Friends DD threw my daughter to the ground

[AmIInside]

Friends daughter is 9 (same age as my DD). My DD is very into dancing and dances constantly. She dances in the house, around the living room, in her bedroom, in the garden, in the shops, in the street - constantly. She loves it.
Friends DD does karate and often practices that too.
Yesterday we were walking home from school and DD was dancing. Friends DD told her to “stop it” saying she was annoying and said “even my mum thinks you’re annoying, don’t you mum?”. Friend went bright red and said she’d never said that and her DD said “yes you did! You said “why can’t she just walk normal, remember?” Friend quickly changed the subject but was clearly embarrassed. I felt really awkward. Didn’t know what to say. DD said “I don’t care that I annoy you, if I want to dance I will do” and started to exaggerate her dancing a little and was swirling around us all. I told her to walk properly before she ends up crashing into someone. She swirled in front of friends DD who grabbed her and threw her to the floor. She landed awkwardly in a muddy puddle and really hurt her arm. She cried like mad 😢 friend told her DD off and told her to apologise, she refused saying DD started it and should just walk normal (echoing what her mum had obviously said). In anger DD shouted that friend was too ugly to be a dancer and that’s why she’s jealous. I told her off for that remark obviously but friends did retorted that DD was an attention seeking idiot and everyone thought so, even the teachers.

Anyway it got horrible and nasty. I can’t stop thinking about it.

Did she deserve to be thrown on the floor? I don’t think so. AIBU to message the mum and tell her how upset I am about the fact she’s clearly been slagging DD off at home?

@qazxc

It's a case of everyone being in the wrong. DD should know that there is a time and place to practice her dancing. Friend DD shouldn't have hit/pushed DD. Hurtful remarks were issued by both children. It's a draw, I'd let it be.

Wise words.

And there are more. Plenty of people are saying that.

Literally not one of those quotes says ‘violence is acceptable’ 🤣

It is possible for both children to be in the wrong and for people to point it out!

Your daughter did not deserve to be thrown on the floor. However, it may be better to encourage the dancing at home and at other more appropriate locations.

@BoredZelda

I said the OP’s daughter was as much in the wrong. Ergo they are both in the wrong and I am not condoning violence.

By giving them equal blame, you are actually condoning violence.

Bloody hell are you being deliberately obtuse? Saying two things are bad isn’t condoning one of them! It’s condoning neither!

I give up

Nasty comments and actions on both sides tbh.

Noone should be pushed to the group though - that's taking it too far.
The mum has told her off for this.

I would back out of this friendship. But no messages are needed.

nobody is justifying the violence.
They are saying that the DD was completely in the wrong not to do as the other girl asked and stop annoying her.

It isn't necessarily true that "violence is wrong but the girl..." the but doesn't actually negate violence is wrong. They are 9. They are learning how to behave and i'd sincerely hope that karate-girl has learned that you don't shove people because if they land wrong it can be dangerous.

but dancing-girl has to learn how to behave too. it is not acceptable to keep on annoying someone. We read it on the relationships board all the time "DP was tickling me and i asked him to stop and he didn't and i shouted and now he calls me an abuser" type of posts.

The girl who asked the dancer to stop had an equal right to ask not to be annoyed. The girl who was dancing had a right not to be shoved for sure, but she did not have the right to ignore someone's request to stop.

If this were grown adults the conclusion would be (should be) that dancer should have stopped but that violence isn't the answer. This is kids so the answer is the same with the caveat that they are both learning how to behave.

I'll say it again though: confronted with arms flapping in my face (and we don'T know if this happened) i would physically move someone if i had already asked them to stop. The difference being that i know not to shove someone.

It is perfectly possible in an AIBU for both parties to be U and at the same time not to be U for entirely different reasons. As it is here.

@TatianaBis

There are throws in karate so that’s a bit disingenuous. There’s a throw where you take the opponents arm and throw them over your body. It’s all supposed to be used for self defence, but people do use the moves to attack people.

Anyway we don’t know that she’s not doing more general martial arts including judo.

And that would've caused more harm to the OP's daughter than it did. If someone threw you over their shoulder you'd know about it. It's not something that's easy to do unless you're very well practiced. If the child was that well practiced, she'd also be disciplined enough to not use physical aggression.

The OP specifically said karate. We have to take what she says as fact.

So OP's daughter Girl1, is twirling about like a prat, getting in peoples way, being embarrassing and annoying. Girl2 asks her to stop and instead of stopping Girl1 ups the ante, being more physical with her moves and I suspect focussing more on being in Girl2's space.

It's not really that surprising that Girl2 responded to that with a shove. And given the wild gyrations of Girl1 it's hardly surprising that she fell down as a result.

OP has deliberating added in the mention of Karate and described the fall as being 'thrown' to paint Girl1's behaviour in a better light.

Honestly Girl1 sounds dreadfully self absorbed and pleased with herself. The 'ugly' comment she made to Girl2 was frankly unforgivable, I'd be mortified if my DD went around saying or even thinking that he looks made her better than someone else.

Take the hint OP, you are raising an annoying brat, time to start parenting a bit harder.

It sound like there was a bit of tension already and the breaking point came when your DD continued to invade the other DDs personal space. This is not an excuse. However, what often comes up on the stepparenting board is that you are reacting to this as an adult and expecting the children in the situation to have adult responses. They are children and will get it wrong and act impulsively in ways we as adults wouldn’t. Which is why it’s not helpful comparing it to an adult only (ie husband and wife) situation.
Only the 4 of you know how the push/throw was executed but I think it’s a really good time to help your DD understand boundaries relating to personal space. Also to understand that violence is not excused by the victims behaviour and recognise she was punished for that.
As for talking to your friend, it won’t erase the comments she has made to her own DD and whilst it was hurtful you must recognise a time when you’ve done it yourself? Maybe time away from each is the best recourse to see if the friendship has run its course.

OP could have given both girls what they wanted by having her dd dance alongside her and away from her friend and the other girl would have had her physical space.
How long was the other girl supposed to put up with your DD's dancing near her ?
If your dd is dancing and the mums are chatting, does that mean that the other girl doesn't have someone to socialise with on yeh walk home? While it's lovely that your dd is passionate about dance, I can see why the other girl would rather she walked alongside her and was more sociable.

I wonder what the responses would be over this violence if it was between two toddlers.
9 year olds are still children, still learning and not perfect at managing emotions etc.

Yet people are viewing this violence as though this happened between two adults. They are children.

Impulsive, and reactive. These things happen between children. It doesn't mean it is right, or acceptable in any way. But it is understandable that they can at times lose control. Which is where parenting comes in. Like the parent of the violent child did.

AIBU to message the mum and tell her how upset I am about the fact she’s clearly been slagging DD off at home?

Forget this. You know the dd finds your dd's dancing annoying, she has probably said to her mum and her mum has said she finds it annoying too. They are not slagging off your dd, they are saying your dd's annoying behaviour is.......well....annoying. Many people would find it annoying.

Reflect on the message instead. Your dd's behaviour is annoying to others and walking home from school is not the time to "practice" her dancing.

@Brefugee

I'm wondering how many parents here would be entirely ok if their kid came home from school and said "I was annoying my friend today and they threw me to the ground and it really hurt, but my teacher said it's just kids being kids and we should sort it out amongst ourselves, and that I kind of deserved it for being annoying

except that literally nobody has said that. Nobody.

For the dancing, for anyone that watches Brooklyn 99, I'm imagining that twirly, kicky, arm-flappy in your face stuff that Gina does. And if i, even at my great age, asked someone not to do that in my face and they did it again, i may grab their arm and firmly move them out of my space.

As for the shove: was it a real karate throw? was it a massive shove that was intended to hurt? was it a smaller shove and because the DD is dancing around she was off balance and fell over in a way she wouldn't if she was walking normally? So many questions.

And what, no kid is allowed to go home and say "blimey mum, Twinkletoes is annoying with all the dancing" and the mum to say "I'm sure she is" REALLY? haha not in the real world.

anyway, OP, hope DDs arm is ok.

One of the big issues that children need to understand, and I drummed it into my kids, was that any violent or aggressive act can result in serious injury, even death if someone falls and hits their head on something hard.

Justifying the actions of the child who did the physical attack is really dangerous, I hope no one has said it to her because it would be really irresponsible.

I'm pretty shocked by the responses here.

If I were you I'd totally support your little one! If she wants to dance let her dance! She might go pro one day!

I would avoid friend and friends DD for a while tbh. A long while!

Separately I would have a word with your DD about calling people ugly! Not nice! But understandable when you've just been assaulted.

I'm also interested in people saying that teachers shouldn't be referring to children as annoying in front of other girls.

I'm imagining a scenario where they're in class, or maybe in PE, and the teacher wants to explain something and dancing-girl is just dancing around and the teacher says "stop that it's annoying". That wouldn't be ok? What if she was forcing other kids to get out of her way and they complained to the teacher that she was being annoying? can the teacher tell her to stop being annoying? what's the protocol here?

AIBU to message the mum and tell her how upset I am about the fact she’s clearly been slagging DD off at home?

That's the least of the problems.

Oh ffs @BoredZelda over reaction, much?!

9 year kids are very different from adults!! They are learning about social boundaries, right and wrong etc. They won't be perfect (nor are any adults behaviour). Kids push and shove until they learn better ways to behave.

@peachesarenom

I'm pretty shocked by the responses here.

If I were you I'd totally support your little one! If she wants to dance let her dance! She might go pro one day!

I would avoid friend and friends DD for a while tbh. A long while!

Separately I would have a word with your DD about calling people ugly! Not nice! But understandable when you've just been assaulted.

OP should also have a word about being deliberately irritating with her dancing by swirling infront of her friend to annoy her.

There are throws in karate so that’s a bit disingenuous
How many 9 year olds are learning them? And the ones that are able to replicate them out in the wild while someone is dancing around them? Highly unlikely.
Shoving her was wrong, she shouldn't of touched her, but making out she did some epic martial arts throw rather than a childish shove is ridiculous.

@TrufflesAndToast

‘BUT It’s not like she walked up to a child and just randomly attacked her’

So it’s okay to attack someone if they are annoying you? Or it’s less of an issue? Seriously?

My DH could walk out into the street and attack someone or attack me. Both would be assault and a criminal offence. Just because I am annoying (which I truly can be) doesn’t give my DH the right to attack me.

AIBU to message the mum and tell her how upset I am about the fact she’s clearly been slagging DD off at home?

YABU.

What do you think it would achieve?
The time to have stood up for your daughter was in the moment.
Friend went bright red and said she’d never said that and her DD said “yes you did!
All you needed to to was run with that dropped baton - "well that's a nasty thing to hear, let's not dwell on it, if DD wants to dance she's not harming anyone is she?" - & change the subject.

Friend quickly changed the subject but was clearly embarrassed. I felt really awkward. Didn’t know what to say

Your DD did though -
DD said “I don’t care that I annoy you, if I want to dance I will do”
Good for her.
Try to learn from DD's example - & back her up. She shouldn't have to be fighting her own battles with a mean-mouthed adult when she's only 9!

So no - don't text your "friend".
What's the point?
She's badmouthing DD behind your back to her own child. She's obviously said enough to make her own child feel empowered to criticise & try to order your DD about. SHE IS NOT YOUR FRIEND.

You only want to message her now because you were too flustered to deal with it at the time. It's too late. It won't do any good, it won't relieve your feelings, & I dare say your remarkable little girl doesn't give a shit either way, because she's got her head screwed on.

So ... don't text. Block.
I wouldn't be friends with a woman who slagged my adult mates off behind their backs. This, for crying out loud, is your child - just have nothing more to do with the silly bitch, & let DD handle the daughter in her own inimitable way.

@RachelHasThoseInBurgundy

I wonder what would be said if a boy had been the violent one?

Ah, well boys are evil on MN so obviously he would need to be arrested and a non molestation order put in place.

But is that going far enough, no custodial sentence?

One of the big issues that children need to understand, and I drummed it into my kids, was that any violent or aggressive act can result in serious injury, even death if someone falls and hits their head on something hard.

Justifying the actions of the child who did the physical attack is really dangerous, I hope no one has said it to her because it would be really irresponsible.

Absolutely. DD only had to crack her head on the pavement, or fall across the pavement into the road for this to have had a very different outcome.

doesn’t give my DH the right to attack me.

You and DH are not bloody children though!

Your daughter sounds like my niece. Danving and twirling and getting in your face when you just want to walk to the shops or sit down for a cuppa. I liken my niece to an annoying fly buzzing around. I want to reach for the tea towel everytime I'm near her 🤣
Sorry OP but your DD sounds annoying! Not that this excuses her friends behaviour mind but your girl is 9 now, teach her the art of restraint and discretion.