To be disappointed with how soft play handled this man

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I reported an inappropriate sexual comment made by another parent at a soft play area yesterday.

I was climbing down from one of the raised areas with my DS and didn’t realise he was climbing up. I said a polite sorry and he replied not to worry and that if he knew his £10 entry included him getting an arse in his face he would have visited months ago. I challenged him and then reported to staff.

The staff approached me 10/15 minutes later to say they’d spoken to him and he had admitted saying that but was ‘obviously joking’ and he relayed his apologies, so they considered the matter sorted.

Personally, I think he should have been asked to leave. He made me feel extremely uncomfortable and could have gone on to say similar to other parents present.

That would have made me laugh too 😂😂

Yes, that is true - and a good distinction drawn between the two situations.

I was really only commenting in jest though.

I think it is easy to be too serious about this. OP accidentally did something we all would find faintly embarrassing both on her end and his receiving end, and I don't think trying to be light-hearted was too unreasonable as an on the spot response from him. He possibly veered into poor taste but I think it was the awkwardness of the moment. I really don't see a pervy creep in this.

blimey, that's an interesting take ! I've missed all these sexualised Reform supporter comments -please enlighten us

The country is definitely doomed if 92% will vote Reform as 92% on this thread have said that the OP is being unreasonable.

Wales and Scotland have had em for years. No outrage at all. Less smelly bins. Win, win, win, win, win!

I'm sorry but when you are a parent... You literally have to be able to laugh things off... He was trying to make it cool and less awkward ... I would have died laughing at this comment... I don't see the issue and if you can't laugh at this hilarious friendly batter.. after a completely awkward situation... Dang... You have a long road ahead of you being a parent... And spoiler alert you are going to spend it pretty much pissed off, not letting stuff go, & making posts about it all.

I’m sorry, but the mindset behind wanting this bloke kicked out is a massive overreaction.

By your own admission, you were the one climbing down without checking. It was a complete accident, but you initiated the physical contact.

Now look at the reverse scenario, imagine if he had been the one to back into you, put his body inches from your face, and then demanded you be kicked out of the center because he didn't like how you reacted to the awkwardness. It’s completely backwards.

You are in soft play, where adults are forced to squeeze past strangers. Have some thick skin, physical contact is pretty much guaranteed.

His comment was a spur of the moment attempt to laugh off an awkward situation that you caught him off guard with so nobody felt weird about it.

If 2 blokes or 2 women bumped into each other like that, they’d laugh about getting up close and personal. But because it’s a man and a woman, a joke about an accident you caused is suddenly treated as a serious safeguarding issue?

The staff did exactly the right thing. He admitted what he said, confirmed it was a joke, and apologised. Expecting a parent to be thrown out and humiliated in front of their kids over it is wild.

Honestly, without the internet, this whole post wouldn’t even exist, and neither would this hypersensitive mindset.

In the real world, you'd roll your eyes, forget about it by the time you got to the car, and move on. But today, everyone has a burning need to run to social media, desperate to have their outrage validated by strangers online to convince themselves they were the victim.

Read the room, accept responsibility for the awkward bump, and just move on. Life's much better this way 😀

This is so much worse than the OP!

Did you consider that you put him in a uncomfortable situation?

You, a stranger, put him in a physically awkward position with an intimate party of your body (I appreciate you say it was an accident and I take your word for it) and he tried to make light of it in response.

People react to uncomfortable situations with deflecting humour all the time and don't always have perfect reactions when confronted with it.

I'm not sure your perpetrator-victim axis is in entirely the right balance.

Oh sorry, I hasn't read this before commenting. Basically snap!

She got 92% YABU probably because other people who wouldn’t have found the comment funny still found her response to it complete overkill. Way over the top

So many strangers will have clicked your profile page to check to see if they can spy your bottom

I also think this. I think the op doesn’t often get comments like this and she’s rushed around telling as many people as she can, from the staff to face book to here.

but some of the comments on here are wild. People are going far too far. Accusing this man of all sorts.

it was clearly an inane comment to an embarassing moment, an off hand comment too, simply in reaction to the situation.

id suggest the op is more careful in soft play in future, looks where she’s going, so she avoids shoving her arse in men’s faces.

I agree.

And on top of that, he did apologise. Why the need to go further and remove him? He didn't come near you again did he? In fact probably stayed well clear of your protruding posterior.

Yep. 18 is an adult. It can be difficult to establish, purely from appearance, one's age, and so it is common practice to approach with caution if unsure.

As for why it's ok to say it to an adult but not a teenager... Teenagers are children. Children don't have the same ability as adults to understand the nuances of language, because they are not yet mature enough. It seems you have not yet matured to that point, either.

I'm more concerned with why the woman thought it was ok to shove her arse in this guy's face. Someone so concerned about a potential sexual inference should be far more careful where she puts her hiny. Maybe the bloke has been on the receiving end of unwanted attention, in the past, and now struggles with women's arses. Perhaps he was exceptionally uncomfortable and nervous, and tried to lighten the situation but has gone home deeply disturbed by the position she put him in.

Why are you so concerned about what he said as a reaction to having a woman's arse in his face?

I can see both sides of this. He made a joke because you did put your backside in his face. It could have been that he got offended or even made a point of putting you in your place. What if he didn't make a joke and said " you need to be more careful and look where you're going as putting your bottom in someone's face could result in a sexual assault complaint". How would you have felt about that? What if he'd gone to complain and you were asked to leave for an accident? How would you're child have responded to that? He apologised, realised his error and is unlikely to say something like that again.

My husband makes jokes when he's embarrassed and I can imagine how upset he would have been if that happened to him. It would probably knock his confidence for engaging with people in public spaces.

That being said, raising it as inappropriate was brave and if comments come across as inappropriate and sexual, men do need to be put in their places and that what happened. Move on

Also think this is funny. Honestly - the humourless complaining about light hearted conversations during a slightly awkward moment aren’t making anyone’s life easier.

I think she's being unreasonable! I'm not voting for Reform. Your assumption is ridiculous.

You keep undermining yourself and you've no idea you're doing it.

Imma get the popcorn.

Whilst I doubt he would, I'd find it hilarious if my husband said that to someone. He would be saying it entirely as a joke with absolutely no sexual interest in the person he made the joke to. He'd be as likely to say it to another bloke as he would a woman, as would I.

This is patently ridiculous.

You seem to be trying to imply she deliberately assaulted a man who may have been sexually harassed in the past (very unlikely). But as others have pointed out, she accidentally put her arse on (or near – OP doesn't seem to have been specific) his head, and immediately apologised for doing so.

In contrast, his choice to make a sexual comment in the form of a joke, implying he found his contact with her to be sexually gratifying, was just that – a choice. And OP is far more likely to have dealt with unwanted sexual harassment and unwanted comments than he is.

But clearly you're not discussing in good faith, so I'm done. Enjoy your catcalls and sexual commentary, I suppose.

I actually assume he would have but then I'm in the camp of being able to make jokes like this without their being any ill-intent behind them.

oh my goodness what a massive over reaction. it was a poor joke. Get over yourself.

A take on this, alternative to yours, isn't patently ridiculous. You are unable to view anything outside of your linear vision. You also seem to be entirely lacking in understanding nuance.

I do think, for someone with such a take as yours and OP's, there lies blame with OP. I think you have both made inferences where they did not exist.

Why is it unlikely the bloke has been sexually harassed in the past? Why so dismissive? The amount of blokes who have been sexually harassed is significant. Speak to them - most have got stories.

As for accidentally putting her arse in his face, that's simply not good enough if she's going to be the type to make negative assumptions about men. She has treated soft-play as a women's-only environment where she does not need to be considerate about her body positioning. Would she have been more careful climbing down the ladder, had it been expected every other parent in there was a bloke? Probably. That suggests she took liberties with assuming that the space was hers / women's.

I think you're going a bit far to think he was implying he got sexual gratification from her. It was a joke on the situation, not his personal feelings. That joke could have been made to any person with any arse - that man is not going to find every person and every arse sexually gratifying.

I am absolutely discussing in good faith. I think your mind needs broadening. Your approach is far too simplistic.

As for catcalls - that is something completely different. You're inability to differentiate is a huge part of the problem, here.

What's your husband's take on this?

You summed up beautifully what I was going to say.
Poor bloke trying to make her feel better, most people (92% it seems) would have had a bit of banter back or just laughed and moved on.