To think neighbours should have had their son apologise?

[ShuffleShuffleSpin]

My neighbour's son, age 12, threw rocks at my children and me when he was not invited to my son’s birthday party. I did not grow up in the U.K. but am raising my children here. I would have imagined that most parents would have at minimum had their child go back and apologise for the violent / harmful behaviour. These parents haven’t done any of that. They saw him - and they did try to stop him - but when I later spoke to them expressing concerns, they simply made excuses, saying he was just being emotional because he felt disappointed. For the record, he and my son are not even close, although we have had him over a few times. And the birthday party he missed was not something he saw taking place - he only heard about it.

is the norm in British culture to teach children who misbehave in an extreme way to go back and apologise, build character and integrity, etc? Please tell me these neighbours are in the minority. Am I wrong to think they should have had their son apologise?

"is the norm in British culture to teach children who misbehave in an extreme way to go back and apologise, build character and integrity, etc?"

Yes - that is the norm. I'm sorry this happened but it didn't happen because they're British, it happened because they're awful people.

You don't sound as though you've been in the UK very long if you're asking this?

Of course it's the norm.

I imagine it would be in just about every country in the world?

Thank you so much for confirming that. That is what I thought, but my STBX partner’s family (who is also an expat) wants me to move countries with him, and he is using this situation to try to convince me that I should move, saying the children won’t learn character or good manners from the culture. I thought that was ridiculous but I then start doubting myself. One of his many tactics. I often finding myself needing to reality check things.

I don't really understand the point of forced apologies.

If they're making him apologize, he doesn't mean it. He isn't actually sorry. It's just pretending.

There should be consequences for what he's done, but "go lie to the people you assaulted" shouldn't be one of those consequences. What's the point?

I see where you are coming from- but in young children often a forced apology makes them face the shame and consequence of their action. Without which they can often forget or not understand the impact of their actions. There is a lesson to be learned, even if they don’t want to apologise they learn that actions bear consequences, that you are not always free of your victims rebuttal and reaction, nor are you free from their feelings, you learn that even if you don’t care- society does- and you will face the reckoning even if you don’t think you deserve it. These are lessons that young children learn easily and therefore don’t repeat. The children that don’t learn it become shitty adults and sometimes criminals who haven’t become accustomed to society’s rules.

if ops neighbors child had been forced to apologise for their behaviour, perhaps they would learn

a- that when you are disappointed , that does not entitle you to a reaction.
b- that when you act aggressively int response to disappointment you will be called on it
c- when you embarrass yourself and hurt others you will have to apologise and feel that shame
d- not to do it again- which is in their interest, as not everyone who gets thrown rocks at them is so kind as op. If they throw rocks at the wrong person they will get hurt.

She wants a forced apology to humiliate him. It is an act of power.

No, the act of power is chucking a rock at someone. He's 12. The OP should have called the police.

I don’t want to humiliate him or feel powerful. I actually feel unsafe and am looking for signs and assurances that the boy understands his behaviour was wrong and wong do it again. I was thinking that if my child had done something serious, I would have been very concerned and would have had them apologise. I am surprised that he and his parents don’t seem to care about what he did. At the same time, he still wants to come over to our house (he just shows up in our garden sometimes), and after that behaviour, with no sign of remorse, I’m afraid to have him around my children.

Perhaps I should call police. To be honest I was hoping not to have to do that.

I agree with what you say here. The behaviour has to be modelled in some way or another. By witnessing his behaviour and doing nothing, his parents are opening the door for him to feel entitled to do more - and he lives close by. That is my fear. He has already done more minor things leading up to this.

Ridiculous statememt. I havr an 11 year old and he would not throw rocks at people, he just wouldn't. If I ever found out he did, then he would be punished and told to apologise, maybe even in letter format. Throwing rocks is assault and an age 12 kid should know it is not acceptable in society. 12 is year 8 in secondary.
Also if the rocks were tiny bits of gravel, or acrual rocks. Either is unacceptable, but obviously tiny bits of gravel is not likely to harm but a large stone or rock couls actually land someone in hospital

Or, she wants to feel that her hurt and upset has been acknowledged and that he won’t do it again. Your take is a little odd, to be honest.

More likely she wants to be reassured that the parents are aware of the child's appalling behaviour and are trying to do something about it.

Don't worry OP, that is absolutely not the norm. If I caught my ds throwing rocks at someone, he'd be grounded for a month.

Yes, this is exactly it. I’m glad I seem to be on the same page with most of you.

Your comment about British culture is stupid and insulting to be honest.

1. throwing rocks is not normal behaviour at all from a child or adult.
2. my son similar aged is at a UK school. If something like this happened , the child would face sanctions. They would have a conversation with a senior member of staff to reflect on their behaviour and discuss how to control their temper. They would be asked to apologise and if the behaviour was part of a pattern they would be temporarily or permanently excluded. Their parents would come to school to discuss it.

I think if this is part of a worrying pattern you should consider talking to the police .

Personally I strongly dislike insincere apologies. Any time someone has flippantly apologised and it meant absolutely nothing I feel rather irate and would have preferred they not bothered if they couldn’t be genuine. And sometimes sorry is just a word offering a free pass to people who want to avoid being held accountable for their own behaviour or who don’t want to take personal responsibility or who want to do what they want anyway and have no consideration of others.

I wonder how much being made to apologise when you are not sorry contributes to what I described above. Is making children apologise when they don’t mean it teaching them to have negative traits, to be dishonest and insincere?

So, I do think you are a bit unreasonable to expect the parents to make their son apologise. Yanbu to expect that they teach him to behave better, show consideration for others, have empathy, regulate his emotions better. But how they choose to teach him and discipline him is their decision and they don’t have to align with you or your methods.

Do you and your children deserve an apology. Absolutely yes! But you deserve a genuine apology with genuine remorse. Not a forced apology.

I'd be giving my 3 yr old a stern talking never-ending 12 thats awful and Im shocked at the parents!!!

the same time, he still wants to come over to our house (he just shows up in our garden sometimes)

No way would that continue.

I'd either preempt this or If he turns up i'd explain its not convenient for him to play today and escort him home.
I'd then speak to the parents and say something like

Hi dave/sue,
Can i have a word? In you go tommy i need a private word with your mum/dad.

sue / dave, you know tommy threw stones at me and my children while we were in our garden. I dont understand how you and tommy think things can continue as they did before....His behaviour wasn’t an accident or careless—it was deliberately and extremely dangerous.

What’s really concerning is that he showed no real remorse, and neither did you. You actually seemed unfazed despite the seriousness. I was shocked that something so serious as this didn’t seem to register as unacceptable to you.

Because of that, we don't feel comfortable having him over anymore hei want to be clear he’s not welcome in our garden or around our children.
His behaviour crossed a line, one of us could have spent the day in hospital because of it. We have to put our safety and wellbeing first.

I hope you can understand this is not about being dramatic, but about having a safe and respectful environment for my children.

Any lame apology after this and I'd thank them but say it's too little too late and your position wont change but you sincerely hope hes learned from this and its a life lesson for him.

Also, @ShuffleShuffleSpin is there any reason why, when he turns up in your yard, you can’t just tell him straight that we don’t trust you anymore after you threw rocks at us. You are not welcome here anymore and you need to go back home. Clearly communicate your boundaries. If he escalates then respond accordingly.

I did not say that the child should not be punished. I was merely responding to the poster of what was a forced apology supposed to do.

I think that the child should be punished, I never said that I didn't. After this has taken place, I also think that the child should have the opportunity to reflect on his behaviour, in a supportive environment so that he learns from it. Punishment and reflection are two different processes. Then the child needs to have support on how to make better decisions in the future.

The fact of the matter it appears that the child reacted because he was hurt because he didn't get to attend a party of someone who he considered a friend. The behaviour is very wrong and could have lead to serious injury. But forcing the child to come an apologise, as an act of power, and letting the OP and her children gloat over him, before he has had the chance to reflect and respond, will not led to improvements in behaviour.

The OP is also upset the the child wasn't punished in front of her so that she could determine if she was satisfied that it fit her criteria of what she deemed fit. It doesn't even make sense to me that she didn't see the value in allowing him to de-escalate so that he could get more value in the lesson in the behaviour correction. The parents seem to have stopped the behaviour and will deal with it in doors, not as some public spectacle.

The whole post reeks of the OP being insulting to British culture anyway, and I'm not even British.

There's also another stating similar things.

I actually explained to Polish man I worked with how we were taught to say please and thank you... parents death grip 😂 and other manners i was taught and he told me they weren't taught that in Poland and he wanted to bring his children up like that. I dont know why people have started making out were rude, horrible people

What?!!! I marched my DS when he was about 8 round to my PIL’s neighbours as he and his cousins were throwing gravel and it fell near his car. No damage was done, but that’s not the point. Cousins got a bollocking from BIL as they had already gone home, but I took mine round and made him apologise. The neighbours thanked him for the apology. I couldn’t care less if he genuinely felt remorse, he was certainly going to be made to apologise. What he did was wrong and he should understand that and apologise.

There is nothing wrong with being shamed when you have done wrong and you are old enough/capable of understanding.

Are you for real?

I think you are concentrating on the wrong thing, your STBX wanting you to move countries?

Of course the boy doesn't care whether you think it's wrong or not. A 12 year old throwing rocks about a birthday party is not a well-adjusted child and, chances are, his parents aren't either. My sons had their challenges as 12 year olds but throwing rocks is way beyond what they'd have even have thought to do. A forced apology won't stop this boy doing it again. Next time call the police or move. Frankly I would consider moving and certainly have nothing more to do with him.

I don’t need a child to be punished in front of me and have no idea whether they “punished” their child. There has been plenty of time to reflect. I’m not asking or requiring people to be punished. I have no idea where you got that. What I do want is an understanding that our neighbour grasps that throwing rocks is wrong and that they won’t throw rocks at us again. “Sorry for throwing rocks, I won’t do it again”. If a child doesn’t do it on their own, then a parent should teach or at minimum reach out and apologise and say they are making sure that the threat doesn’t continue.