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...?

Some gravestones are part of our church path. Same for interred ashes. Actual grave stones are often dangerous so wouldn't allow my DC to "play" in amongst them as such but would do grave rubbings and stuff. Church graveyards are different to cemeteries though to my mind.

I wouldn't let mine run freely round a graveyard but to visit some family members graves you have to navigate others graves to get to it as it's not directly on the path. I don't think it's the end of the world if you accidentally step on one. It's not like the person in the grave is going to care. And if it's an ancient grave, their family aren't either. Kids running round graves from the 1800s is only really a safety issue.

I used to go the cemetary with my mum when I was a kid, she would see to her parents graves and I wandered around playing. It was lovely.

There is a cemetery near my place of work and I would often go for a walk there. I have seen children playing football on the war graves cemetery which has an area of grass. When I asked them to stop they said their dad said they could while he was at the grave and they pointed to a large family group up the hill. I decided to leave it as Dad was heading down. It is incredibly disrespectful.

I also know of children who are allowed to 'collect' the coloured stones that are put on some graves. A parent once told me quite proudly that their child had a jar full of them at home!

Playing on the paths OK. Playing on the graves NO!!!

Disrespectful and really horrible. The thought of kids just stamping over my parents grave is really upsetting. Are the little darlings going to tidy up the flowers they trample and knock over? Hmm, let me think......

Also as a PP said, some graves stones are unstable, and way a huge amount. I remember a story about a little boy who was killed (Scotland?). The family blamed the council for not making the graveyard completly secure and checking all the memorials.

Just no

Nope

The cemetery is popular with young families?... Why?

Under the current circumstances the local playground is shut and the local park is very small, but the cemetery is adjacent so people go there too.

It’s not a churchyard, there’s a small church-like building in the centre of the cemetery but I think it’s just a place for the funerals to take place.

The children were maybe 5 or so? Standing and jumping on and around some old tombstones away from the path, with a parent down the path supervising from a significant distance.

I live near a cemetery that is also a nature reserve - loads of people go walking through it as most of the graves are very old and it's full of trees and plants. And yes, I see young children and dogs running all over them constantly. Really winds me up!

That should be "weigh"!

YANBU - Its not a playground, exercise field nor a dog walking park.

No. A graveyard is not a park. Children need to be taught that.

Wow, I'm quite surprised at the venom on here about this. Spent a childhood going to graveyards (Dad was obsessed with history) and we played in the graveyard. My own DC regularly go to visit Dad's grave and we visit other people in the family at the same time and the kids like to explore. But they've also been to historic graveyards. I don't know why children playing in a graveyard is considered worse than e.g. hunting out Harry Potter characters in Greyfriars Kirkyard. We've recently had a thread on here about going to old cemeteries and finding out about the people buried there and everyone thought that was great. But children being children and playing in a green space and daring to step on a grave? Why is that so terrible? Graveyards are for the living, not the dead and no harm comes to the occupants if someone steps on their grave. I'd rather have children playing on my grave and wondering about my life than it being neglected and forgotten.

Exactly CountFosco. Of course it depends what they are doing, definitely not defacing or removing things from graves. However for me death is part of life, and if we visit graves then as I see it small children do no harm playing quietly there. Maybe Aunty Ethel would actually like the company.

Okay, I’m really glad you all agree with me. I’m not yet 30 and wasn’t sure whether I was being all old-fashioned, and needed to chill out.

I walk there with my toddler and baby, only because we’ve done the park to death and obviously have nowhere else to go (we also don’t have a garden). My 2 year old kicks his ball along sometimes but ONLY on the paths or it goes right back in the buggy. He knows not to step on or otherwise touch the graves, and wasn’t allowed to play with those little stones someone mentioned upthread. No shouting, no running. It’s just basic manners, surely? Well, and safety.

So disrespectful. Visiting graves, fine. Playing on them. Absolutely not

as always, a bit of common sense (not plentiful on MN) and it is fine. That means paths and open areas, yes, on graves, no. And yes there is a risk that standing stones can fall and yes people have been injured or killed.

and pick up after your sodding dog wherever you are. Even if that means using your bare hands. you bought the thing, that's what you signed up for.

No. As pp have said, it's not safe to play on/around old grave stones/monuments - they may topple.
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-38028261

Newer graves could still be being visited by the bereaved who might be upset - an absolute hard no on any grave that had flowers etc on it.

That's bloody disrespectful.
I visit the cemetery 2/3 times a week. I sometimes take dd2 with me. She's 4 and knows you never walk on the graves. Sometimes she will run about when I'm sorting dd1's grave BUT she wouldn't run on the graves.
Plus it dangerous.
I see plenty of dog walkers who let their dogs on the graves.

What @CountFosco said. The dead don't care. It's the living who are bothered. If they are recent or tended graves then no (out of respect for living relatives) Otherwise fine, if safe to do so without causing damage.

It seems pretty disrespectful. I wouldn't let my kiddies do it.

It disgusts me to think about people allowing children to play on graves.

A local council closed the entrance to a local cemetery because parents were using it as a Shortcut to take their children to school. They would let their children runaround and scotter all over the place. It was so disrespectful. Unfortunately the parents really didn’t give a damn.

They closed it during school start and finishing times

This is awful! And shouldn’t matter if the graves are from 1700 or 2010 either as I see someone mentioned this. If there is a public path through a churchyard my kids aren’t even allowed on the grass never mind the more sensitive parts of it. Imagine that being your family’s graves being jumped all over

It’s not a churchyard, there’s a small church-like building in the centre of the cemetery but I think it’s just a place for the funerals to take place.

You mean a chapel.

And yes, very, very disrespectful.