football and it went straight for my baby on the swings luckily God knows how as I had my back to them I managed to block it with my hand. They dont paticularly bother me but stuff like football when
there's a massive field next to it does do my tit in or when they're riding on there bikes as it's only a small park and it's meant for babies.

YANBU to ask her to stop swearing, most teenagers realise its not appropriate right next to little kids. She was probably just embarrassed in front of her mates.

canary I take DD(8) to our local skate park a lot, the teens there are decent kids, yet still some stupid cow shouted at them the other weekend coz her toddler wanted to play with his ball there and they were skating in the way.

Saddos hanging out in the child's section of a park. I'd call into the police station and ask if the PCSOs can have a word sometime. Or ask the council if they can put up a sign with age range on it.

I think you did the right thing, the girl was probably embarassed about being told off in front of her friends

I swear a ridiculous amount but (generally_ manage not to around the kids. Even when DH and me are out for a day without the kids if I spot children near me I will try to curb my language. A couple of days ago though, we went for a meal (TGI Fridays, and I had 5 'purple rains' which are absolutely lush but maybe I overdid it a bit ) then to the cinema, followed by the pub. Was maybe about 9pm ish, was just starting to get dark. I was tapped on the shoulder by some woman hissing at me to 'watch your fucking language, my kids are here'

Night time, in a pub (not a restaurant either, just a pub) and YOU swear at me to tell me to stop swearing around your kids who shouldn't even be there. They looked about 5/6 ish for gods sake. Who in their right mind thinks its appropriate to have small children in a pub that late at night. Ugh.

I actually asked this to the barmaid when I ordered my last drink, and she looked a bit sheepish and said kids were meant to be out by 7 and she hadn't realised (tbf it was really busy and she was rushed off her feet) and she ended up asking them to leave. At which stage they started swearing very loudly at her too (infront of the kids which is apparently a problem to them...shock horror). Horrid family.

Rockaby you're there too long, so!

I can't help feeling sorry for 'teenagers'. Seems like there is nowhere for the to go, nobody wants them hanging around. Remember your younger kids will soon be one... I know i'm missing the point however. They should not be acting like that around young kids and you were in every right to address it.

Teenagers hanging around children's play parks is one of my pet peeves. I have no problem if they go there to play - there's one group of girls (about 13-14) who often meet at our local play park and do a very good job of organising any eager child in some intricate role play game involving knights and dragons and goodness knows what. My kids light up when they see the leader of this group and it means I can sit down and not worry too much about what my two are up to as I know the girls have it well under control!

But the rest seem to go there to smoke, chuck litter about, vandalise the equipment, swear, hang about at the top of the climbing frame so the kids can't get to the slide, etc.

And I don't buy the excuse 'they've got nowhere else to go.' They've got all the grassed areas, the benches, the football pitch etc etc. They don't play on the equipment, they just hang about on it getting up to no good. When I was a teenager it was really 'sad' to go into a play park unless with a younger relative, but now it seems to be the done thing!

I can't help feeling sorry for 'teenagers'. Seems like there is nowhere for the to go, nobody wants them hanging around.

Yeah I think the same tbh. It really does seem they can't win. Stay in and people moan that they don't go outside. Go outside and theres always a problem..they hang round the streets...they are intimidating people just by being there, go to the park, they are in the way, a group of teens congregating in a field or something would be reported just for being there as clearly they are doing something wrong...and so on.

I remember being a teenager and it was awful. When we were in the park (even afterdark when no kids were there) we were reported regularly, police used to 'move us on' from wherever we were as there were complaints..even though we genuinely did not do anything wrong. We even tried going deep into the woods to be away from people and dog walkers and such would phone the police to report us for being there too! Even looking back I don't think we made excessive noise or anything, and we weren't drinking/fighting/whatever.

Luckily 2 nights a week there was a youth club in our local community centre that we could go to to not annoy people. But these days even those have mostly closed down due to funding being withdrawn :(

I agree. It is crap for teenagers. It's that rubbish, in between stage where you're too young to do what you like, but too grown up to be taken places by your parents.

I've asked for volunteer positions to work with young people (thinking secondary age) round here as I remember how great youth clubs etc were for me when I was that age, but the only thing I've been offered has been Beavers! There seems to be so little for them here . Maybe after I have this baby, I'll start a youth group!

Still though, this particular girl was being a little rude and inconsiderate imo. If I find out my dc is doing this in twelve years time, I'll be seriously miffed. Or maybe walter's right and I've been in the Home Counties way too long ! Need to get back to good old, sweary Ireland!