Children playing on graves

[Goostacean]

Safety issues aside, should children be allowed to play on graves/gravestones?

There’s a cemetery near me that’s popular with joggers and dog walkers, and obviously with young families currently too. Clearly the “occupants” are unaware, and it’s nice to have some life and laughter there - but also feels a bit disrespectful somehow.

What does MN think...?

Imo it's awful and the parents should stop them.

They shouldn't play on random graves, in my opinion. If they want to play on their own family's graves then that's up to their parents.

I was always taught that you never walk on a grave it is too disrespectful. So children def shouldn't be playing on them.

No way! They should be taught to respect the graves and walk between them, not on them

No they shouldn't play on graves. It's disrespectful.

Personally it wouldn't bother me but I know it bothers other people, so I never let my kids run riot in graveyards.

No, very disrespectful.

Many older gravestones are dangerously unstable - at least one child has been killed by a toppling gravestone. Quite apart from the disrespect to bereaved relatives, parents should be keeping their children well clear of the stones.

I think it's much more disrespectful to let dogs foul a graveyard
Its not a dog toilet. Ours is always full of excrement and it gets trodden into the church and into cars.
Children playing in the sunshine are not offensive in my opinion, even on graves.

It's fucking disrespectful and disgusting behaviour! The parents should be ashamed

No, not at all. People spend a lot of time and effort making graves and gravestones a pleasant, respectful place to visit their loved one and pay their respects. I'd be horrified to know that others were letting their children stamp all over my loved ones' graves.

Hugely disrespectful. I would say something.

Playing on graves? Really? You should not stand or walk on a grave. People have no manners

It depends, I definitely don't think it's OK for graves that are new enough for people to be visiting still. People lay out flowers and photos so you can't have kids running all over them.

It’s very disrespectful and parents should teach their children that it’s not acceptable.

That's bloody appalling. That would have been the kind of behaviour that would have got my backside a sound dusting back in ye olden days. Even in these here modern days, if I saw my kids playing on graves, they'd get bellowed at so hard they'd practically levitate off them.

Just for context, the majority of the graves are from the 19th and early 20th ventures - the most recent I’ve seen is probably from the 90s but that’s very unusual.

The cemetery is popular with young families?... Why? They’re not using it like a park, surely? I hope not.

Of course it’s nice to have signs of life and happiness within graveyards (like flowers, plants and birds), but that should go alongside being a respectful and reflective place that people can come to grieve and remember their loved ones.

What do you mean by playing on the graves?

I was also taught that it's very disrespectful to walk on a grave, and that's something I've taught my children too.

If it is their own relatives grave, and the family don't mind, then no problem. Anyone else's grave? Absolutely not. And the same goes for adults walking on them, or letting dogs sniff and pee on them.

very disrespectful , its not a playground

We’re very regular cemetery walkers and I’m pretty strict with DS’ behaviour there. He knows absolutely no walking on the graves and that he should keep the noise down and be respectful when he sees someone ‘remembering’.

I definitely don't think it's OK for graves that are new enough for people to be visiting still.

You might not know if people are still visiting though. My grandparents spent a long time researching their ancestry and visiting graves they could find, I think the furthest back they found was my grandad's own great great grandfather, who would have lived around mid 1800s maybe? They don't do anything to the graves because they don't want to 'interfere' but they do still go on a circuit of visiting the ones they found.

Very disrespectful. Parents should be teaching children about respect and part of that is to walk sensibly and that graveyards aren’t playgrounds.

Hugely disrespectful. I remember attending a relative's grave as a child and being told sternly to walk between the graves, never on them.

What are people even doing in a cemetery!?!?

I wouldn't let my children as I know other people would find it disrespectful but I find the notion of grave spaces where a section of earth is reserved for decades or longer an anachronism.