Friend “hit(?)” my 8 year old.

[NetflixandKill1]

Help. Long time reader, first time poster.
so I am in a friendship group of 3 women. Myself, and Carrie and Nieve (names changed) We’ve been friends for a good few years. Between us there are 6 children. 5 girls, and my boy. Usually we all get along so well. Myself and my 2 friends have shared some deep things and we’ve bonded well. On the odd occasion I will feel like the outsider of the group. Carrie and Nieve tend to arrange things outside of our group chat. This hurt in the past, but I’m grown and accept that they’re just closer in general.
So, to the incident.
My child (8 M) was walking toward me and Nieve and Nieve child (8 F) launched towards him and tapped him, she he did the same back. Nieve got mad and said to my son “don’t punch my daughter otherwise I’ll punch you) he reacted quickly and replied “ok go on then” so she did. It was with a clenched fist, and a light jab on the top of his arm. This completely shocked me. I got upset and left. It couldn’t leave my mind so I ended up messaging her and telling her how I felt. I said it really upset me, and I don’t hit my own children so for another adult to do that, really hurt. She apologised for hurting my feelings, but will not apologise for what she did. She can’t see her wrong doing. She’s very impulsive, so I assumed she acted on impulse and I gave her a few days to think it over. I asked her if she had chance to think it through and her response was “no, should I have?” I’m heartbroken. She’s adamant she’s done nothing wrong. I basically told her she needed to apologise, but she has flat out refused. She spoke to another mutual friend we have who confirmed it would upset her also, but she still can’t accept it. I’m ready to walk away from this friendship. I don’t know if I’m making this bigger than it needs to be. Help. I am perfectly able to hear saw honesty. AITA

Ah, pressing charges isn’t a thing in the UK so I’m thinking maybe there were some crossed wires there.
Ha! Hopefully the big blubbering man has learnt his lesson.

If the grown adult in this situation didn’t go round lashing out at little kids then it wouldn’t have happened ffs. Can’t believe how up in arms people are about this boy saying ‘go on then’ when he’s been caught off guard with a threat of violence. The appropriate response would’ve been, ‘ooh you cheeky monkey!’ Or a joking boxing pose and laughing to break any tension before moving on. Or not issuing threats in the first place.

There are posters who always defend the adults in situations like this; it’s always because the child is rude/badly behaved. Because it must needs be the OP who has failed as a Mum somehow.

Violence/threat of violence against other people’s children is always completely out of order, end of. No attempt should ever be made to justify it. The OP’s friend shouldn't have made the threat in the first place.

That's a good point. We had a case where a French tourist was prosecuted for hitting his little girl in public.

I can understand that. You have to see her every day at school for the next couple of years. You’ve told her it’s out of order, you’re going to distance yourself and she knows it’s been said in the playground. I’d leave it there. If anything else happens you at least have those messages between you proving what happened if you need them.

On the basis that Nieve's DD tapped him first, this sounds like a very toxic situation and I think you should distance yourself from them. So YANBU.

Unless there is a backstory of your DS hurting the other kids? In that case, YABU.

Have we been told yet what ' tapping ' actually is ?

Completely disproportionate response from this woman (I wouldn’t call her a friend). Avoid and don’t subject your son to any more of her behaviour.

To be fair, there are few things worse than rude children.

Once again, not defending this woman’s reaction however.

It doesn’t sound like the little boy was particularly rude, though. His comment ‘go on then’ followed the friend’s threat to hit him. As far as I can make out, he hadn’t said anything before then, rude or otherwise.

Switch on the news. I can think of many things worse than a rude child right now. How would you have reacted when threatened with an act of violence?

What a fucking weirdo she is!! My two best friends and me have loads of kids and when they used to fight or argue we would collectively tell them to get a grip and knock it off. Imagine giving a little boy a punch, my mind is boggled!

Id have nothing to do with her ever again except perhaps dropping her a message to say hitting children is against the law.

Her child doesn’t sound rude to me at all. Confident, but not rude.

Are you one of those who thinks children should be seen and not heard?

That was the instant feeling I got. The older generation really don’t understand 2026 children. Times are different. Every child is different. Don’t tell me my child was rude because he had a reaction when threatened.

Yeah, your son behaved way better than the unhinged adult who thought it would be a good idea to punch him on the arm.

Crazy woman.

Just the threat of a punch would be enough for me. Who speaks to a child like that?! Tl

To be fair, there are lots of things worse than rude children. Like adults trying to minimise a grown adults threat of violence.

This is how I feel also. Nieve can’t understand my thinking. I would never threaten a child, let alone act it out. She apologised how it made me feel, but she didn’t and wouldn’t apologise for her actions. Insanity.

Her actions make no sense either, she clearly thinks your son was in the wrong because he's a boy who hit a girl (no other explanation really as it was her daughter who started it) but then she's an adult who hit a child which is arguably worse. It's so hypocritical

Does Nieve have a job? Please say she doesn't work with children.

No, I don’t like rude people in general.

Yes worse things happen on the news, I don’t mean literally.

I have at no point excused Nieve’s behaviour.

How would I react? If she said it jokingly, then maybe it wasn’t rude. If she was serious, I’d have probably crapped myself thinking she was a psycho and walked away

Just proves how bonkers MN can be when grown women are justifying an adult punching a child. Op take no notice of the fruit loops, some people really do tie themselves in knots to argue with the op even when there is very clearly no grey area to be had.

This is the thing. It wasn’t a joke. If you had have read my updates you’d have seen that. I’ve made the decision to leave the friendship and move along. It’s just not an energy that I want to be around. Thank you for your input.

Crazy old place this isn’t it?