Adult man swearing at a toddler

[AnnaSunshine]

We have a family membership to Kew Gardens. I know it’s expensive, but we go almost every weekend to let our children run around and enjoy being outside.

My youngest child is 18 months old. He is in that gorgeous stage where he had just started to talk a little more coherently and where he absolutely loves running around and climbing. He can follow simple instructions….. when he wants to!

If you know Kew, we were over by the Japanese gardens. My eldest thinks this is the most beautiful place that she’s ever seen.

This area has some gravel sections where the stones are raked. They are not to be walked on.

As you can imagine, my son (who was with my husband) immediately ran into the middle of one of these areas. My husband called to my son (which he thought was a hilarious game) and then my husband went to go and scoop him up. Cue toddler screaming “No daddy!”.

At this point a man in his thirties sitting on a bench with a woman turns around and tells us “you cannot walk on that.” I relied, “we know, but he’s a toddler and he doesn’t understand that yet.”

To be clear, my husband has already removed my son.

The man then continues “What is wrong with you Karen? Parent your children. You need to have boundaries. What is wrong with you? You are a terrible parent!”

This is with escalating agitation. My son, still with his Dad, starts to cry because there is a man shouting at his mum.

I should have walked away, but I said still very calmly:

”Karen‽ He is not even two. He is not yet cognitively developed enough to understand this.”

To which the man stood up, turned to my son and shouted “You little sod, don’t go on the f-ing stones!”

I said “You are shouting at a toddler. For when you have calmed down, we forgive you for this.” And, I know pettily, walked across the stones myself to go and hug my child.

Was I unreasonable in this? Kew is made for people of all ages. We absolutely respect it, and would have taken my son off the gravel regardless of people being around, but I cannot comprehend this man‘s actions.

I’ve got thick skin, so tell me how it is if I’m wrong.

Lazy parenting?

Come on, you have said that to be cruel.

It is a sweeping generalisation based on my husband’s momentary mistake, which he corrected.

😂 No, I sleep very well thanks, irrespective of how badly I’ve fucked up.

I also take responsibility for my fuck ups. If you wanted people to lie to you and tell you that in no way were you and your husband partly responsible for this situation, and it was only the fault on the big, nasty man, then you should have said so and I would have scrolled on by.

Well, let’s go over this one more time.

My husband was with my son.

I was shouted at.

I wasn’t rude nor did I shout.

I was petty walking on the gravel myself and said that from the start.

I don’t think it was a big deal.

No one has really said anything to convince me otherwise, but some people have said that we could reasonably anticipate going forward. That is fair.

Reins are not for us, but I think would be great for many.

And you seem really angry at me? I’m not sure why?

That’s not the point and irrelevant to this post. Of course I do stupid things all the time but I try to reflect and learn from my experiences.

Your reflection on this situation is to argue that Kew Gardens is a free for all for toddlers because cognitively their brains can’t possibly stick to the paths and that anyone who hasn’t been can’t possibly comprehend the difficulty parents face in Kew Gardens keeping their children off the areas they would prefer you not to walk on.

Silly Kew Gardens. They really need to let everyone walk all over their lovely garden features.

Sorry, have to agree with this.

I’m a florist and the bloody number of parents who let their kids squeeze the roses and try and pick the petals off the flowers does my nut in. No, I do not think your child is a cute lambkins.

My post said:

At this point a man in his thirties sitting on a bench with a woman turns around and tells us “you cannot walk on that.” I relied, “we know, but he’s a toddler and he doesn’t understand that yet.”

To be clear, my husband has already removed my son.

My youngest child is 18 months old. He is in that gorgeous stage where he had just started to talk a little more coherently

That told me everything I needed to know. Your kid isn't gorgeous to anyone but you. He's a pain in the neck: control him.

If you can't stop him running into areas, he shouldn't be on, keep him in a buggy.

You are not allowed to walk on those stones. How many cute, gorgeous toddlers you think have done it because their parents can't control them. Won't take long for it to ruin those stones if every parent had an attitude like yours.

Standing arguing with a stranger that your son isn't cognitively developed enough for god's sake.Just control him

Cool story, bro. But you missed the part where everyone clapped.

*Note to self - avoid Kew Gardens if you have children.
Stay away from creepy men in their 30s swearing at children.

Kew gardens is supposed to be a place of peaceful tranquillity. That's why people pay to go there. It's not a place where toddlers should be running roughshod. If that's what you want there are plenty of public parks with play areas.

I'm also a frequent visitor to Kew.And I know the japanese garden and gateway, you mean.

It's quite a wide open area and big stone feature. You didn't have control of your child if he was able to get onto that.

Read the Kew website. It is all about families.

Visit Kew. It is all about families.

I assume everyone laughed in your face when you said about forgiving him. Bloody hell id have called you a pompous ass for that.

no he shouldn’t have shouted but just a word to the wise, not everyone finds your toddler as “gorgeous” as you do.

Using this snippet from your OP doesn’t erase everything else you’ve said to excuse the way you parent!

I really get the feeling people on Mumsnet don’t like children.

I think talking and moving are probably everyone’s favourite milestones with their kids.

I didn’t say anything about my child being gorgeous.

We can go over it as many times as you like.

I’ve been very clear that the man shouldn’t have shouted at you. Or at anyone else. For the avoidance of doubt, I think the fact that he shouted at you rather than your DH was a combination of misogyny and cowardice and his use of the ‘Karen’ slur was pretty disgusting.

I also want to make it clear that I’m not differentiating between you and your DH here. Whichever one of you was nearest should have anticipated and taken steps to prevent it so that some great bullying oaf didn’t feel it necessary to open his gob and frighten your child unnecessarily, and so that a member of staff doesn’t now have to go and rake it because you and your family have walked all over it.

I’m not angry at you at all. I don’t think I’ve said anything that would suggest otherwise, although I understand that tone isn’t always easy on line. I do think it was lazy parenting and I do think that you could and should have anticipated that somewhere like that would be irresistible to a two year old and stopped it before it happened. Do you let him wander about on a busy main road? No, because you anticipate what will happen. If you go into a shop, would you let him play with a valuable tea set? No, because you anticipate what will happen. This is just another example where you should have anticipated what would happen.

In response to (I think) you saying that stepping onto some gravel is the same as going onto a road, and that no one should ever leave the paths in Kew, I simply said that isn’t how Kew is set up.

Read back over everything I have said. I’m really not sure what I have done to offend you?

Some of these responses are mad...blaming the OP is ridiculous.A toddler ran into a 'precious' area of the garden, not a big fucking deal and certainly not worth being abused by some idiot over.
OP the one thing I don't get is why you were so bloody apologetic about forgiveness etc and started quoting child psychology......I think he took your response for weakness and thought he would go in for another dig.I would be giving him a real piece of my mind for that kind of reaction.It was completely unacceptable, over the top and like I said, abusive.

Let's hope he never does! If he will speak so abusively to a strangers toddler i dread to think how he would treat his own.....

No, it isn't all about families.And it's certainly isn't about your pain in the neck toddler, who isn't gorgeous. He's only gorgeous to you.

It is not all about families. There are so many areas in kew gardens, in fact, most of them where children will not be allowed to and cannot run riot.

There is actually a dedicated playground for children. You should have gone there.

If you go on to Kew gardens website, it's all about science and biodiversity. There is a dedicated section for families, and it recommends the hive and the children's garden and the tree top walkway.

It does not recommend the japanese gateway for children. Places like that will be ruined if every toddler was allowed to escape onto it

Sorry, but your little darling cannot do what he want and the entire garden isn't all about families. Far from it

In future take him to more age, appropriate places within Kew or keep him in a buggy.

It is not all about families.

Kew Gardens is financially underpinned by well-off families paying a fortune for overpriced ice cream and lacklustre pizzas to nourish their unruly broods in the extortionate cafés. Families with young kids are one of its key demographics.

It makes me laugh to read all these comments about it being an unsuitable environment for children given that, on sunny weekends and holidays, around 1 in 10 toddlers living in rhe leafier parts of South West London can probably be found there, running roughshod, climbing trees and demanding that their parents take out a second mortgage to fund ice creams.

Wow, so your toddler made a mistake, as toddlers do as they don't understand 'the rules'.

Perhaps (?) you as parents made a mistake by not preventing what happened but I'm sure not many of us on here could hand on heart say our toddlers haven't done something they shouldn't have that we failed to prevent. And we're talking about such a minor thing here.

But a fully grown male shouts at you, using a misogynistic term and then shouts and swears at your toddler and the focus of the responses isn't on that?! Bizarre.

OP, I think you were well within your rights to respond and good for you for not letting him just get away with speaking to you and your child like that. Total male privilege that he felt he had the right to be judge and jury and so telling that the comment wasn't made to your husband. I'm furious on your behalf, how dare he.

I don't think I'd have been able to have been as restrained or polite in my response as you, if he'd said the same to me or my children.

I did say, what I said was really odd, but I’m not really used to being shouted at.

Probably threefold:

Actually telling him that when he realised he had sworn at a toddler not to give himself too hard a time (a small part)

To wind him up. I was furious with him for swearing at my child!

(And contradictory, but also true) to de-escalate.

I know that doesn’t fully make sense, but true .

Forgetting the angry guy for a second, I can’t believe the abuse OP is getting for losing control of her toddler for a a matter of seconds. Kew Gardens markets itself as family friendly so it’s not like toddler shouldn’t have been there in the first place. Toddler was misbehaving, ignored verbal instructions and was therefore physically extracted from where they shouldn’t be…isn’t that precisely what MN usually advocates for?

What a vile man. I would’ve reported this to the front desk and ask for him to be banned. ScreamIng in a child’s face is totally unacceptable. Hardly a criminal offence to wander on some stones.