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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

to think kids can't save spaces in queues

52 replies

redwinefine · 14/05/2020 18:43

At the supermarket today, I parked beside a woman who let her child (about 5/6 years of age) run off while she was chatting on the phone by her car. I didn't think anything of it and was walking to join the queue when the child ran past me to the next quarantined box. She spun round and round on the spot then ran over to railings about 10 yards away and started swinging on them. The queue moved into a cordoned off part and I moved with it. The child (still at the railings) started screaming and her mother (still traipsing over from the car) shouted at her to go back in the queue. By the time the mother joined the queue she was 3 customers behind me (it was becoming quite busy) and started mouthing off that I had 'bunked' her and her daughter, that some people are just 'horrible' etc.....which I just ignored. So AIBU to not keep the space that child was meant to be saving in the queue....when she was not in the queue and that the mother was just being a CF??

OP posts:

IncrediblySadToo · 14/05/2020 22:16

so if someone joins the queue, then goes back to their car to get their list and their bags, I should respect them as 'someone who got to the queue before me' rather than expect them to join the end of the queue? I'm surprised some people are that much of a pushover.

Nothing to do with being a pushover, it's just not being a twat

You knew they were there before you, why the actual fuck does it matter if the kid had gone to have a bit of fun after being cooped up in the house?!

You behaved like a petty idiot.

Original poster

redwinefine · 14/05/2020 22:25

@IncrediblySadToo No, i behaved like someone who wanted to actually get into the shop. Unlike some child's mother. I'd be surprised if you were a pushover if this happened to you. I didn't know they were before me. I thought they were having a run around before going back to their mother... at the car... Idiot.

OP posts:

Original poster

redwinefine · 14/05/2020 22:26

@notacooldad since 82% of people agree with me, seems it's not just my view

OP posts:

ohlookthisisjustdaftnow · 14/05/2020 22:45

That woman shouldn't let a kid that age run around a supermarket car park, let alone trust her to go and stand in a queue and follow social distancing properly.

SomeHalfHumanCreatureThing · 14/05/2020 22:48

My Dad used to make me stand in parking spaces in busy holiday car parks. Amazingly nobody ever drove into me, but a fair few lost their shit. Fun times.

She was a dick

Vodkacranberryplease · 14/05/2020 22:48

YANBU. The kid wasn't in the queue. If it was then of course you hold the queue. I often queue on my own and if I forget something etc I go to the back, don't even think about it and certainly never been offered my spot back.

EngagedAgain · 14/05/2020 22:59

A child of that age shouldn't be running around especially at the moment. Also, where I queue there are cars nearby so I'm thinking of that safety aspect too. I'm assuming most other supermarkets are the same.

Original poster

redwinefine · 14/05/2020 23:02

@EngagedAgain Definitely - lots of cars flying round the corner into spaces and trying to drop off people at the front/ end of the queue etc. Not safe at all

OP posts:

Nottherealslimshady · 14/05/2020 23:11

Surely the kid has learned an important lesson about needing to stay in a queue if you want your place kept? Otherwise she becomes that CF at McDonanlds that goes to put her bags down on the last table as soon as she walks in then goes to stand in front of you because she got there before you.

Bbq1 · 14/05/2020 23:23

Sort of the opposite experience here
A few weeks ago, I was just joining the queue outside a shop, a boy of about 11 or 12 was the last in the line so I joined behind him. A woman who joined the line a few seconds before me just openly went and stood in front of the child taking the space between the person in front and the child. He didn't react but I just felt so annoyed on his behalf because she had clearly completely disregarded him just because he was young. How rude. The boy then sensibly continued to queue before going into the shop. He was shopping alone but was just as entitled as anyone else to not have somebody blatantly queue jump. Bet she wouldn't have done that to an adult.

Butchyrestingface · 14/05/2020 23:43

I've selected YABU. Of course a child can hold a place in a queue. But that is provided on them actually staying in queue, which this one didn't. And that would apply whether the MIA queuer was a child or not.

Pipandmum · 14/05/2020 23:54

Letting a kid that age run around an active car park is irresponsible. I would have hung a bit back to see of she was rejoining the queue, but otherwise no. If the woman was that precious about her space she should have been standing in it herself.
And if someone joined a queue and then realised they forgot something in the car, the normal thing would be to tell the person behind you that you were just nipping back to the car to get bags/phone/whatever and would be right back.

Original poster

redwinefine · 15/05/2020 00:04

And if someone joined a queue and then realised they forgot something in the car, the normal thing would be to tell the person behind you that you were just nipping back to the car to get bags/phone/whatever and would be right back.

TBH, I'd be absolutely fine with this. It's the entitled expectation that bothers me when someone waltzes out of the queue and expects to be able to return 10 minutes later

OP posts:

Thisismytimetoshine · 15/05/2020 00:15

You were in the right, op. Madam will be draping her towel over every sunbed by the pool 4 hours before everybody else wakes up if nobody puts a halt to her gallop

MintyMabel · 15/05/2020 00:35

It's called 'not being a mug'.

It’s called basic decency.

ProseccoBubbleFantasies · 15/05/2020 00:39

Gobsmacked that anyone would put this kind of expectation on a 5 or 6 yr old and horrified they're not being more closely supervised.

I'd consider failure to do both as a safeguarding issue, esp in a busy car park during a global pandemic!

Ilovecats14 · 15/05/2020 00:42

You were definately in the right.

cabbageking · 15/05/2020 00:50

She left the queue. She joins the end and starts again.

FirstNameSurname · 15/05/2020 07:06

In normal times DD1 has routinely needed to join queues for me due to other DCs disabilities. From the age of about 6, she is now 12. Shes always been a "good queue-person" and modelled others behaviour but people still queue jump her even though she is queueing exactly how an adult would. Some will find any excuse to queue jump her. If she ties a shoe, looks at anything in the queue line they will seize the opportunity to go round her so she has become very good at holding her space but people still dismiss her.

This child didn't act like she was queuing so I would forgive anyone who ignored her queuing but as the child was in the general vicinity of the queue and so young it would have been nice for others to ask and guide her. Especially as this is such a new concept.

SnuggyBuggy · 15/05/2020 07:10

The child sounds too young for the responsibility of holding a queue space. Mum needs to supervise better, car parks aren't playgrounds.

Mummyoflittledragon · 15/05/2020 07:33

My dd when she was 7 queued for me at a hotel and then I stood beside her as we got to the front. I told the staff member I was next and she physically ignored me and asked the person behind to go elsewhere as though I were a trouble maker. I am disabled and dh was in another part of the hotel.

I know this wasn’t the case here. But the only time I have been to the local supermarket, my dd queued for me and I joined as she got closer. She’s older now and the woman does seem very entitled.

So do you op with the attitude that a person should have to go to the back if they forgot something in the car. My disabilities are hidden op.

KatherineJaneway · 15/05/2020 07:36

Leave a queue, lose your space

Agree.

ShayAndBlueSeeker · 15/05/2020 07:43

I voted VABU because it seems to me that you weren’t kind. I have asked my child to queue for me many times for valid reasons and although my child queues properly, there is sometimes a mean person who queue jumps them.

This child shouldn’t have been running around, no. But if you knew they might have been queuing, just fecking hold the space. Their mum might have been taking a call from work, a hospital, a care home, DWP, their best friend. It doesn’t matter. Be kind.

Seems such a twattish thing to start a thread about. “Someone was on the phone, sent their child to queue, I sort of knew but the child ran around (CHILD RUNS AROUND SHOCKER) so I acted like a dick. Wow, the child was annoying.”

EngagedAgain · 15/05/2020 08:41

In redwinefine's OP she has said that initially the mother let the child run off (probably across the road, albeit at the supermarket, but possibly dangerous), they still only ended up 3 spaces back. Funnily enough the other day when I went shopping (20 min queue) there was a boy of about ten waiting alone, and I think at some point someone joined him. He was obviously very sensible and no one took any notice. The difference is he was old enough.

Original poster

redwinefine · 15/05/2020 13:22

@Mummyoflittledragon RTFT

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