to allow my son not to invite a mean boy to his party?

[Busyworkingmumof4]

My oldest is turning 9 and normally we have only ever had family birthday parties. This year we have allowed him to have a friends birthday party for the first time.

I asked him who he wanted to invite and he listed eight names, which are all the boys from his class except one. When I asked why he did not want to invite that one boy, he said that he is mean to him all the time and gave me some examples. Given this boy's behaviour, I didn't see any reason to encourage my son to invite him.

This morning, after my son handed out the party invitations yesterday afternoon, I received an email from the class teacher telling me that to have one boy excluded from the party is "not fair" and has "created tension" and "goes against the school motto".

Should 9 year olds be expected to invite kids who are mean to them to their own parties, just to not 'create tension' in the classroom?

Erm... 5.45 am Monday here was between 1 and 4.45 am Tuesday (AUS time being 8 - 11 hours ahead of us, ish)

So yesterday for OP would indeed have been Monday, wouldn't it?

Uncalled for drama which has not been helped by a teacher who should not be involved,

People certainly seem to be in rush to involve the teacher when it's their own precious darling on the receiving end...

Op, can't you understand that for the teacher to have gotten involved, your son must have really rubbed the non invited boy's face in it?
Why are you condoning this?

5.45am UK time would be Monday afternoon in Australia.

No I am not troll hunting. I asked the OP earlier on if she meant last week and she said she was 3 hours ahead time wise.

You are speculating Iamagrey, you have no idea if he did.

Actually 3 hours ahead could well be a country such as UAE where Sunday is a school day.

@Spikey You are quite right! I got myself totally muddled there, didn't I?

Please accept my apology, and ignore my embarrassment

Well I thought it was 12 hours ahead at first and then realised afterwards it couldn't be that far ahead so went and looked it up. I think the mystery of being at school on a Sunday is solved though.

So, I'm assuming that all the people replying saying OP is mean for not inviting the boy would also invite people who are nasty and physically abusive to them to their own personal celebrations?! I very much doubt it!

I wouldn't invite him either.

As an adult I would look into the situation before making a choice that would exclude one boy from the rest of the boys. OP made the decision before speaking to the mother, and even now, doesn’t know the whole story. As such, those stating that the kid that has been excluded is being ‘mean’ are speculating. I have a very sweet and sensitive dd, but even so, kids are playing around with their personalities and interactions so if she told me someone had been mean to her I wouldn’t make a hurtful decision based on that alone, I’d look into it.

No I wouldn’t invite a child who my child’s didn’t want at their party but nor would I allow them to leave one boy out and then go and hand all the other kids invitations out in front of him.

well it would look to me that your DC is the mean one!

Has the child's mum spoke to you since school?

It's a hard call. I understand your sons perspective and the schools for excluding one child

Again, not receiving an invite to a party would only serve the mean child well; actions do have consequences and someone must teach him that lesson.
Seen so many parents totally blinkered regards to their offspring's behaviour. Oh, it's always the other children, never their precious ones .
Boys will be boys/it's only children/ he's a boy's boy?!/ she's much maligned/ etc /etc.
Sit your child down and tell them to be kind and if they don't want to play with someone, it's absolutely fine - but it's not fine to get others to not want to play with that person or whatever the situation might be.

Why do people assume the mean kid has sn. He may just be mean. And frankly I wouldn't want anyone that pushed me over at my party sn or or not. And in fact aged nine I didn't.

PM

Seen so many parents totally blinkered regards to their offspring's behaviour.
This ^

I know someone who moved their kid 3 times to different schools as "they were being 'bullied'." "Poor kid was just misunderstood and didnt mean anything by what they did."
Like hell they were, they were brats who bullied several kids in several schools mercillessly. The reason they were moved was because the parents all rocked up and told the schools if they didnt move them they were taking their kids out.

The kid has left school now but is still a brat and mum still thinks the sun shines out his arse.

Some kids are just brats and grow up to be bigger brats in the workplace as parents indulge them over and over again.

When dd1 was 10 she invited the girls on her class to her party except one girl.
The girl in question bullied dd1 for at least 2 years by that point. Pinching, pulling, saying things to her. It was relentless.
We had complained to the school countless times, and they did very little. It was so bad at one point that dd1 went mute.

Only reason we didn’t remove dd1 from the school was a new head took over who got it all sorted, and it went on the girls permanent school record.
It wasn’t just dd1, a few of the other girls were subjected to her bullying.

I couldn’t give a shit If certain people on this thread think I was mean to exclude this girl. She was and still is a bully.

The difference between your situation and the one here @misskitty is that the behaviour your dd was subject to was explored and recorded - not the case in the instance OP is talking about. I think the issue for me is that even though the child hasn’t mentioned anything wrong previously, it’s ok to exclude a child on that basis.

Send a text or invite them all privately if you are excluding one child, the school should not have to police this. My DD once got excluded, the whole class was invited except her. She wasn't a bully but the girl whose party it was, was a bully. It is totally shit for the kids either invite a few or all but never exclude just one.

So, a victim of bullying should never be allowed a party with their whole friendship group, unless they invite the bully?

Great victim blaming message there.

OP never said bullying or called her son a victim. Doesn't stop the chinese whisperers on aibu translating it themselves though, does it?

Unkind behaviour, being 'boisterous', energetic child, etc etc ad nauseam, whatever you call it, it's all the bloody same - behaviour that makes other/s miserable, be it by excluding them, sneering at them, being overly physical i.e. pushing/shoving, not allowing to sit with a group.....
Shove your pity party for the bloody bully up yours and face the facts that bullying by any other name still hurts the same.
Bullies should be made to take their own medicine and taught a lesson as it's blindingly obvious from this very thread that their parents - as represented here by the 'include the bully' whingers - are utterly incapable of doing it themselves. Ineffectual parenting is the root of oh so many evils.

.

It's sorted, and it turns out I was being unreasonable. We have now invited the other boy to the party too.

After I spoke to the boy's mum she called me back later in the evening and explained her son's version of events. The pushing to the ground had apparently started off as a 'strong man' challenge that they had both been happy to play, but it seemed the other boy kept winning.

Armed with this information, I was able to address this with my son, who admitted that it had indeed started off willingly but he had wanted the other boy to stop when he kept winning at pushing him to the ground.

On this basis, it seemed that the other boy was not being deliberately mean after all, but just continuing a game for too long. I probably should have investigated that further in the first instance.

For clarity - I have never said that my son was being bullied or felt a victim. The question was more about not inviting someone who my son didn't like.

Also - spot on about where we are! School week is Sunday to Thursday.

I'm glad that was resolved, OP. It wasn't right to invite all the boys except one. That's always hurtful. I've been through a similar dilemma with my DDs' sixth birthday party. I made it an all class party and she told me she didn't want 2 of the boys there as they would 'ruin it'. I know my DD well enough to be aware that she is capable of being unkind herself and she's definitely not being bullied. I also witnessed an incident when they were queuing up at home time. One of the boys was trying to push in and she was telling him off and making him line up. So she can definitely hold her own.

I talked her into inviting them both, saying we would be there to make sure no one ruined the party and she didn't need to worry about it. She was happy then.

Now only one of the boys is coming, it looks like the other one isn't as I haven't had a response to the invitation and the party is on Saturday.

Parties are such a delicate issue. My DD1 will be 9 soon, she hardly gets any party invitations and this sort of thing is very hurtful.