to have removed a stick from a child in the playground who stuck the stick in DS2's eye??

[bythepowerofgreyskull]

his mum was watching him flinging the stick around, he had hit DS2 three times already and each time his mum had said oooh try not to hurt anyone.

The child giggled an ran off each time, DS2 wasn't very happy but not very sad either.
The last time the boy ran up to ds2 and poked the end of the stick into DS2's eye.. lots of screaming from DS2 later, the mum said honey I have asked you not to hurt anyone.

I saw red and walked over to the little boy and took the stick out of his hand and said "sorry I can't let you keep the stick because you have really hurt DS2 and I really don't want you to do it again"

trigger lots of tutting from the Mum and looks of "how dare you speak to my child" although she said nothing.

Her little boys is always punching kicking tripping up children and I had had enough.

Did I act inappropriately? Should I say anything to the Mum at pick up.. along the lines of .. I hope I didn't upset you taking the stick off your child this morning.. I really wanted to ensure he didnt' hurt DS2 again.??

Seriously KM? She took a stick out of his hand. She didn't beat him with it.

I would have asked the mother to remove the stick from her child after the second incident.

Once I would have let go.
Twice I would have insisted she take it off him, and keep it to play with when she got home.

The OP did nothing wrong however.

In situations like this you not only need to protect your children from injury, you need to show them that the behaviour of the other child is unacceptable, and that you will act to stop it.

i know. it's All Your Fault.

Well I actually think it goes beyond protecting her own child (although obviously that's the main concern).

It's about society and collective responsibility which includes to a certain extent, collective parenting. By this I mean all adults sendind out roughly the same message despite the nuances of their particular styles.

see, i don't really think that should influence your behaviour if the person isn't hard-looking...

I would have taken the stick off the child a lot sooner.

And if the mum decided to punch me in the face for my trouble, she would find that I am the one who can get litigious 'cos I would sue the feckin' pants off her.

I sometimes think that the attitude of not disciplining other folks children has a lot to say for the state of society today.

the mother is quite 'ard.

I was cross with the child but really really cross with the lack of care by the mother.

you were right to be cross. Couldn't care less who the mother is or whether she looked hard or not, the simple matter is that you protected your child (without harming the other)...

Agree with St George.

can't see what is wrong with taking the stick away. the lazy nice mother should have done it.
sorry KM but why should the op remove her dc who is doing no harm?

I'd not mess with you St G - I've seen you in action !!!!

Not all parents of "bullies" enjoy their child behaving aggressively at all, but I suspect there are some parents out there who quite like that their child is 'tough'.

I'd have walked over (and have done in the past) to both children and said loudly enough for all to hear that it's dangerous to play with sticks and that it ought to be put down in case someone gets hurt. If it wasnt taken on board, I'd have done as the OP did. It's never got that far though, IME.

To be honest, when DS is being beligerent with other children, I'd be grateful of the back up and assistance of other parents in disciplining him. Sometimes the words of a stranger or other parent are enough to shock him into stopping since I think he tunes out my voice sometimes. Ho hum.

Wot St George said.

True vvvqv - sometimes a close friend and I take turns in saying something to each others' dc as it has more effect!

I would have hit them both with the bloody stick

It really winds me up when parents sit and wath thier offspring being little shites and do notheing!

Sorry just want to add to the discussion that DS2 is 20 months and the child concerned is 4..
they weren't messing round together

QV

KM you could then spend your whole time doing it.

I don't get this precious 'no other adult is allowed to so much as look at my child, let alone tell him off or take a dangerous object off him'. When did that become the norm, exactly? Because when I was little we knew full well that if we were doing something mean, or dangerous, any passing adult who spotted us would put us straight. And quite right, too.

If you don't want your child to be told off by strangers, you are going to have to watch them at all times so they never, ever, do anything they shouldn't.

My DS is in a boisterous stage atm, it's driving me mad, when I take him to the park I'm constantly fretting that he is going to hurt someone

Removing well-behaved child from the vicinity of badly-behaved child just teaches both of them that aggressive/dangerous behaviour wins, though, doesn't it?