WIBU? - Child waking the street

[Iltavilli]

We live on a cul de sac with a ginnel (alley for non-northerners) at the bottom, so it is often used as a cut through for people walking children to the local schools about half a mile away. Leaving the house this morning around 8am (huge lie in as I normally leave at 6am), a girl of around 7 or 8 was being walked to school by her mum.

The girl was banging what looked like two plastic sticks together, quite loudly, and was shouting “get up, get up, it’s time for school and work” all the way along the street. She was about 100 metres ahead of her mum, but mum was laughing along and not trying to stop her. I said to the girl that some people, like nurses, work at night and need to sleep in the morning so they can take care of people the next night. The girl burst into tears, and as mum got to where we were (outside my house) shouted at me for making her daughter cry.

Given the weather is so warm, and people have windows open to sleep, was I wrong to ask the girl to stop - but also to explain why she should stop?

If one of mine were shouting and banging at that time of the day I wouldn’t mind someone asking them to keep the noise down. I mean why on earth is now considered being an arsehole for speaking to a child and asking them to pipe down?

The mother was apparently 100m away, by the time she’d have got to the OP the child would have been long gone. So the OP was correct in speaking to her. Her mother sounds like one of these parents whose child can never do wrong.

@LaLoba sadly true. I’m both in and from the north (a few posts on other threads give pretty outing clues as to where I live).

And as for ginnel, it’s standard in the bit of Lancs I grew up in... not quite Corrie, but not too far either.

Why do people always say stupid things like 'if you work nights you expect noise!' Yes, I expect usual household noises, I expect traffic, I expect people walking around and talking. I do not expect and should not have to deal with annoying brats banging sticks and shouting stupid things. The same goes for people loudly playing music in their cars, my current issue.

And if you disagree I just hope you never expect your medic overnight to be fully awake and alert when caring for you or your family.

Well done OP

Ywnbu op the mother was.
Yes you probably should have spoken to the mother rather than the child, were it not already obvious that the mother was not showing any inclination to be considerate

Oh my goodness some of the reactions on here demonstrate to me exactly why teachers and people who work in schools are having such a shit time if it with ill disciplined rude children.
There was always a sense that an adult could gently correct a child’s ignorant behaviour.
Argh!!! You would want a stranger to intervene quick enough if something dreadful was happening to the precious littlest darling. But god forbid a stranger should encourage more social responsibility.

Sorry bad day having had the shot kicked out of me by a 5 year old at school whose parents are letting him find his own way with the world

I'm totally in agreement with you OP, I think you educating the child that not everyone has the same daily routine is a wonderful example of the saying "it takes a village to raise a child". Well done!

Children having fun is a wonderful sound. But not so wonderful if they have decided the world runs to a specific timeframe and that everyone must get up now. They need to learn that consideration for others is a wonderful thing! And if Mum doesn't have that consideration, then it's left up to the village ...

Sorry I say ginnel and snickett and I live down south what’s that got to do with it?

@laloba report the post then FFS stop troll hunting.

FWIW, I work shifts and I see both sides to this.
The irony is that by you telling the girl off, and her crying, then being shouted at by the mum, you probably caused more noise.

Why ever not? Bad behaviour gets called out, bad behaviour stops. All move on with their day. Result.

It wasn't 'bad' behaviour. It was a 7 year old kid making a little bit too much noise. That isn't behaving badly it is behaving within the normal range for age. I do agree the mother should have told the child to quieten down, but the idea that we all have the right to 'call children out' whatever the fuck that is is ridiculous.

OP wasnt a “random stranger”. She lives in the street. If anything, the child was the random one.

Oh FFS. She was a stranger to the child, not the street. Surely that didn't need explaining

@laloba report the post then FFS stop troll hunting.

Honestly, not a long term MNer here....is that troll hunting? Pointing out obvious BS? K’nell.

K’nell 😂😂

I’ve not heard it said like that for ages

I have a 7 year old. I would never allow him to behave like this, have and would tell him to pipe down and explain he needs to be considerate of others.

This is not out of the ordinary. This is called Parenting. It's not outrageous for an adult to talk to a child when the parent is not dealing with anti-social behaviour.

Anti-social children turn into anti-social teens and then adults. They need to understand that they don't always get to do exactly what they want because it might upset or inconvenience other people.

OP was perfectly polite and reasonable in talking to the child, the child cried it would seem because they don't like being told not to do something. Any reasonable child would recognise it for it is and not cry, but of course they probably wouldn't be doing it at all in the first place anyway!

I’ve not heard it said like that for ages grin

Old school profanities, me 😀

@nwybhs never heard the phrase 'it takes a village to raise a child'?

Adults are allowed to speak to children they are not immediately related to. Even if it's to tell them to stop something. Whether it was bad behaviour or just normal behaviour is a matter of opinion - either way, the mother should have stepped in before OP needed to say anything.

Calling the OP “random” when she is in the street she lives in is dotty.

Not realising I meant she was a random stranger to the child, not the street, is much more 'dotty'

OP was in her own street, as she made perfectly clear. She had a purpose for being there, so calling her random is silly and inaccurate.

Your sentence is the only inaccurate thing here. I said she was a 'random stranger' to the child. Not random for being in the street, random stranger to the seven year old child. That's not difficult to understand, yet this is the 3rd attempt at explaining!

And it makes not a blind bit of difference that the child did not know her.

It did to the child.

Why would it? OP didn’t do anything wrong.

That is clearly a matter of opinion.

She told a noisy kid she was making too much noise, which is inconsiderate.

7 year olds don't possess the emotional ability to realise this in the way adults do. She wasn't being inconsiderate, she was being fucking seven.

And the kid shut up.

The kid was 7. 7.

With any luck this “random stranger” has helped her to become a better person.

She hasn't. All she has done is upset a child who may or may not have a lasting bad memory. It certainly won't make a 7 year old suddenly have an adult approach to her day.

7 year olds don't possess the emotional ability to realise this in the way adults do. She wasn't being inconsiderate, she was being fucking seven.

Yep, and next birthday she'll be 8 and then she'll be 9 and before we know it there will be another adult that doesn't know how to behave because no-one told them when they were 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 or 7, how to behave appropriately. The OP didn't give her a scenario she wasn't able to comprehend at 7.

It wasn't a scenario requiring complex emotional ability. It was simply, if you make a lot of unnecessary and deliberate noise when people want peace, they might get disturbed and annoyed. Jesus Christ, toddlers have the capacity to work that out pretty quickly.

It was simply, if you make a lot of unnecessary and deliberate noise when people want peace, they might get disturbed and annoyed. Jesus Christ, toddlers have the capacity to work that out pretty quickly.

They don't though, not without guidance.