Two adults cornered and scolded my 7yo

[Rosie5832]

At a classmate’s birthday party, my child was cornered by the parents of another classmate. They accused him of bullying their son and told him to stop it. He said he wasn’t doing that and they kept on shouting at him that he was.
After this, he was very upset and was crying inconsolably.
Another parent - the mum of the birthday child - went to his assistance and messaged me telling me to return to the party as my son needed me, and that she couldn’t settle him at all (I had left for an hour). While she was messaging me, these two parents came over to her and told her my son was a bully - he was right there and still crying. She told them to back off. When I arrived, they rushed straight over to me and told me that my son was bullying their son etc. No acknowledgment from them that they had cornered him alone and shouted at him. It was only later at home that he told me what had happened, I called the other mum and she confirmed it, describing the way they approached me as an ‘ambush’. She said the whole party turned into a ‘sh*tshow’ because of the way these parents were behaving, and all the other parents - and probably some of the kids - could see what had happened.
I’m in shock over this. I’m meeting with the school teacher today to alert her to this incident and to make sure my son is kept safe in school.
I want to say something to these parents about their behaviour. Imo they were completely out of line, and all the other mums I’ve spoken to since agree that you never confront a child alone like that, regardless of what issue you have with them.
On the way in to school this morning, my son stopped dead just before the door and said, “why didn’t you stay at the party?”. He was clearly thinking about the whole incident and probably concerned that he would encounter these parents at the school.
Has anyone any experience of this kind of behaviour from other parents?

No, it’s really not. It’s a standard phrase for a seven year old and really doesn’t mean anything. What kind of a world are we going to have in a few years time if kids are brought up being scared of casual words.

Nope. Pretty standard when I was at school. Problem is that in successive generations we’ve brought up our children to believe that words can hurt as much as physical assault, and now, as this OP demonstrates, we’re reaping the rewards by having children who are not in the least resilient.

Can I just say something here. I’m disabled. I was at school in the sixties and seventies. I was variously assaulted by being thrown down a set of stairs by another child, so that I chipped a tooth and had to be hospitalised for concussion. Was punched in the stomach by the school bully - again hospitalised. Came into school every single day to find that my desk had been broken into, stuff stolen, pen nibs broken, ink bottles opened and thrown over everything, homework ruined. Called names like cripple, spas, retard and worse. Accused of stealing, which was investigated by teachers in front of the rest of the class even though I could prove I was somewhere else at the time. Sent to Coventry for no other reason than my disability and waited for by the school bully outside the school in a quiet corner of the village and beaten up - two or three times a week.

The school did nothing, despite regular complaints and meetings from and with my parents, and when once or twice I retaliated I was the one who was sent to detention and blamed for being a ‘bully’. Eventually I was moved to another school because the authorities weren’t willing to discipline those responsible.

This is what real bullying looked like. It drove me to consider suicide and attempt to harm myself. Thankfully there are far more safeguards in place now than when I was at school. So forgive me if I don’t consider one seven year old saying to another ‘ you’re dead’. They’re words.

Yes; i know someone whose head was held in the fumes from boiling ammonia by a bully at school.

Sixty years later he still has no sense of smell.

OTT means over the top.

In other words, the parents overreacted. Did you understand that's what I meant?

Not read the post then.

Pompous crap. This sort of rubbish is one reason why life has become so difficult. Kids used as chips in an adult's game. Put it all to one side and be proud of your boy.

I have twin sons now adults with children of their own. One ds is a very sensitive quiet and serious and his brother was captain of the rugby team large group of “followers” friends. When they were at school they were put in separate classes. When they were 14 my quiet son became even more withdrawn and was being bullied horrendously at school and one night the way he said good night to us seemed very off so my dh went up to his room 10 minutes later to see him trying to do very serious harm to himself. Despite numerous visits to the school and even writing to the governors nothing was done so we changed his school which was the best thing for him. His other brother wanted to remain at his school so we said yes. Next parents evening I could see this couple looking at my son and I thought it was because of his twin as there was a lot of gossip at the time. All the teachers were singing his praises so I had one more teacher to see and went to use the bathroom on my way back see this couple having a word with my son who stood there with a smirk on his face. I walked up to them and asked them what was wrong and they told me he had been bullying their son and he was in a very bad way mentally and the school was ignoring it and so you know what I think they were brilliant to approach him as no one else would listen to them and trust me he never did that to anyone again I made sure he no longer was allowed to play rugby or attend any after school activities in fact I wish I had been braver when my other son was being bullied as maybe he wouldn’t of tried to kill himself

I often think parents of twins are some of the most level headed - simply because they literally have an experiment to show that children turn out differently regardless of parental input.

It is so easy for the rest of us to think "oh well, we were so busy when dc 3 was born" or "well we had no experience with dc1."

But in fact children are their own people and I think when we can pull parental ego out of the equation (are they great at x because we did well with them? Or did we do something wrong with that one) you get much more level-headed parenting - and I'm so pleased for that boy being bullied that you were able to have that more detached approach and realise how your son needed to be handled and reined in, rather than leaping in defensively to protect him. And I'm sure he is better off for it too.

He was 14 not 7

@Calliopespa trust me it def made him question his actions. I’m his parent not his friend and as his parent I will not let you make anyone feel worthless. Sometimes as a parent we parent the child who is sensitive but not the popular child. I’m 100% guilty of allowing my son to believe he was a legend in his own mind as he was captain of the rugby team and trust me that idea was squashed when I found out what a big headed bully he had become. All children can be bullied and be a bully and anyone who thinks their children are angels I take my hat off to u as pushing that halo out must of been painful

it was a party for a different child. The crazy parents and their kid were invited just like OP’s

As a parent I would be so upset if someone accosted my daughter when I’m clearly not present and berated her to the point of tears over something that should’ve been addressed to me. BUT I would also be curious as to why these parents felt the need to begin with to confront my child. Children aren’t always innocent. Sometimes they do and say things without thinking and to look cool to others without understanding how people may feel and then sometimes you have straight up mean kids but I wouldn’t ignore an accusation of bullying bc it’s serious. Kids take their lives and I will not stand by and allow my child to be the cause of another’s anguish. A hard convo needs to be had with the parents, your child, and the teachers and admins at the school. There are always two sides and the truth in a situation like this. And calmer heads will prevail but due diligence needs to be done on both sides

A conversation has happened and calmer heads have prevailed, several days ago now.... The OP did not ignore the accusation that her son might have bullied another child, and went to the school to talk with his teacher and try to sort out what had actually happened.

The "bullying" by the child was a matter of two words on a single occasion, taken out of context and blown out of all proportion. The bullying of the child by the two adults (who had clearly made no effort to talk to the school or the other parent(s) involved) was witnessed by many other parents and was undoubtedly bullying, but was not something the school felt able to comment about because it had not taken place in the school.

You can always see all of the OP's posts on a thread by clicking on "see all" at the bottom of any one of their posts, and that way you can be sure to see any updates they may have come back with since the first post. I find this very useful!

If my kid is being nasty and I'm not there, I hope another adult WOULD give them a good bollocking in my absence. Bullying is unacceptable, regardless of if their parents are there or not.

And if two adults attack your kid when you are not there, I'd think you would hope other adults would intervene to stop them? As you say, bullying is unacceptable; in this case the parents were there and were doing the bullying.

This isn’t what the thread was about. It was about something that had happened previously at school. Yes adults have every right to intervene if something is happening at that moment that is affecting safety/ welfare of kids in some way. But they don’t have the right to threaten kids over something that happened last week.

And in wanting to stop bullying, it doesn’t allow you to then become a bully yourself.
The way these adults treated a 7yo was unacceptable, even if the 7yo was a bully or they genuinely thought he was.

If one wants to stop bullying, then need to start by behaving likea decent p, mature adult. Not a like bull.

You need to report it to the police.

that is abusive behaviour

You need to establish if your son is really a bully by talking to other parents and school. If he is then I have no sympathy.

And if she has and he isn't, well, isn't it lucky she told us several days ago about having gone to the school to find out just what had been going on!

No. This is not the"last act of a desperate parent". That situation would be, having been up to the school many times, talked to the child's parents many times (NOT the child) and nothing changes -desperate parent gets other patent up against the wall by the throat and tells them what will happen to THEM ( not the bully) is the bullying doesn't stop.
They was disgusting behaviour. Well done to whoever stepped in

You're right, OP. If something like this happened to a child at one of my DC's classmate's parties, I can't imagine any parent being willing to drop off and leave their child again so long as these parents might be attending. No young child should have to deal with two aggressive adults in their face without a trusted grown-up there to tell them to back off. When you leave children at a party, you trust the adults present to behave appropriately towards your child. And it must have been very distressing for the host mum to have to deal with this while trying to run her child's party.

The teachers always said when we are being bullied we should tell the teacher, you are doing the right thing. I wish you the best.

You have no sympathy with two adults abusing a 7 yo child? Thanks for telling us about yourself