Places actively discouraging children

[Allhallowseve]

Just wondering what other people opinions of this are?
I follow a few local garden centres as we visit quite regularly under normal circumstances. Since they have reopened they are advertising as being open but asking people not to bring children.
I am just finding the way children have been treated throughout this pandemic absolutely awful .... I don't know if it's just me?
Yes I know things could be far worse for them and people are shielding not able to really get out. But garden centres actively discouraging children from visiting?!
Adults are able to meet up in outdoor areas yet it's incredibly hard for children to do the same. Adults can pop out to shops now , grab a coffee maybe do a couple of things they enjoy . However the play parks are padlocked and taped up . Most school year groups are not going back until September , all playgroups , clubs and classes are cancelled. Yet they are the least vulnerable group in society and seem to have been forgotten.

Our family locked down voluntarily a week before the country did, as did many others. We'd started limiting social opportunities prior to that. So we do understand the purpose of lockdown.
Italy's health service was really struggling and we needed to ensure our nhs could cope. Fair enough.

Latest figures from the ons is that there were 3300 active cases up to the 7th June, or 0.06 percent off the population, or 1 in 1700. It must have been rife when we locked down, but now there's an incredibly small chance of encountering someone who not only has it, but has it asymptomatically/ pre-symptomatically so isn't already quarantining.

I don't think this justifies banning children from spaces.

Those saying children shouldn’t be allowed to go places because SOME children don’t follow social distancing and touch things etc then we should ban everyone, as I’ve seen plenty of adults not following social distancing too and not using sprays etc on entering shops!

At least there is plenty of evidence that children aren’t affected by and don’t spread covid, or certainly not the same as adults. Unlike adults.

so many people are unable or unwilling to keep their children under proper control.
esp at the moment, i don't want to be barged into by children running up and down in shops.
i remember tv person, henry kelly, saying much the same. he brought his children up to regard a trip to a cafe/ restaurant as a rare treat.
he made it clear to them that they had to behave a certain way. he told them that any infringements would show that they were not yet mature enough for such places, and they would leave immediately. he didn't have to do this often; they wanted to go, so they behaved properly.
parents now seem scared to simply require that their children do as they're told, to the detriment of everyone else.

My daughter went to sainsburys with my husband last night. Shes 12 and was just so bored. Didnt realise children were banned from Sainsbury's? She was happy to have a trip out!!

I took my daughter to Tesco with me today. She was a little star and lovely company, though cost me about three times what I'd been planning on spending.

@maddy68 Kids have spent more time stuck at home than adults, I'm not sure where you think they might pick it up.

I tooky son to a toy shop yesterday and he loved it. I agree with you OP, our children have sacrificed much in the name of saving other people's lives.

Imagine the uproar if people were told 'no over 60's' or 'no adults allowed

Exactly. Ageism works both ways. I think the way people are talking about children at the moment is despicable. I presume when those people are old and it’s our kids generation caring for them they’ll want respect then? Yet they aren’t willing to give it now- absolute hypocrites.

BackInTime, good point. In all the rain my daughter hasn't even been for her usual socially distanced daily walk in over a week. No chance of spreading it around garden centres, even if she licked every surface going.

Anywhere that "discourages" children just doesn't get my custom. I'm a lone parent, where I go my 7 year old goes.

There are lots of places where kids aren’t welcome at any time. They’re just not being welcomed at some garden centres temporarily. I don’t know why they’d want to go to one anyway right now, they’re pretty boring.

“Boring” for children in normal times maybe. But at the moment our children don’t have their preferred options - no playground, no soft play, no hobbies / clubs, no school, nothing really. Oh I forgot, they can go on another walk.

I personally wouldn’t actively choose visiting a garden centre, but if it means I can reduce the time in my house from 24 to 23 hours then I’ll probably take that at the moment.

Exactly lemons it’s quite baffling to me that people have so little imagination to not be able to work that out.

Yes well said lemons. There is literally nothing for kids to do at the moment. Of course going out somewhere is going to be preferable to sitting within the same 4 walls 24/7

Minimum number people in store to achieve SD should not be taken up by families
Exactly.
It's not a case of mean people hate children. Many businesses are on their knees and need customers who are actually going to do a proper shop.

The queues are large in places and that's for everyone's safety. There's limits on numbers in shops for everyone's safety. Unfortunately I don't think I'm alone in going somewhere else if it looks like I'm going to have to waste half my day queuing because some parents have decided their children need a change of scenery.

Exactly @LolaSmiles, I'm not sure why so many can't get this, and think it is just people being mean and discriminatory to children.

There is literally nothing for kids to do at the moment

This is patent nonsense. In the last four weeks, since travel has been allowed, I’ve been to the grounds of a stately home and Rutland Water several times. They were full of kids playing and running around, having a great time, I bet if you’d offered them a visit to a garden centre they’d have told you where you could stick it.

Come on this is just common sense. Of course it's best that children stay away from the shops. We're doing this to protect them you know, not just for a laugh. The more people that are in shops the more risky it is. Children don't need to go to the shops at any point. As for the other points adults can meet friends in outdoor areas and so can children. Adults can grab a coffee, I don't think that children are particularly drawn to coffee but there's no reason why a parent can't grab them something too.

We're doing this to protect them you know

No we're not. We're doing this to protect the people who are at risk of getting very ill and dying from this disease, which is almost never children. And that is still a good cause but frankly it is a bit weird that if my kids want to spent their pocket money on things from the garden centre they'll have to ask their elderly grandparents (who ARE more at risk) to pick them something up on their next visit.

We are mainly doing it to reduce the number of people in a shop at a time for social distancing purposes. A shop will want as many paying customers as possible at the moment, whilst still protecting the customers. The best way to do this is to reduce the amount of people from one household going into the shop. I am sure many shops that are restricting children going into a shop will also restrict the number of adults going into the shop from one household. It is not discriminatory against children it is just common sense. I am afraid children's pocket money spends do not make commercial sense for many shops at the moment.

This shift to keeping all the children hidden away is going to spectacularly implode with the summer holidays around the corner. We have a whole generation of people that we’ve ignored and they have absolutely nothing to do.

I nearly ran over a little gang of boys when I was out today, only about 10 or so years old. Normally they’d be in school or clubs or something but there is going to be millions like them soon milling around with nothing to do. Parents are going to have to work over summer and the care isn’t there to supervise or keep them busy.

What do you think is going to happen? I reckon in a few weeks a lot of individuals are going to be wishing they’d been a bit more generous with the garden centres rather than have the havoc we are heading for.

People are now meant to shop in singles in our shops but no one seems to bother about the endless pairs of pensioners strolling around there. Including my own 2 parents who have informed me they’ve been going to Aldi together in masks and gloves, I just know they’ll be a bigger bloody liability than a few kids

Nobody seems to care about the number of young couples who seem to be unable to shop alone either. They vastly outnumbered pensioners in Morrisons this afternoon.

This shift to keeping all the children hidden away is going to spectacularly implode with the summer holidays around the corner. We have a whole generation of people that we’ve ignored and they have absolutely nothing to do.

I nearly ran over a little gang of boys when I was out today, only about 10 or so years old. Normally they’d be in school or clubs or something but there is going to be millions like them soon milling around with nothing to do. Parents are going to have to work over summer and the care isn’t there to supervise or keep them busy.

What do you think is going to happen? I reckon in a few weeks a lot of individuals are going to be wishing they’d been a bit more generous with the garden centres rather than have the havoc we are heading for.

And that's why last weekend saw several illegal quarantine raves around Manchester, which resulted in stabbings and rapes as well as a massive clear up of gas cannister and the retrieval of weapons.

It's an environment in which young kids run the risk of being recruited into older gangs, if their parents are no where to be seen.

It's not a good mix. Boredom and frustration.

Nobody seems to care about the number of young couples who seem to be unable to shop alone either. They vastly outnumbered pensioners in Morrisons this afternoon.

True