AIBU to feel uneasy about teens congregating outside shops?

[fld]

Is it just me that I don’t feel comfortable with kids and teens congratulating outside shops so making it difficult for people to leave and enter.

Plus they swear.

This behaviour isn’t big or clever.

You sound ridiculous to be honest.

Hasn't this been a thing since the beginning of time. I remember "hanging around" trying to get someone to buy me 10 L&B and a litre of white lightening. There wasn't any youth clubs 30 years ago and there certainly isn't now.

Given the closures of community centres and youth centres across the country, the increasing cost of activities such as cinemas and activities like roller skating, what else do you expect them to do?

Would you rather they stay indoors staring at screens for 15 hours a day?

Yes they might use bad language or be in the way but in my experience if you simply say “excuse me”, they’re very polite and will move out of your way.

Also, did you mean congregating?

Gosh that brings back embarrassing memories. I once asked a police officer (on his day off) at aged 12 to buy me cider, he actually did!

Just ask them (politely) to move when you go in or out the shop.
9 times out of 10 I get a "oh sorry" and they move.
It really isn't an issue.

When I was a teen, I used to hang out at my and my friends' homes. Why can't they do this now?

Youth clubs are crap. They don't last long as there is a pool table, seating - that's it - well in my days

Congregating - there are around half a dozen of them,

I did say excuse me - they told me to FO

As a black woman in my area, there are loads of white kids that congregate outside my local shops all the time..I've stopped going. It's really intimidating

I can absolutely see how it can be intimidating.

I can also understand that it will very much vary by the type of people congregating. I can imagine there are areas that you wouldnt feel safe challenging.

But... is it that they are trying to intimidate and cause issues or is it that you lack confidence to ask them to move aside?

I've never had any issues with "excuse me" personally. But I've been told I can have a pissed off teacher voice and most of the kids congregating by us don't mean any harm so will move when asked. If anyone has any tips on getting my daughter to pay as much attention to me as loitering youths, please tell me!

If it's a particular shop, it might be worth mentioning to the owner that they've stopped you coming in.

Yeah my mum hated me doing this asa teen.
nowhere else to go really.

She signed me up for every activity known to man

When I meet the odd group who respond to excuse me with “fuck off”

I reply “I’m trying but you’re in my way”

Usually if they don’t get a reaction and don’t think you care about their presence and language they soon just move!

Are you messaging from 1986 OP?! 🤣.

I kinda like a feral kid group, reminds me of my own 😂. Round here they are still terribly nice and polite even when congratulating each other outside shops (HIGH FIVE😁). I generally find if you treat them with courtesy, eye contact and a smile they are nice back, or certainly not sweary. Maybe work up a smart comeback for next time!

There was a huge group of about 20 gathered along our local parade of shops yesterday. Swearing and shouting. A few were on bikes and were doing wheelies on the wrong side of the road into oncoming traffic forcing cars to stop while they circled round them laughing and banging on the car roofs. They were all aged about 12-14. I don’t think “excuse me please” was going to get you very far with them.

I find most teens are polite if you talk directly to them. In your case, if they are blocking the door or walkway, and are rude if you ask them to move, then talk to the manager of the shop. They are impeding access to his place of business, so it is his concern.

Sometimes it’s this. To visit my parents, I drive down a service road. Had it in the past where about 8 of try to block the road with their bikes. One of my parents’ neighbours had their rear wiper pulled off by them.

Do we need to go back to the near-ultrasound devices to repel them, which I can hear, even though I’m supposed to be too old to do so? These were fashionable for a while.

Let us not forget that teenagers were demonised in 2020 for simply existing: they were “vectors of transmission”, had many things in their lives destroyed by Saint Boris and his merry men, and some of them are still feeling the effects.

Yes, teenagers can appear intimidating when in large groups, especially if they are messing about, blocking entrances to shops, and riding bikes all over the road. But on balance, I think it’s better if they’re out and about, instead of their lives being screens and nothing else.

To be honest, I find the persistent charity stalls right at the entrance or exit of the shop just as irritating. At least the kids don't try to stop you and guilt you into giving them money.

Didn't they use to have that Mosquito system, whereby they used to play annoying sounds near the shop doorways that only people under a certain age could hear? Probably very unethical; but I did hear of some places that just play loud classical music, which has a similar effect on making the young hoodlums disperse!

I guess it can't be much fun being their age with nothing else to do but hang around in big groups. If they could actually do something - kick a ball around, play games or whatever, it wouldn't be nearly as menacing; but teenagers playing top trumps or British Bulldog is probably deeply saaaaaaaad nowadays.

I hate this kind of behaviour and I'm not surprised you find it intimidating - I do too.

The PPs jumping on you have possibly never come across this kind of crowd.

You think it’s better for 12 year olds to be deliberately doing wheelies towards cars then calling the drivers fucking cunts and banging on their cars while preventing them from driving better than being on a screen? I have to disagree. Besides it’s not one or the other. I didn’t have screens growing up. Except a TV and a sega mastersystem when I was 12. I managed to not intimidate the public while riding my bike with friends or stay in the house 24 hours a day.

I hate it too but it’s hardly anything new, they did it when I was a teen and I hated it then too. Find it intimidating. I avoid running in the evening because of this too, they always feel the need to say something to me or occasionally run after me and find it hilarious.

Where would you like them to congregate?

We had people locally complaining about them meeting in the toddlers play area until it was pointed out those were the only benches.

They can’t meet in pubs and don’t have the money for cafes. Ask your council to put some benches beside a skateboard park or on the local rec, and they’ll move there.

Make provision for them. They have as much right to exist as anyone else.

Just ignore them. They are not interested in you.

It's not always possible for them to hang out at a friend's house so this is just somewhere to go and idle away their time.

Are they rude to you? Are they doing something dodgy like selling drugs? If their crime is just congregating outside a shop, then ignore. There should be more youth clubs and community centres.

To be honest, I find the persistent charity stalls right at the entrance or exit of the shop just as irritating. At least the kids don't try to stop you and guilt you into giving them money. @ParsleySageToiletDuckAndBinBags

The charity stalls outside of shops are very irritating! I have been hassled by them much more than I have ever been by a group of bored teenagers.

It's part of why I use Amazon so much.

Where I live, the girls vape, the boys smoke weed and do wheelies in the bus station to impress the girls.