French shopkeeper thinks English parenting is terrible

[Turquoiseforever]

Long one sorry, but I've included details to try and give an accurate picture!

Holidaying in France currently and have had a memorable incident in a shop today that has given me some food for thought, just interested in other people's thoughts on this.

Gave my oldest kids (3 & 6) €5 each to buy a souvenir of their choice at our local seaside town. Most shops turned out to be quite bougie and aimed at adults, but saw one which looked hopeful. Had an A-frame sign outside with a plastic colourful beach windmill on it, and a rack of children's clothes. Went in and quickly realised it was again full of very valuable things. At one end was a basket of handmade crocheted teddies, handmaid kids clothing, and some wooden toys. The kids took a look at the teddies, picked one up each then sat in two kids chairs holding them on their laps for a few minutes while I had a quick look round the shelves around them. We had a look at a few other things together, for full disclosure: when we entered my 3yo picked up a very delicate cup which I quickly set down and reminded her not to do. As we were leaving my 6yo very gently pointed out a necklace to me on a very flimsy stand that started to tip over, which I caught before it fell and set upright again. They looked at a few other things without incident or touching.

We didn't spend long, said merci and went on our way. About 10 mins later a lady from the shop approached us in the street and informed me my kids had broken two toys in her shop. We went back with her and found out that the rabbit teddies they had been holding had some very thin toothpick-like sticks of wood in each ear (to shape them a bit) which had been broken by my daughters twisting the ears, pretending to give them a 'hair style'. I had no idea at all they had been broken. Obviously this is my responsibility and error of judgement, and was totally correct to be brought to my attention.

However, the lady also subjected me to a rant about how French children would NEVER pick things up in a shop, they are taught "limits", whereas all summer she has had English, German etc children visiting and breaking things and being given "no limits" by their parents. Complained we had left the place a mess and her husband had to tidy behind us, because the teddies were placed back in the basket but not sat upright as previously displayed (I had set the chairs back carefully but admittedly been distracted from checking the basket).

I pushed back (calmly!) on her generalised critique of my parenting, and she said she has just lost patience after a summer full of similar experiences and essentially admitted this lecture wasn't personal. Still, it was pretty heavy handed to give in public in front of my children and other customers.

To be clear I know I made an error. We had been in a few quite breakable shops already which required heavy parenting, and I guess I saw an opportunity for a quick relief for us all. Normally I would supervise my children looking at anything handmade, so it was a lax moment, but I did think they were just wool and stuffing and wouldn't suffer at all from light playing. Also, typically I wouldn't take my children into these kind of shops. They have never broken anything in a shop before!

I just wonder how humbled I should be. Did I just catch this lady on a really bad day? Was she a bit racist? Are french children really that obedient all the time? Should I strike it off as a bad day and move on without too much thought, or do I take the criticism on board more strongly and accept I should be stricter with things like this and re-evaluate my parenting?! Do we really have much lower standards in the UK?

It's a shame, we've had a lovely holiday but now I feel like we're not that welcome here and have been judged/looked down on in general. Do we really have a terrible reputation in France?

Yes very interesting how many have mentioned the shoplifting, what is it with French teens and shoplifting?

I'd chalk this one up to experience & cultural differences OP!

I do find some shop keepers in France have a very fussy and over protective attitude to their stock! Even as an adult, if I unfold a jumper to put it against myself to see how it looks in the mirror and refold it after; immediately the shopkeeper appears behind me to re-arrange it the display 😂 It makes me feel very uncomfortable and puts me off buying anything, but I guess French customers must be used to it as otherwise the shops wouldn't stay in business.

That said, your kids shouldn't have broken the stuffed animal ears - they are kids and these things happen, but in this situation you probably should have offered to pay for them.

Certainly under the Equality Act 2010

Yeah she was grumpy, at least she pretty
much told you it wasn’t just you though and she was at the end of her tether… Rude to imply it’s just British kids though. We were camping at the new forest a few weeks ago and there were some French teenagers who were running around like looneys, shouting and screaming late at night… I didn’t think ‘oh god aren’t all French teenagers little shits.’ Just those ones 😂

I don't think it's ok to allow your DC to touch / pick up things you don't intend to buy.

I agree British parents are scared to say No to their DC and this doesn't benefit children in the long run.

I'm not convinced about the French children = well-behaved, English children = savages thing. But that might be from coming across a lot of school groups of different nationalities in various holiday jobs when younger - I've met appallingly-behaved children of many nationalities!

That said, you were clearly in the wrong. Since my children were babies, the rule has been "we don't touch if we're not going to buy". I would have thought most parents would have this rule, unless the toy is very clearly displayed to be played with, as happens in some big toy shops. And you're not supervising your kids closely enough in shops if they can knock things over.

I think it is true that French children aren't allowed to annoy their parents and surrounding adults to the same degree as English children.

It's your poor parenting, not specifically British parenting. Although parents these days do often seem to be much more lax than when I brought up my children in the 90s.

French parents are generally much more keen on teaching manners and good behaviour in public with their young children than British parents are.

Children aged 3 and 6 should certainly not be picking up and " lightly playing" with toys in shops, let alone twisting the toys' ears to make a "hairstyle". Letting them do that when you clearly had no intention of buying the handmade toys is terrible parenting, in Britain as well as France. The shopkeeper was absolutely justified in having a go at you. She now has unsellable toys which means she's lost money. Even if your children hadn't broken them they would have rubbed their likely quite dirty hands over them.

In shops young children need to be extremely well controlled yet you didn't do this. You need to improve your parenting so that your children can learn how to behave properly.

If the child is respectful and puts things back the same way they found them then what is the problem? Of course if my child caused any damage I would pay for it.
If you go somewhere like Smyths Toys you really expect a child not to touch anything?

The kids weren't just looking at them though. They were twisting their ears to give them "hairstyles".

You should have been watching them far more closely. You describe several times where items could've easily been damaged because you weren't being vigilant. The shopkeeper was right to be pissed off.

I agree
I think there’s a lot of “gentle parenting” of a snowflake generation happening. Those parents aren’t helping their children as they won’t thrive in the real world and be able to cope being independent.

I used to work in a Tesco and it was unbelievable what parents would let their kids do to keep them “entertained”.
Tje amount of toys that were picked up played with round the store then discarded ( often broken) was nuts.
I thought “not touching” was a fairly normal rule but clearly that’s changed.

I have the most appallingly badly behaved children (or in other interpretations, one with severe ADHD and one with likely ADHD). We have recently had a French holiday and found that yes, the French children are better behaved but a) everyone was extremely understanding especially in restaurants b) we kept things tightly locked down in shops, left restaurants quickly after eating etc. and c) we used the example of the French children to our advantage.
Look at those children, they are much younger than you and they are sitting nicely/not watching their mum's phone. And this helped a lot - in the UK we are fighting a losing battle when every single other child in a restaurant is on a device for example.
It helps that my French is better than every other English person we came across and a fair number of the German/Dutch tourists and we even used my French to interpret between a Belgian tourist and a police officer! So I was able to explain that DS saying "I'm not hungry" grumpily actually meant he'd eat a pizza after he had a smoothie down him (though I need to learn the French for hangry).

So, your children broke exhibited hand-made objects.
You haven't even noticed and left.
And your biggest concern is, that she told you so in public/in front of your children.

Did she have any other options to inform you than in public and in front of your children?

@Drivingmissrangey@Ladyluckinred@SeptaUnellasBell

Im afraid you are all incorrect and @Drivingmissrangeyit is you who need educating.

I would refer you to The Equality Act 2010 and the helpful notes in www.equalityhumanrights.com

I think the French strict parenting works very well when adults are actively supervising, but once they don't have an adult watching them not so much.

A bit lax on your part to allow kids to sit and play with teddies they weren't going to buy while you looked around.

Kiddy fingers are generally gross. They shouldn't be handling things they're planning to return to shelves.

When I lived in Oxford (where there were lots of French school parties, notable for all having identical rucksacks and one teacher per about 30 kids) they did a crackdown on shoplifting and had to stop when the police station was full of French School kids - although one issue was arrest one and 29 other kids had to come as there was only one adult.

The issue for me is letting them sit and hold something you clearly had no intention of buying; that's pretty rude. Would never have allowed that for my kids.

Did you pay for the two broken teddies?

Presumably the shop can't sell them now after your children used her merch as if they were in a playgroup.

You weren't parenting them properly. I hope you paid for the items.

You "didn't spend long" but it sounds like you went through the shop like a whirlwind, leaving a trail of destruction. There were a lot of mishaps in a short period of time.

But racist is not just limited to race now, it also includes ethnicity, culture and religion these days.

Did I just catch this lady on a really bad day? Maybe. But I can see why she was cross.

Was she a bit racist? Hard to tell. You didn’t specify your race or her race. She could have been xenophobic at most.

Are french children really that obedient all the time? Obviously not all the time, there will be badly behaved French children. But on the whole they’re better behaved then children from Britain.

Should I strike it off as a bad day and move on without too much thought, or do I take the criticism on board more strongly and accept I should be stricter with things like this and re-evaluate my parenting?! I wouldn’t dwell on it too much. But I think you should have been watching them more carefully, given the type of shop and the things on offer, especially the 3yo.

Do we really have much lower standards in the UK? Absolutely. But then I think the UK is far less child friendly than mainland Europe. European children are usually better behaved as they are more integrated into culture, such as being out late at night with family having meals.

and how would that make her not racist against English parents? 🤦🏽‍♀️

This! French kids on school trips are fucking FERAL. Think running around hotel corridors at 1am. Has happened twice (in Greece and Italy) when taking trips. Other nationality teachers were Not Amused.

Racist? How would this be racist in any way?