Would You Have Said Something?

[sherrardk]

Himself went out with boy #1 today and they both saw a woman bend down to her child (about 8 years old), punch the child in the face whilst hissing at him to 'shut up'! I'm pretty sure I would have said something (not sure what though), would you have said something?

[sherrardk]

I'm sorry about the typos - my husband is not overly observant, he does not notice what is going on around him, he probably couldn't anticipate what was about to happen.

[sherrardk]

He did see it (as did my son). He was probably too gobsmacked to react.

[ummmm]

I'm not sure what I would have done. If you confront someone who is mistreating a child then what next? You can't force them to stay there, and despite what people say, no decent person is going to assault a parent in front of their child, so you give them a load of verbal, child gets dragged home and parent takes their frustration on them.

All you can do really is phone the police and hope there is CCTV footage.

[sherrardk]

Think that's what I'm going to do. It was in Sports Direct so they must have a shed load of CCTV and I know the time to within five minutes.

[ummmm]

And hopefully she bought something by card.

[sherrardk]

Good thinking!

[Dee Sa]

I was once in the Roman Rd market in Bow East London and I saw a woman shout and slap round the face a boy about 12 years old, the boy promptly slapped and punched her back in the face, I was so shocked I had to sit down and by the time someone brought me water and I recovered they had gone. What sort of family life must have gone on in the household ? the image has stayed with me for years.

[sherrardk]

That's sad. I don't think most of us have a clue about how wretched some kids lives are.

[Jeza]

Same but different if you see what I mean. A man came in the shop and was in front of me in the queue. The shop door opened and a dog ran up to him. He kicked the dog and said outside and pushed it out. He then came back in the queue. I was so mad I kicked him and said get outside. If other people in the shop had not cheered I think he would have slapped me. He left. I am not a lover of dogs, but a lover of what's right or wrong.

[sandrajo]

Yesterday in tesco I witnessed a woman shouting at a small girl who had wandered away from her she pulled the tot by the ear then slapping her hard round the head!! I was appalled and very angry at what I just seen it did take me a few minutes to react but I wasn't the only one who had something to say to the woman, 2 woman stacking shelves had a few words to say to her and the woman just mumbled and shrugged them off mumbling she'll treat her daughter as she saw fit... Then a security guard appeared and asked the woman and the child to go with him. I don't know what happened after that my only hope is the kid never gets abused like that again!!