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. 😡

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."
Bingo!
And we have it.

Mumsnet is snobby for having an issue with behaviour of people who behave a certain way on hen weekends. Ignore the fact that some people are more likely to behave a given way than others (e.g you're unlikely to have a group of upper working class men acting with the obnoxious entitlement of the Bullingdon club). Let's pretend we live in a blissful world where there's no such thing as loutish chavvy behaviour.

If disapproving of that behaviour and those who carry it out makes me a snob, so be it.

I don't live anywhere close to any of these hen and stag destinations thank goodness but after catching a train at 10.00am one Saturday morning and witnessing a crowd of prosecco swigging women heading to Liverpool for a 40th birthday weekend, together with a group of lads with cases of beer and another group of lads with carrier bags of just about every spirit available, it has made me think twice about catching the train by myself on a Saturday morning ever again. There is a huge problem with this sort of behaviour and until the powers that be stamp down on it, it will only get worse. And don't get me started on the last trains at night - around here the guard hides in his cab and only pops out to release the doors at the stations so they don't have to deal with it!

York is grim- it seems to be the default hen destination for Teessiders and Geordie hen do's. I think its because lots of hotels etc package up an experience including spas and pamper sessions or cocktail lessons with free prosecco etc. It's probably more attractive to any aspirational hen than staggering down to Henry Africas in the Boro. Stags are bad too- and they seem to love Whitby- another favorite place that's decidedly lairy on a weekend but they often seem to have some sports or adventure activity in the day.

In Manchester where the city centre bars and clubs are often unwelcoming to large same sex groups, the women have colonised what was the biggest gay village in Europe and made canal street practically a no go for the gays on a Saturday. Sad

This is such a depressing thread. I'm not sure what, if anything, can be done that will improve the situation though.

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."

To me chav is not a derogatory term for the working classes, it's a very pointed derogatory term aimed at those folk displaying a certain set of brash and often antisocial behaviors. Chavs are the morons wheel spinning their modified car around the streets at 3am, they are the loitish oafs strutting around with their tops off in the syn clutching a can of lager while walking their killer dog, they are the twats who threaten you with violence if you ask them to turn their house party music down on a school night, they wear their ignorance with pride, have a sofa in their front garden, they know their rights even if they cant spell them. The working classes despise them as much as the middle classes, they are a blight on any street and leave a trail of misery wherever they go. Despite what Owen Jones may think the word chav is not an attack on the working class, it's an attack on the feckless underclass.

Common means everyday so to say people are common is to say being an everyday person is scummy.

Not so. From the Collins Dictionary:
If you describe someone or their behaviour as common, you mean that they show a lack of taste, education, and good manners.
I don't think that applies to 'everyday people' in general.. And some former pupils of extremely expensive schools behave very badly and they're not working class.

But go ahead and make a class issue out of the issue instead of being concerned about appalling public behaviour which most 'everyday people' loathe.

That reminds me of when an interviewer asked a group of young women in the street what class they believe they are. "Middle class" they said. "I would say you are working class" replied the interviewer, only to get the priceless response "No I ain't, cos I don't work!"

Does any one else think hen parties look really ridiculous/ funny when they are stood or walking aimlessly about with the bride to be all dressed up looking daft and they all look totally bored or at best unexcited about the whole thing.

Numerous large groups of people roaming about drunk in city centers and all the drama that comes with them is unpleasant. That's day or night. No need to comment further on the details.

Councils should do more to curb this behavior, in whatever way they can. It causes a massive burden on the community, health system and police.

I live in Amsterdam - a city known for its stags and hen parties. The council here has taken steps to curb yobbish behavior through the pubs and cafes. The public won't stand for it. The city is better for it and just as popular. It can be done and everyone can have a good time.

@bigbluebus did you see the thread on here a week or two ago about the group of men effing and blinding on the train in their work uniform? The OP asked if she should report them and she was torn to pieces calling her a grass and a pearl-clutcher.
I personally find it saddening that awful behaviour is tolerated and that the police have had their funding and numbers so badly cut that there's no expectation that they'll do anything. I find large groups of pissed people on public transport really intimidating, unpleasant and scary and I can't be the only one.

To me chav is not a derogatory term for the working classes, it's a very pointed derogatory term aimed at those folk displaying a certain set of brash and often antisocial behaviors.

I agree and have never understood how 'chav' could possibly be conflated with 'working class'.

This is awful but local councils can ban drinking alcohol in public places. Trains can ban alcohol.
The train I use to go back home from York has a ban in alcohol on Fridays and Saturdays evenings/afternoons.
It doesn’t stop awful behaviour as people are already drunk when they get in. The situation is bad enough that the police is in the train every single time to try and ‘manage’ the situation.

What IS bad is the fact I have been told many times that I should just loosen up and accept that sort of behaviour because ‘they are just having fun’.
I’m not sure how being accepting of people passing out from alcohol or swearing/becoming aggressive etc... is helping anyone tbh.

York is also well known to be a no-go area during the races. People might be better dressed but they are still just as drunk, falling over and vomiting type of drunk at 2.00pm.
Imo they are not better.

I agree and have never understood how 'chav' could possibly be conflated with 'working class'.
Because it suits a particular type of middle class person to consider themselves as super woke and oh so liberal and tolerant.
The reality is that the world sees their faux outrage as disingenuous virtue signalling.

I've got a working class background. Everyone knew who the chavs were.

What IS bad is the fact I have been told many times that I should just loosen up and accept that sort of behaviour because ‘they are just having fun’.

No, no, no.

Being drunk (and all that entails) in public is an impingement upon everyone else. It's the death knell of any society when we can't censure our fellow citizens for such loutish behaviour.

The trains are particularly bad for drunk behaviour because the victims are trapped.

I have a WC background too. CHAV stands for Council House and Violent. It is a derogatory term.

I have been with UMC people who have called people who don't look and sound like them "chavs." These people were working class but were neither living in a council house (not that it matters) nor violent. So yes, some middle-class people definitely use the term to cover all working-class.

YANBU

These sort of hen dos are so utterly dreary that everyone has to get totally annihilated to be able to cope with the endless boredom. I shudder every time I'm invited to one and if I know it is going to be as you have described, I would be busy that weekend, sticking needles in my eyes.

@MaxNormal. I did see that. We always tell school children they are representing the school whenever they are in uniform - surely the same applies to adults.

I have been with UMC people who have called people who don't look and sound like them "chavs."

At the risk of posing a circular argument, they're at risk of outing themselves as someone who's not really terribly UMC at all in doing so.

CHAV stands for Council House and Violent

No, it doesn't. That is a backronym (a constructed acronym created to fit an existing word). The word "chav" is more than 200 years old.

The Oxford English Dictionary defines "chav" as an informal British derogatory, meaning "a young lower-class person who displays brash and loutish behaviour and wears real or imitation designer clothes.

AlaskanOilBaron Yes, I know they're traditionally too "well-bred" to do that but it does happen. The worst sneering I've heard though has been from "new middle."

I was on a train back up north from
London a few weeks back and there were hen do women in my carriage and they were all in their late 40’s - mid 50’s at a guess. It was mid afternoon on a Saturday. They were all absolutely steaming drunk. One kept getting alternate tots out and shouting “come and rub your dicks on this”. One of them vomited all over the aisle on her way to the toilet. Fucking revolting.

Tots=tits