To not let my 12 year old hand around in the town centre

[Twooclockrock]

12 year old son is in a huge mood as we have said no to letting him go and hang around in the town centre with friends.
A teen family member was stabbed two weeks ago nearby but not in the town centre (non life threatening) , his cousin was mugged in the town centre not long ago, and a friends son age 17 was approached by a group of kids who produced a knife and told him to get out of their area only three weeks ago.
Plus we have had several letters home from school saying to stay out of the highstreets due to the school wars thing going on this past week.
London suburbs, relatively nice area but bordered by some not so nice areas and the town centre is a known hang out for gangs.
It feels so restricting and mean to say no, but I am concerned for his safety and think it's not worth it.
Do you let your tween/tern hang out in the toen centre? Ie walk around the shops, grab some food etc? It used to be the main event of a saturday for me when I was his age.

The repeated misspelling of McDonald’s suggests this is a wind up 🤣

Violent crime is actually at the lowest level for many years. Unfortunately, we have social media and right wing media trying to claim the opposite.

And people’s children being stabbed. And dying.

And the people calling Over reaction! are the same ones asking Why don’t they bring up their children properly? or even Oh well, it’s only those children - it doesn’t affect us.

I remember my utter horror and disgust a few years ago when a poster on a similar thread did actually write Well, it’s only Black youths killing each other, you don’t need to worry.

Shame on them. And shame on anyone on this thread who thinks the OP’s child isn’t as valuable as their own. (Obviously I don’t know the OPs demographic or environment, but I’m distressed by the wilful dismissiveness some people are enjoying themselves with here. I wish they’d stop.)

Correct!

Although any amount of children being stabbed etc is clearly not good.

I wouldn’t be surprised if this “red/blue school wars” thing had been put about by the far right in the first place. Or I was looking through it to see if there were any missing articles (a/ the, etc)…

That’s fucking awful, re what you read.

Some people should be ashamed if themselves.

My children’s classmates are majority black or Asian - and those children are absolutely as entitled to life as mine are - makes me sick when people dismiss children’s (or adults) lives like that.

Jones town ... didn't say it did but they also need peer interaction and something to get their 'teeth into'

Yanbu, I have never ever seen a group of teens hanging around anywhere that were not loud, irritating and obnoxious. Ever.
Why do they need to hang around anywhere?
i don’t know anyone with teens whose kids do this. It’s always at someone’s home, or actually doing an activity or something. Never just hanging around.

There were two unprovoked attacks at shopping centres in my locale in the past 3 days. One man was attacked with a knife and died. Another was attacked with a machete and is in a serious condition in hospital. Both were just going about their business. Like heck am I allowing my teenage son to hang around those shopping centres of an evening.

@GertrudePerkinsPaperyThingsame. I have a 10yo and won’t be allowing this hanging around. I have a lot of friends with older kids and teens and none of them do this hanging around nonsense. That’s what leads to trouble. My ds’s friends have older siblings who don’t do this either so for me it’s good that it’s normal for him.
we will encourage and allow lots of planned trips and activities and our home is open for friends to visit, but won’t allow ‘hanging around’

The odd macdonalds isn't going to do any harm. You can't wrap him up in bubble wrap forever anyway - I think a town trip at 12 is perfectly okay.

DD goes into town with her friends. She does plenty of activities, goes to friends houses and we have an open house, but sometimes they want independence and to do things away from adults. It’s a small town and chances are if they misbehaved someone we know would see them and it would get back to me. (Although now off to various other more exciting places on bus/train most of the time —again independently!)

Given the warnings from school, I would probably say no this time but promise a review once it has calmed down. It’s a very hard tightrope between allowing them growing independence and wanting to keep them safe.

If the public transport is good - then can you enable him to use it independently or head somewhere where you’d be more comfortable with him going?

12 seems a bit young to be " hanging about" in a town centre. I would be worried that they might be:
a) targeted by undesirable older teens and either be encouraged to join them and their activities
or
b) get hassled or worse by other older teens because they look young and vulnerable.
Of course you know your local town centre, and it might be an idillic place, but I wouldn't let my child do it without an older responsible teen or teens on hand to teach them the ropes of what to stay away from.

I take it knows about the events of recent??
So what you say goes,without question, he can find something else to do!!!
Also you should ignore the mood.

If you are really insisting that things have not changed dramatically in the last 20 years, you are gaslighting.

Then I guess my teenage son was repeatedly beaten up and twice robbed, and our friends' sons also robbed in the past, all within the confines of social media and right-wing press (Indy? Guardian?). Gotcha.

Don't be ridiculous. Not at all whst OP is saying. But if they gain other interests they will probably never want to just hang out. Seen this happen many times

It wouldn’t surprise me. According to the police, there have been absolutely no violent incidents actually linked to this school wars trend.

Sounds like someone trying to whip up hysteria.

No one is denying that incidents sadly do take place. Overall though, violent crime levels are down significantly.

What we have now is constant social media posts about the violence that does occur, which are then amplified by the Daily Mail etc.

It is illogical and counter-productive to smother young people because of things that are very unlikely to happen.

It would be like saying I’m going to stop flying because of occasional plane crashes.

Very presumptuous of you to think that everybody with safety concerns is swayed by DM. I don't read DM (or The Sun for that matter) but I do have eyes and I do speak with friends almost all of whom are parents of teenagers or young adults.

I would be interested to know which violent crimes are down - because it’s easier to get the figures to the figures to say what you want.

Growing up as a teen in the 90s - violent crimes among teens were fights - as in punches and kicks; and at the very worst, baseball bats.

Now - we are talking machetes and kitchen knives. They are just not comparable.

As a mother myself, your doing the right thing. He won't understand that tho. Can you offer to have a couple of his friends over at the house maybe ? Or any other alternatives

The figures are extremely clear.

There were 4.5 million violent offences in 1995, compared to 2.6 million last year.

That is a huge drop given that the population has grown massively since then.

I think what the poster is saying that it might be the fist fights that had dropped. But the knives are more dangerous .

So say there was 2000 violent incidents in the 90s and 1800 of them were first fights. The other 200 being knife attacks

Now the violent crime has dropped to 1200. But 1000 of them are knife attacks

That's not really better is it?

If your town centre is Bromley, I have seen on Facebook posts about the "school wars". Why not keep your son away whilst this is going on but let him go in a few weeks for just a meal and a brief look at the shops.
If your centre is Croydon, I would understand not letting him go at all.

I have grandchildren that aren't allowed into town on their own.
The parents have set up all sorts of activities after school clubs, weekend drama group for one, football for the other, in-between family group hobbies.
Going to clubs etc, they meet like minded friends.

The idea being it keeps them off the streets. No doubt there will be a time they will venture further. I feel so sorry for parents, hearing all sorts of horror stories.