Another dad lost it at my kids

[Gymmum82]

So my kids and the neighbours kids all play out together regularly. Usually about 10 of them. We live in a small village, they are polite, well behaved, respectful kids. They only play on each others drives. Or in houses. Sometimes they will ride their bikes or scooters up and down the street. It’s a very quiet cul de sac.

They knock on each others houses to ask if they want to play out. Yes sometimes it can be a bit annoying if you’ve just sat down and there’s 5 kids banging on the door. But if you say not today. Or kids will be out later. They will go away and they won’t keep knocking.

Last weekend they are all playing out. About 5 or 6 of them. They go and knock on at another friends house who also plays out and the dad comes to the door and absolutely loses his shit. Shouting and screaming at them. All the kids come back in tears. Another parent went round to find out WTF happened and the dad said exactly what the kids said. They knocked on and he yelled at them. No apology nothing. Perfectly justified in his reaction.

I am absolutely livid, I’ve told my kids they are never to knock on again and his kid is not welcome in my home again. But I’m still seething. I will see him regularly and I want to call him out on his behaviour and tell him never to raise his voice to my children again. But AIBU?

I'd just tell them to stop knocking. His kid will miss out, as he'll have to look for them outside to see if they're playing out.

So you are being the adult and punishing a child for the actions of the parent'
How a person treats people in public is a good indicator of how much worse they treat people in private so that poor kid probably needs help to get away from mum n dad not punishing

I think this is unreasonable. It's entirely possible he's projecting other stresses in his life onto people knocking at his door. Particularly if it's done every weekend as you say.

Give the guy a break and don't hold it against your kids. You say you are part of a WhatsApp group. Just text him and ask him is his kids can come out to play.

Why make such a dramatic issue of it?

This 100%

You never know what us going on in other people's lives. He should have apologised to the kids but he may just be sick to the back teeth of kids banging on his door. Some people (my ex husband included) are completely incapable of giving an apology to anyone for anything. He will have his reasons. You shouldn't punish his kid. Just allow his kid to play but don't allow your kids to go over. Its not a good lesson to teach your kids. To punish someone for another person's actions.
Just Speak to him once you've all calmed down. Get him to explain. What did he actually shout at them?
I have 2 boys and live on a cul-de-sac too do have perspective but this would be my thought process.

FFS it’s not the kids fault to ban him/her from your house!

Wow so the dad loses his cool at kids chappin the door and basically everyone has this wee boy marked as an abused child and needs safeguarding.
There could be numerous reasons why the dad acted like this, and why hasnt the OP confronted him if her boy was involved.
Has the boy done anything to the OP boy/house. If not then your actions of excluding the young boy could cause knock on problems for your boy.
Picture this - the wee boy is out with the friends playing and 1 of them goes aww lets get the OPs son out to play. And the wee boy says i cant play with him. OPs son is left looking through the window at the other kids playing. Dont punish kids for parents behaviour.

Why would he care if you ‘called him out’ on his behaviour? It doesn’t sound like he is a people pleaser. He is a grumpy arse. Every neighbourhood has one of those. I still remember the thrill of having to retrieve a ball from our nasty neighbour’s garden. Your kids will be fine.

Look you know the kids were in the wrong here surely! 5 fists banging a door, when he's probably said to them multiple times about banging the door. A knock and a bang are 2 very different things.
You all need to teach your kids social etiquette when knocking on - one child knocks the door, and the others wait at the end of the drive!
You clearly have rose tinted glasses where your children are concerned so won't listen to anyone that says they were in the wrong!

It’s very rare to get a bunch of 10 children all playing nicely with impeccable manners 🧐 And even rarer for 5 or 6 children to all return home in tears 🤔

I think there’s definitely more to this than you realise. If you’re furious about the way the dad reacted then I’m not sure why you’re letting it drop tbh. I’d either be knocking and politely telling him what he did wasn’t on, or at least posting in the WhatsApp group if you felt you couldn’t face him in person.

Then I would teach the children basic manners of only 1 child knocking on the door. Why do all of them need to bang loudly on the door?? That’s ridiculous. As good as the children are, they still need to learn (be taught) further how to be respectful.

Knocking a door isn't misbehaving but the OP has admitted there were 9 kids banging the man's door and ringing the bell at the same time.

He's probably told the kids loads of times not to do that, but because a couple of parents think it's okay the kids think it's okay!

If I had 9 kids banging my door and ringing my doorbell at the same time - I'd probably lose my shit after a while!

Some of these comments are fucking wild! People agreeing they would lose their shit as well at a group of small children yeah very good. If its annoying speak to the parents or speak to the children in a calm manner. If you were doing something irritating to another person would you expect someone to lose it with you as a first warning that they didn't like your behaviour... absolutely not you would be on here starting a thread about someone being a CF for shouting at you.

Op has already said they haven't been told loads of times and there is a parents what's app group. There is no point in making up the story yourself if you don't believe the op just don't comment 🤷‍♀️

I can guarantee that whilst he might not have told your children not to do it he's definitely told at least one or two of them not to do it.
Presumably you weren't there when the other parent spoke to him so don't actually know what was said then either.
Could have been "I've been telling x,y&z for the last 6 months to please stop banging on my door and they've continued to do it, I don't mind them knocking on for A but to stop the banging"

If the kids knock on his door then he's going to answer however he's going to answer. In this instance he answered angrily so they won't do it again.

I honestly don't think there is any more to do than that - all the debates about moral rights and wrongs aside. That's how he's reacted. "calling him out" isn't going to do anything except maybe risk life at home being worse for his family IF he is aggreesive and angry at home. The kids were upset but as they won't knock again they won't be upset again and life will go on.

I definately wouldn't be excluding his child as retribution.

You’re over-reacting.

OK, it sounds like he over-reacted too. He was rude. He was grumpy. Some people are, and it's part of growing up to learn to cope with them. It won’t hurt any of the children to learn that they need to be wary of annoying some people.

You don’t actually know exactly what he said to the children or to the neighbour.(And in my experience children often say "shouted at me" when they mean "told me off".) He might have all sorts of stresses you know nothing about, that he doesn’t want to share. His child might be being bullied by one of the other children. He might have had a terrible day, or be in the middle of a family row, or have a migraine, or just heard that his mother was dying. Or he might just be a grumpy git.

Let it go. You don’t want to teach your children that if someone does something wrong they should hold it against them for evermore. It would certainly be totally out of order to teach them that because they don’t like someone they should punish that person's family.

Not sure how I'd react but certainly wouldn't exclude the other child! Sometimes we aren't sure what's going on behind doors. Could be going through a really bad time, no excuse too be nasty though

They’ll give the door a good bang with the 5 of them

Must admit if 5 kids aged 6 to 10 year old were giving my front door a "good bang" I'd be having stern words with them too. The older kids especially should know better. If they have been give other doors a "good bang" before someone should have told them this by now instead of letting poor behaviour continue.

Tell the kids one of them knocks the door or rings the bell once, respectfully at peoples doors or they might get a reaction they don't like, then forget about it.

The only thing I have to say is that most people do not like the excessive noise kids make. I think I would lose my shit having them up and down my road constantly. You keep saying people have never complained to you etc. People don't feel comfortable complaining about the noise of kids and we live in the UK remember. We notoriously like to moan in private. People's actions speak louder than their WhatsApp messages and this guy had obviously had enough of living in a zoo!

There is no way that the group of kids knocked quietly once and then moved on. This doesn't sound like any kids I've ever met. Of course you are going to believe your precious angel and are taking their side of the story as testament. The likelihood is that the large group of them were hammering on the door and wouldn't go away and were possibly even shouting for the friend to come out.

The dad is most likely fed up of having multiple kids consistently hammering on his door, he is entitled to peace and quiet in his own home and it is startling to have people constantly knocking at the door. You have no idea what he has going on in his life that resulted in this response, he could even be wfh. Typical MN to come to the conclusion that this is a child at risk, just give the bloke some peace. Can your child text the friend to ask if they are able to play?

Don’t let your kids anywhere near him.

Please don’t ban his kid from your place.

If there are indications he is worse behind closed doors and crossing lines make an anonymous call to SS or the police.

Lovely to have a street where kids play out. My DC had this and it was great, though occasionally had blips like this with out-of-order adults. I always tried to get my DC to see the humour in it, eg 'be careful of Mr Grumpy at number 27" ... though I can see that in your case that wouldn't be appropriate as one of the playmates is this man's son.
Seeing as you said he's on the neighbours WhatsApp group, do you feel you could post on there to ask him, eg Hi John, I heard you got annoyed with the kids calling round. Did they do something in particular that was inappropriate? If so, please let us know so we can talk to them about it.

I’d speak to him and ask him not to aggressively take his frustrations on small children.
Make it clear that you are disgusted by him.
Then ask on the group WhatsApp if any other parents are overly irritated by your child knocking on their door, because you don’t want DC coming home in tears again. AND you want to be a good neighbour.

Please dont punish the children for the parents behavior. Going to your house playing with your kids probably there safe place.

This was basically my whole childhood. I had no idea it was meant to be traumatising. If a gang of 5-6 kids bang on someone’s door they are taking the risk that they are pissing off the adult relaxing inside and may get chased down the street. 5-6 kids giving the door a “good bang” and he’s supposed to be chill with it?