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AIBU?

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Original poster

Children apologising: who IBU in this situation?

513 replies

FrangipaniDeLaSqueegeeMop · 05/05/2021 00:43

Disclaimer: I’m neither family in this but my friend is.

A year 2 (age 7) girl gets shoved in the playground by a boy when they were playing cops and robbers. This really upsets her but she's not forthcoming with standing up for herself. When she gets home, because she knows the boy lives around the corner, she gets her (6ft tall and stocky - this is relevant) dad to take her to his house so she can knock on the door and ask him to apologise. The boy’s mum is a widow, an older mum (early 50’s) and it’s just the two of them living there. The dad/family of the girl know this.

When the girl and her dad arrive and say Thomas shoved her today and they’d like him to come to the door and apologise, Thomas’ mum says no because “it’s just what happens when children play sometimes they get shoved” and that the dad was out of order to come round as it’s intimidating for her living on her own to have an unexpected and ‘burly’ man knock on her door making demands.

The family of the girl say they think this is out of order and an apology should have been given, they’re trying to teach their daughter to stand up for herself especially when it comes to boys being rough and crossing physical boundaries.

Who is in the right?

OP posts:
FatCatThinCat · 05/05/2021 07:50

The girl will never learn to stand up for herself so long as her dad keeps stepping in on her behalf.

Sunglasses2 · 05/05/2021 07:53

The dad should have spoken to the school about it if anything. I bet he would have thought twice about going round if there was a 6 foot, burly dad living there. Hmm The mum was right not to go along with it because of the way he dealt with it. If he'd raised it with the school and they'd told her that would be different and she could have got him to apologise

MrsBungle · 05/05/2021 07:56

The dad sounds like a dick. He should have asked the teacher about it. He’d have got short shrift on my doorstep.

HoppingPavlova · 05/05/2021 07:58

I would have told them to buzz off as well. It’s completely inappropriate as it needs to be dealt with at school. He needed to contact the school with the right process followed.

It’s very odd that this girls ‘go to’ is to acknowledge that dad is intimidating and the best course of action is to go intimidate someone into an apology as opposed to getting dad to go to school to talk about the problem.

ConfusedAdultFemale · 05/05/2021 07:59

It happened in school, the dad is extremely out of order here.

Hazel444 · 05/05/2021 07:59

The dad is the one out of line here. Why is he trying to intimidate a woman who lives on her own for something her child did at school? He should be absolutely ashamed of himself and I would be so embarrassed of him if I were his wife.

SoupDragon · 05/05/2021 08:00

Surely the shove was part of the game? Cops and Robbers isn't a quiet, calm game. I assume he didn't just go up to her randomly and give her a shove to get her out of the way and I assume she wasn't hurt in any way.

It's difficult to say whether the dad was being deliberately intimidating or not as, from the OP, he doesn't appear to have done anything deliberately intimidating, he can't help his size and his DD asked him to go with her.

The girl's family is in the wrong though.

ConfusedAdultFemale · 05/05/2021 08:01

@HoppingPavlova not that odd that she’s learned that. Her father will likely have pushed the idea that if anyone touches her he’ll sort it out. I tell my kids the same, they come to me with their problems except I deal with it by talking to the school and not intimidating widows.

babybythesea · 05/05/2021 08:05

@Mumbot345635

Wow I’m really surprised at the responses on here. Very sexist just because a man is six foot he must be a bully! He can’t help his size! Why does everyone assume he barged round demanding an apology? He could have turned up and explained the situation nicely and the mum been a shit thinking her big can do no wrong!

The boy was a bully pushing a girl - no wonder he does that with a mum like that.

The PARENTS of the girl were wrong for going round to the house. They should have told school and/or told the girl to tell the teachers at the time.

The mum was wrong for not making her boy say sorry (no things like shoving don’t happen all the time only nasty little shits do it). She was also wrong for assuming a six foot man had come to intimidate her - it would be totally dependent on what he said/did which you haven’t said at all...

So both were in the wrong. But what the dad said and did when he was at the house is massively relevant and you haven’t said.

No, the boy wasn't a bully. A bully is someone who targets someone repeatedly. The repetition is key to defining a bully. A one off event is not bullying. The fact that it happens repeatedly is precisely why bullying is so awful. If you use the word to describe an event like this, one off, not targeted, then it starts to have the effect of having people not understand the seriousness of bullying - it sort of cheapens the word.

You don't know, because you weren't there, what happened. Is it a child running across the playground who can't stop in time and cannons into a girl, knocking her over? That happens a lot because children don't always judge their speed or distance well. I've also seen children knocked into by accident, and then had them insisting it was on purpose - children aren't always good at judging intentions.
He should still say sorry but it should be dealt with at school.

Maybe the mum went back into the house and spoke to her son, but maybe she doesn't want to drag him out , at home, his safe space, to be spoken to by a random adult, which is scary for a child. You don't know what she did after she shut the door.

Calling the boy in this instance a shit is really unpleasant when you don't really know what happened.

ddl1 · 05/05/2021 08:07

I think both are U to an extent. But the dad going to the other family's house to tell them off is much worse. And sets the opposite example to the desired one for his daughter: 'might is right; don't be assertive yourself; get a bigger male to protect you.'

SpiderinaWingMirror · 05/05/2021 08:07

The Dad is clearly a dick and is teaching his child nothing.
I had a screaming banshee of a woman arrive at my house once with her daughter (teen) shouting the odds about my daughter.
I called the school the next day and told them that if she ever set foot on my drive again I would call the police. Her daughter had form for fabricating shit fir her own pleasure.

Brokenpencilsarepointless · 05/05/2021 08:08

The girl isnt being taught to stand up for herself. She's being taught to get a big, burly man to do it for her. She's learning it's even better if that big burly man confronts a woman on her own, in her own home where she should be safe.

Your daughter should have been comforted at home, and encouraged to tell the teachers when these things happen. If she is unwilling to do it, then you have a word with the teacher at drop off/pick up. You dont ever go to the parent. You've no idea of the circumstances, you only have one side of the story, you dont go round someone's house and demand anything.

Teach your daughter to stand up for herself by getting her to speak to the teachers, to bring these things up on her own.

What happens when she's in the workplace? Will she have her dad march round a co-workers home to tell them off? Or will she go through the correct complaint procedures?

Basically, you need to decide if you're going to teach her to be civilised and handle things in the right way (as our society sees it) or teach her to take matters into her own hands and send a man round to stand up for her.

Brokenpencilsarepointless · 05/05/2021 08:10

It does read like OP is the mum of the girl. I dont think she'll be coming back to the thread. Might get her husband to do it though.

Original poster
FrangipaniDeLaSqueegeeMop · 05/05/2021 08:10

Morning all

To clarify, my friend is the wife of the dad. She came over for drinks last night and was 'bursting with pride over her DD taking the initiative to think of going round'. I was very Hmm but I may be biased as I think her DD is overly-pandered too and has had a history of telling tall tales when it comes to my own children - eg coming and saying my DD said she wasn't very nice, but it turns out she omitted that she'd called my DD a nasty name. That kind of thing. And her parents blindly believe everything she says at face value. She has an issue with another girl at the school where she's claimed she's being bullied, but the other girl says it's the other way around (I suspect, like most cases with kids, it's a bit of both)

Anyway I'm sure her DH didn't mean to be intimidating, but as a single mother living just me and my kids it doesn't matter how nice a person is, the very act of someone bringing a school issue to your house (turns out the other mum didn't realise they knew where she lived, it's only because her DD had seen the boy playing in the front garden) is intimidating. From what I understand he just said "Thomas shoved Rosie in the playground today and she's come round to ask him to come to the door and apologise."

We had a bit of a disagreement as I said thought with what he did was wrong because

  1. It should have been sorted at/with the school
  2. The boy has never done this before (friend confirmed) and it's kind of part and parcel of playing rough games, kids get shoved. If I marched my kids round to every child's house who shoved them we'd get nothing done
  3. I don't think her or her DH realised just how intimidating it is to do that to a woman living with just her kids. No it's not his fault he's burly, but still it's so inconsiderate to it think he'll that might make an older woman feel
  4. If it was my kids I would, at best, say that I'll have a chat with them separately rather than marching them to the door

I sometimes think they are frightened of saying no to their DD!

OP posts:
Morningshere · 05/05/2021 08:10

Ironic...
The girls parents are trying to teach their daughter to stand up for herself especially when it comes to boys being rough and crossing physical boundaries.

The boys mum is showing a perfect example of a female standing up for herself when it comes to a man crossing boundaries and trying to intimidate her.

Mumbot345635 · 05/05/2021 08:11

I said children who push are little shits - not this particular boy if you read properly.

If a girl says she was pushed she should be believed. Pushing doesn’t happen by accident. Children don’t randomly get upset because of an accidental knock. If this was a woman being pushed and saying she was pushed would you have the same response? No? Well that’s how men are allowed to grow to into abusers.

The boy was violent. We know know nothing about the man and what he said or did on the doorstep - only his size. Why are you protecting someone who was violent and assuming the worst of someone because of a physical characteristic they have (their size). The dad could have been super nice and said sorry I know this isn’t a big deal but xyz... yes they should have reported it to school but maybe they are reception parents who don’t know the norms yet. Schools haven’t been saying things like this to parents as they’ve been busy dealing with covid and the kids have hardly been in school this year.

Original poster
FrangipaniDeLaSqueegeeMop · 05/05/2021 08:12

And I agree it's impossible to know if the shove was nasty or not if you weren't there - but it was still dealt with badly IMO

OP posts:
Original poster
FrangipaniDeLaSqueegeeMop · 05/05/2021 08:13

Oh and the reason the dad went round and not the mum was because the DD insisted it had to be her dad

OP posts:
Sunglasses2 · 05/05/2021 08:13

The PARENTS of the girl were wrong for going round to the house
The parents didn't go round, the dad did. The mum could have been at work or not live with them, so not sure why you are trying to drag her into it

TwoBlueFish · 05/05/2021 08:13

Should have been dealt with at school at the time. Dad should absolutely not have gone round to demand an apology.

AhaShakeHeartbreak12 · 05/05/2021 08:14

This should've been dealt with in school

Mumbot345635 · 05/05/2021 08:14

Op I agree with you. Except I don’t think you should jump to label the child a liar. People who report violence should be believed.

lljkk · 05/05/2021 08:14

One shove? ONE shove?

There are times parents get involved but not over one shove.

Yes I'd ask my boy to apologise but would also be tempted to ask my boy to never play with the girl again. That's the reputation she'll get.

Mumbot345635 · 05/05/2021 08:15

It’s good you said that to your friend though. They should handle future disputes by going through school.

Mumbot345635 · 05/05/2021 08:16

Lijkk - would you say one push from a man to a woman would be ok? This is how boys grow up to be abusers. Teach your boy better.

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