To be sick of miserable people shouting at (my) children?

[Yellowballoon77]

I am a SAHM so I see this a lot more than DH does. Especially since - in order to keep sane - we’re generally out and about every chance we get.

I think this is a lockdown / Covid thing, but I am SICK of people mindlessly telling off my kids for pretty much no reason. I’m all for “the village” mentality, but the “village” feeling quite mean-spirited and I've had enough.

Things that happened this last few weeks:
3-year-old ran from one bit of the paved park to another, across the path of an older couple walking. 3-yr-old didn’t bump into anyone, didn’t make anyone have to swerve or even slow down really, and was probably still about 2m away from them, but the lady (maybe in her 70s) shouted “get your child away from me!” And then, when I responded with a gaping mouth, she said, “Put your child in school! They shouldn’t be out like this!”

Another instance:
Park today, preschooler and school-aged child doing cartwheels on the grass. A dog wanders over, so school-aged child (who absolutely loves dogs) asks the owner if he can stroke the dog. Owner says “No, don’t touch other people’s pets!” (A Covid fear, I know, but the kid asked!) and then dragged his dog away by the collar and muttered “fucking kids” under his breath. I mean... whaaaat?! The dog wasn’t touched! I was . Man wouldn’t look at me at all, I told him to stop being so rude to kids. He heard me, but didn’t look me in the face.

Another example: kids playing loudly (how dare they?!) in our big shared garden. Woman who I don’t know sticks her head out the window and shouts “shut up! Shut up!” And then slams the window. It was about 1pm.

I have about three other examples of the same kind of thing.

And pretty much NONE from about a year ago and beyond so sure it’s a Covid fear and kids are easy targets to yell at.

I’m sick of it. It’s really starting to bother me and make me wonder if it’s like this everywhere now, or just where I live.

Am I alone in noticing it?!

1. Sounds like covid fear, give her some slack - people are a bit anxious at the moment.

2. Good that your kid asked, but he was well within his rights to say no. The 'fucking kids' comment is one I've made under my breath when children in supermarkets are being annoying so I won't judge him for that - some people just don't like children!

3. YABU. It might be your garden, it might be the middle of the day, but children are noisy and it's annoying... If she'd called the police then she would have been unreasonable (as it's legal to be annoying) but she was expressing how she felt and I imagine your children were probably being louder than you realise to get a reaction like that.

I think it's a combo of general end of tetherness and you noticing a few things in a row - nobody's got a vendetta against your kids, don't worry.

Pre Covid, I can’t think of a single instance where someone has randomly told me or my kids off.

The park couple & dog walker sound overly grumpy and best ignored. People are stressed atm but they dont need to take it out on young children.

However, I'm willing to bet your kids were being too loud. Were you taking action to quieten them down a bit? I know how hard that is, my two are loud and exuberant, but I find people more forgiving if I am clearly trying to calm them down/be considerate of neighbours

It's hard to say without knowing the other side of the story. There are definitely miserable people but given this is happening to you a lot gives me pause for thought that it may be your kids. 🤷‍♀️

I will say though, I go out walking a lot and frequently there are kids running/walking/on bikes and not staying close to their parents. They will get close to you or suddenly swerve in front of you without really paying attention and often the parents just smile indulgently like I'm supposed to find this really cute. It was annoying before covid and it's even more annoying now.

My go to phrase is: ‘If it’s more than two, it’s you!’

If you’re constantly having strangers whinging about your children, maybe you need to consider the impact of their behaviour on others. Reading your OP, you don’t sound unreasonable. However, would the other people agree with your version of events?

People are on edge, definitely and understandably. And that will make them less patient.

Your children screaming and squealing in the garden almost certainly isn't as pleasant or even tolerable as you think it is.

People are permanently stuck at home, often working. They can't even escape.

These people you have found are rude idiots.
I have not seen any issues around here, a0t least yet.

To be honest your 3 year old shouldn’t be running towards old people at the moment. They are more vulnerable to COVID and more likely to react to others coming close, especially as nurseries/schools are still open.

If your DC are playing loudly, ask them to quieten down. It is not their right to disturb everyone.

Re the dog thing, agree the man was plain rude.

The dog walker was correct.
Your neighbour may have been unreasonable, we have no real idea of how ‘loud’ your kids were being.

Yeah kid noise is annoying. But so are loud cars, motorbikes, people telling on mobiles mega loudly, people playing music, dogs barking, people arguing, people doing DIY etc. If people cant tolerate normal family noise they should live in a soundproofed dungeon or in the sticks. It's not like there is much else you can do with kids at the moment, other than play in the bloodg garden.

Likewise with kids walking in front of people, I try and avoid it and apologise if it happens but it is kind of inevitable. You can't put older children in reins or keep them holding hands with you 100pc of the time. And again it's no more annoying than people standing too close in queues, people stopping dead infront of you for some reason, people engrossed on their phone and not looking where they are going, people with no sense of personal space etc.

I think these people are either horrible to everyone or want to be horrible to everyone but find it easier to pick on children, who have a bit more of an excuse for their annoying behaviour.

Also I thought that's what children were supposed to do, ask before they touched an unknown dog

I think you ought to consider the possibility that your kids/you are the problem. Must have been pretty loud for someone to shout "shut up" out of the window. Why should she have to put up with your noise? You sound entitled and unreasonable

Tensions are running high.

People don't just WFH Monday - Friday.
Kids shouting when you're doing a call-centre type job from home must be a nightmare.

You won't have heard it pre-covid because people were at work then.

I dont understand anyone saying the dog owner was correct, the dog approached your child and they asked before they touched it, what's wrong with that?

I guess the garden-lady might have been trying to work from home and was stressed. The others sound unreasonable. Stress is heightened for most folk at the moment so try not to take it too personally if you can.

You sound unlucky. Old lady panicking I can sympathise with, but she should have a bit more understanding about kids running about in a park, and it's unlikely she was about to catch anything, unless she was very, very short and in the wee child's Breath Zone.
Dog walker - your child asked first, that should be enough. He was rude.
Neighbour - a bit harsh to go from nothing to "Shut up!", she should ask politely first if she's struggling with kid noise. But if we're being charitable,maybe that was the straw that broke the camel's back? Or she might just be a bit rough-mannered. Sorry you're having a rough time, you just keep doing your best and hopefully you'll run into cheerier people soon!

It is absolutely the right of a child to make noise when playing. Speak to any council noise officers. UN Rights of a Child. Protected in law.

I definitely agree that it’s annoying when people do that smiling indulgently thing like their kid is a total angel. I don’t do that. In fact, in the example 1, I was in the middle of saying “be careful, watch out you got close to those people” when the woman cut me off.

Perhaps kids were being annoyingly loud in the garden, even though their noise levels weren’t the ones that usually grate on me (!). But it’s difficult to live on top of each other - especially now when there’s no escape. I’ll concede to that. Difficult to keep them in, though; we’re all going a bit mad!

Anyway - even though you don’t all think I’m being reasonable (absolutely fair enough) I do feel better for a rant!

@Grenlei

Your kids sound pretty irritating. Maybe you should focus more on that rather than assuming everyone else is wrong!

They really don’t. How miserable are you?

Hmm, maybe its bad luck or where you live...we have 3 kids and a dog and we have not had any issues. But our area is filled with kids.....and dogs....so if you are in the area you must be used to kids and dogs...and if they made you grumpy...you would have to move elsewhere (or you would be miserable!). I have seen a few times old people looking at my kids with a smile and I thought, how sweet.

I've had this a couple of times recently. Today I was out for a bit of fresh air with 2 and 4 year olds on their scooters, 3 year old on her bike, and me on my scooter.

Someone was walking towards us on a (nice wide, shared bike/pedestrian path) with a dog on a long Flexi lead so I called out "give the lady and doggy lots of space kids". The lady stood to one side whilst the kids all slowed down to walking pace and went past as far away from her as possible whilst remaining on the path. 4 year old said a lovely and polite, unprompted thank you, and the woman still had the audacity to roll her eyes and say fucks sake as I went past behind them. Soooo bizarre.

The dog thing is standard safety, you never touch someone else’s dog, ask, if they say yes cool, if they say no rescue to their wishes. What if it’s a nervous nippy dog? You’d blame the owner if it bites.

Maybe your neighbour works nights and is trying to sleep. Lockdown has been a nightmare for a lot of night shift workers as so many people are at home making noise all day, playing music, doing DIY, using garden tools etc. instead of being at work.

I must add today my son and another boy were driving their remote control cars around fast and it went on to the walking path (it was at least 12 feet away from an old couple walking in the same direction). I quickly told the boys to keep the cars off the path and out of the way. The old couple looked up and stopped. The wife was using a cane and needed support from her husband. I thought, oops, they will probably be annoyed at the boys driving their cars fast...but the boys kept the cars away after I told them to be careful and keep them away from people. Anyway, so the old couple kept walking and when they got close they stopped and watched the boys driving the cars around. They were enjoying this scenery and smiling discussing about the boys. They stood watching for a little bit, before continuing on their walk.

I'm not miserable, however I do find loud screeching almost unbearable, and also small children careering around parks quite annoying when you're trying to SD (in lockdown 1 I was running outside daily and found myself dodging and swerving round small children constantly as they wandered into my path. The ones on bikes or scooters were worse, in fairness to the OP hers were at least only on foot).

@Mangofandangoo

I haven't experienced most of this but I was shopping with DD (then 2.5) and an elderly lady tutted at me and made a remark that she should be at school. My DD is very petite and there no way she could pass for school age

When my granddaughter was down from Scotland last year in early July a comment was made about school, before I could say anything she commented to me just loud enough to be heard She's rude, isn't she!