to think chavy, tacky hen parties should SOD off [Edited by MNHQ at OP's request]

[CannoninD]

I’m fed up.
I’ve lived in my beautiful, respectful and historic city my entire life .... but over the last year it’s been invaded by GOD AWFUL hen parties!

20+ strong groups of horrifically common (referring to behaviour not social class) women who inflict their horrific behaviour on everybody within reach.

They’re EVERYWHERE and I know it’s not just me as there are sunbstantial concerns being raised by residents all over the city.

I counted 23 large groups this weekend (I only walked into the (small ish) city centre on Saturday morning and witnessed the following behaviour-

• Loud swearing (F and C word) right in front of/across young families and children just trying to enjoy a day out.
• Shop doors slammed in elderly shoppers faces (too busy pratting around to pay any attention).
• Stock being damaged by pratting about (and then hidden) to avoid paying.
• Horrifically vulgar and inappropriate content being loudly discussed in family areas (a garden/park area) to the point that families got up and left.
• Completely inappropriate Lingerie being worn in the street (before 2pm).
• Vomiting in the street! Whilst being jeered by the rest of the group.

Personally I would rather bleach out my own eyes than go on a hen do like this- but honestly at what point do we just call the police on these ridiculous idiots inflicting such unreasonable behaviour on families and regular people? What’s worse is, I bet back home they’re perfectly normal women. They just all get together and come away from home and behave like total arseholes!

Being in a large group and celebrating an event- does not give you a hall pass to behave like scum. 😡

In the last few years my city seems to be the go-to place for older hens. In broad daylight it is not unusual to see groups of 50+ (in age) women in skirts that barely cover their thongs often they don't with a bottle of cheap beer/cider in hand making an absolute raucous. There is always the obligatory veil/inflatable willies/three sizes too small 'Sharon's hen do' t-shirt with personalized backs, such as Sexy Shazza, Horny Helen, Dildo Doreen. It is vile to observe. Oddly I have never seen a stag do that I'm aware of.

I reckon many posters are curious about which 'historic, classy city' is being ruined for the OP....

It doesn't matter. Any town is ruined by hoards of boozy chavs.

And where she thinks the boozy chavs (as she calls them) should go instead?!*

How about not going out in public till they've sobered up a bit and are properly dressed?

I have to agree with the OP and to those who think this isn't a problem, I'd say, just try living in a town where this kind of thing is a regular occurrence. I would add that I don't like being on trains where a huge crowd of drunken male football fans get on and shout, jeer and generally make a racket for the whole journey.

Hen do's differ from Stag Do's in that women think they are invincible, and do not have to answer to anyone because they are ..well women

There is an element of truth about this. Men know that in a bar setting if they misbehave they have a large bouncer to deal with who is not shy with physically ejecting you if you are acting the twat.

I use York races as a prime example. Women turn up on minibuses at 11.00 A.M, already worse for wear having consumed the obligatory fizz

The same happened at Ascot a few years back when people (men and women) were falling all over the place blind drunk by lunchtime. They started to restrict the amount of booze you could take in after that as the Daily Mail had shamed them in a 'Chav-scot' special. I think the most astonishing thing I saw that day was a group photo of a hen do being taken by the racetrack. Just as the photographer shouted cheese a women at the front spun around and bent over, hitched her dress up and pulled a mooney in front of the whole grandstand. She had a massive orange arse and you could literally see everything. My wife took it as an omen and placed a bet on 'Big Orange' which romped home to win the Gold Cup.

@yabbers how dare you! Sheffield is a hugely historic city. And by slagging it off, in a backhanded way, you are doing what you are criticising the OP for.

OP yanbu! I have been on hens in Liverpool abs Brighton recently. We’re a bunch of boring bastards so it was the Tate Liverpool and lovely dinner for us, but wow. Some of the other behaviour...

I really feel for people in Brighton too. The state people were making of the place. I know there were big issues with the mess left after pride (www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/brighton-residents-complain-of-litter-following-pride-festival-a3904181.html) but the hen and stag dos are doing that to Brighton every week.

Was going to say, is this York? We don't really go into the city centre at the weekend for this very reason.

Also, I don’t think people think the Edinburgh festival behaviour and posters are fine. What used to be about comedy and plays seems to be more and more about who can ‘push the envelope’ be most naked or perform biggest fetish competition.

@SerenDippitty I was thinking Tenby as I read through. Such a beautiful, small town reduced to screeching women of a Saturday afternoon. I've been loathe to go back for a while so nice to see it's been clamped down on.

I have recently booked to go there again, though bearing the hens in mind I booked Monday to Friday.

I wondering why I don't feel as annoyed when I see stags out on the town (compared to the feeling I get when I see blow up penis hen groups?)

I don't like either but wondering if we are we conditioned to be more accepting of large groups of rowdy men? (Football/sports events?)
Do they strut through town carrying blow up dolls/ huge vulvas/breasts? I haven't seen any but it may well happen?

Do men/women behave differently on stag/hen nights??

YANBU. Not sure there's much to be done but I agree it's shitty.

It boils my piss and it's not just hens but massive groups of women on day trip piss-ups marauding up and down Stonegate screeching and swearing dressed in stripper heels therefore staggering about on the cobbles, bashing into completely bemused and horrified international visitors. It paints such a bleak picture of Britain.
Pulling your top down to show appalled passers-by your pierced nipples at 2pm on a Saturday is not amusing.
The horror quotient is upped exponentially on race days. I am so sick of it.

Do they strut through town carrying blow up dolls/ huge vulvas/breasts? I haven't seen any but it may well happen

Yes to the breasts. I'm surprised no one else has seen this.

Common is horrible. It implies there's something offensive about being an average person. Common means everyday so to say people are common is to say being an everyday person is scummy.

I agree with you OP, vile and grim.. My husband and i were having a drink outside in a riverside bar a few years ago waiting to go to the Cinema when a large Hen Party turned up. I am not kidding but they were literally just wearing their underwear. Well, not just normal day to day underwear but racy teddies, all in ones (or whatever they're called now), stockings and suspenders etc. I was soooo embarrassed I didn't know where to look. I expect my husband enjoyed the spectacle though!

No is everything I'm reading on this thread about York true? Was thinking of treating myself to a weekend break. Guess I'll give it a miss and scope out somewhere else.

Anyone else here grow up in a garrison town in the 80s? Light years before stag and hens we had squad dies pissing in our gardens and vomiting on our cars

Sorry, squaddies

@CatherineOfAragonsPrayerBook York is a gorgeous place and I'd really recommend a visit - but not on a weekend!

Yetanother :Yes to the breasts. I'm surprised no one else has seen this.

I'm sure plenty of people have! It's vile.

CatherineOfAragonsPrayerBook
Some weekends are worse for it than others with May-August being more popular with hen parties.

Your best bet for a nice weekend in my experience is up to April/May and then from September onwards. Easter weekend can be nice, but like any nice place it gets super busy.

The summer season on weekends tends to be bad for the loutish hen parties. They aren't the majority of people in the city centre but they have an ability to make things uncomfortable for everyone else.

WhiteDust
In terms of my experiences with stag dos, they tend to start later. There's more women in fairy wings, pink outfits, with penis themed accessories than there are blokes who get dressed up as babies etc so we see them more. Because they start later or spend an afternoon in the pub, the general public doesn't have to suffer through stag behaviour during the day, where as some hen groups think it's fine to flash their tits and catcall younger men from 2pm. At the end of a night stags tend to be rowdy more, they don't avoid people noticing their poor behaviour. I think the problem with those sorts of hen groups is they think drinking prosecco from 10am on the way dolled up to the nines going to a nice city somehow makes them sophisticated, but really they're just drunk and antisocial by lunchtime.

Totally agree OP, was in York over a previous Bank Holiday weekend and by 3pm the town was swarming with screaming chavs dressed like strippers to go to the Slug and Lettuce, it’s so revolting.

Oh yeah, I opened this thread fully expecting it to be York. The last couple of times I've been on a weekend it is exactly as OP describes. Rivers of piss and puke by 6pm.
And I've been to Billericay on Christmas Eve, so I'm unshockable.

Do they strut through town carrying blow up dolls/ huge vulvas/breasts? I haven't seen any but it may well happen

Have seen breasts before but they do not seem to form part of the standard stag do kit like hen do's and inflatable cocks. Usually blokes are all in some themed fancy dress (fighter pilots, superheroes, jockeys etc) with the groom in a skirt or mankini. Not that this improves things substantially

Uses the words "chavvy" and "common" yet says it's not related to social class
Can't you complain about bad behaviour without resorting to deride the working classes? Mumsnet is so fucking snobby and unpleasant it's unreal. Hate all the scoffing and sniggering at "chavs."

I do feel that there's been a shift from people behaving themselves to just not caring anymore and that's sad really. I know I was young a long time ago now but we did behave ourselves ( mostly) and a hen night was one night out , not several.
I'm not being a prude here but some manners would be good or just accepting that not everyone wants to have their night out ruined by drunk / noisy / men or women on a stag or hen party.
I feel for the big cities having to clear it all up too! It must affect council budgets as well.