Why does this affect me so much?

[brucemillar]

Parked outside the local supermarket in the 'Pickup & Drop' waiting on my wife. I catch site of a young (4 or 5 year old) beautiful blonde girl, who has a smile bigger than her face. She is straining to push a trolley into the adjacent trolley bay, but obviously enjoying her task.

Just as she gets the trolley into the bay and retrieves the token, I her a really loud angry female shout (and I mean really loud). The shout is along the lines of 'GET OVER HEAR AND GET IN THE F*ing CAR. Everybody turns to look, including me, at a large mixed race, young woman, who now runs and grabs the child by the arm, forcibly lifting her feet off the ground, she dragged the child over the crossing with her feet scraping along the ground, still shouting GET IN THE F*ing CAR!!!. When they both reached the F*ing car, she threw the child in the back seat in a manner that must have hurt her, it is impossible for that not to have hurt, and slammed the door.

I sat and watched it all. I wanted to get out and intervene and I didn't.

Now it haunts me, I cannot think of anything else, all day and night and now again his morning. I feel terrible for the little girl to whom this must be life, and for my own lack of action to intervene and, at least say to the adult, "stop it, this is wrong".

I know it's 'what goes on'. I know it is irrational of me, but it has really got under my skin, to the point that all I can see is that child's sweet innocent (not over-dramatising here) smile and the look of terror as she was dragged along with her shoes scuffing the ground. It makes me want to weep. But it also makes me want to go back find the woman and drag her along.

Feel free to laugh, snigger comment at my weakness. But it was horrible to witness and I am ashamed that as an adult I did nothing.

Just saying.

 

[WDB124066]

Did you get the plate, call the authorities. I have with a similar incident.

 

[brucemillar]

Did you get the plate, call the authorities. I have with a similar incident.

No I did not take the plate. I could have and should have but I did absolutely sod all.

 

[WDB124066]

If you know you are balanced and see suffering like that with humans or animals don't be afraid to be called a dobber. What you see may well be just the tip, but let the authorities deal with it.

You will probably find somebody else somewhere else is on to this, if not now in a week or twos time...

 

[219]

I fear I might have been the same , and it would certainly bother me too .

Short of seeing her again , probably not a lot you can do .

You could possibly report the incident to police or social services .

The supermarket may have cctv of the incident which the police could act on , along with your witness statement.

The child may be enduring a life of abuse .

 

[219]

Assuming this happened quite recently, you could go back to the supermarket , explain the situation, and ask them to see if they have it on cctv , with the number plate visible , or they might have cctv of the woman at the checkout and be able to identify her by payment card . If they do , then report the matter to the police .

Actually might be worth reporting to police first and offer to go with an officer to identify the woman from any cctv .

Most cctv systems keep recordings for 3-4 weeks before over writing.

This is unlikely to be a single , isolated incident.

 

[Ted]

Sometimes it takes time to react to just what is happening and sometimes it doesn’t, Bruce.
There are probably people who would do nothing in an emergency - say the Grenfell fire, then somthing triggers and they risk their lives.
Would I have done something? Probably not - not because I wouldn’t want to get involved but what would it achieve? Possibly more mistreatment for the little girl.
As wdb124066 says, maybe a call to the authorities (I don’t know which but it WAS assault) would do something - maybe not.
And like you, I would be turning it over in my head as to what I could have done better.

 

[saff]

You have not shown weakness, merely compassion. It doesn't matter if you're a strapping six-foot bloke or a mild-mannered lady, you see something like this and it registers something in you. I would feel the same in your position. On a 'lesser' note I feel a similar horror when I witness or hear of animal abuse, though not as much as with a child. The reaction you are feeling will fade I guess but you'll probably never forget.

The perpetrator is obviously a disturbed individual who needs to be stopped to prevent further abuse of this poor child.

 

[m80]

If you report it to the Police, and request feedback from their actions,
they can investigate any CCTV footage. With you as witness also charges of abuse become plausible.

As a minimum the 'lady' would become known to social services.

 

[KennyN]

What realistically could you have done at the time , had a chat with the mother to show her the error of her ways and give her some sound advice regarding parenting skills - NO ,she would have told you to F off and then the partner would have got involved and you would have ended up rolling around the car park , then police get involved and you get charged and in a cruel twist she would blame the child for causing it in the first place.

Report them , so social services can get involved eventually if at all. Then what , child gets taken into care system and god only knows what can happen then.

The parent clearly doesnt give a toss for her offspring or children in her care and no amount of reasoning with them will change their views.

It is a very sad world we live in now .

No where near the same severity as your situation but we were doing a bit of hill walking the other day and met a young couple with a dog that was a carbon copy of ours so we had a brief chat about the breed , i went to pat the dog and as soon as i touched the head the dog let out a yelp as it had some pretty nasty cuts on the side of its head , the owner was too quick to tell us the reason for the injuries and that it had ran into a tree. That got me looking at the side of the dog which was also in a bad way regarding injuries and as i was looking at them they made their excuses and left , the animal was terrified of the chap , as soon as he moved the dog flinched as if it was waiting for an impact , ears back and tail right under the body. I still shudder and think about at what a woeful existence that poor animal has , and for how much longer before it is just discarded or worse.

Kenny

 

[PXW]

I'd report it. Give the police and/or social services a call and say what you saw and heard. The woman may just be plain nasty, or she may be at the end of her tether for reasons we can only speculate over. But abuse is abuse (and is no respecter of social class). Even if nothing is done, it will be noted - safeguarding often looks for clusters of incidents that build a picture, not just the one big incident that is seen as being "enough".

 

[brucemillar]

What realistically could you have done at the time , had a chat with the mother to show her the error of her ways and give her some sound advice regarding parenting skills - NO ,she would have told you to F off and then the partner would have got involved and you would have ended up rolling around the car park , then police get involved and you get charged and in a cruel twist she would blame the child for causing it in the first place.

Report them , so social services can get involved eventually if at all. Then what , child gets taken into care system and god only knows what can happen then.

The parent clearly doesnt give a toss for her offspring or children in her care and no amount of reasoning with them will change their views.

It is a very sad world we live in now .

No where near the same severity as your situation but we were doing a bit of hill walking the other day and met a young couple with a dog that was a carbon copy of ours so we had a brief chat about the breed , i went to pat the dog and as soon as i touched the head the dog let out a yelp as it had some pretty nasty cuts on the side of its head , the owner was too quick to tell us the reason for the injuries and that it had ran into a tree. That got me looking at the side of the dog which was also in a bad way regarding injuries and as i was looking at them they made their excuses and left , the animal was terrified of the chap , as soon as he moved the dog flinched as if it was waiting for an impact , ears back and tail right under the body. I still shudder and think about at what a woeful existence that poor animal has , and for how much longer before it is just discarded or worse.

Kenny

Kenny

You sum up exactly what is playing in a loop through my head. "Publish and be dammed" springs to mind. My vision of 'do gooding' may simply cause more heartbreak & pain than already exists.

Rolling around the Car Park, did cross my mind at the time, but the entire incident lasted seconds and I just sat there like a spectator, gawping, hopeless. My indignation and anger grows the more i think about the incident and replay it, in my mind. That in itself maybe should be telling something?

With regard the dog incident? What can I say. I am dog owner and lover and know just how much trust these beasties put in us and how often that trust is abused. Shocking.

It sounds in your case like the guy had whipped the dog with a heavy leash/chain. There is no excuse, none at all. He should be whipped with the same chain. But the dog will probably still want to give affection.

 

[french]

Always amaze's me when you see a woman bent over , resting their nose on the child's nose,usually after a series of slaps... whilst screaming at the top of their voice "What are you crying for "
Uh having a moron for a parent ?

 

[WDB124066]

Did you see that clip I posted a day or two back of the two blokes [economists] who said crime went down in the 90's because abortions went up in the 70's....

 

[ChrisHampshire]

Definitely report it. If she behaves like that in public, just think how she might behave in private....

 

[grober]

Welcome to the world of social work. Folks working in this area must constantly see stuff like this or evidence of it, every single working day. Think they call it "the circle of deprivation" What you saw unwittingly was a life class in "parenting skills" being passed on to the next generation.

 

[219]

Kenny

You sum up exactly what is playing in a loop through my head. "Publish and be dammed" springs to mind. My vision of 'do gooding' may simply cause more heartbreak & pain than already exists.

Rolling around the Car Park, did cross my mind at the time, but the entire incident lasted seconds and I just sat there like a spectator, gawping, hopeless. My indignation and anger grows the more i think about the incident and replay it, in my mind. That in itself maybe should be telling something?

With regard the dog incident? What can I say. I am dog owner and lover and know just how much trust these beasties put in us and how often that trust is abused. Shocking.

It sounds in your case like the guy had whipped the dog with a heavy leash/chain. There is no excuse, none at all. He should be whipped with the same chain. But the dog will probably still want to give affection.

Bruce , I understand your reservations about ‘do-gooding’ , but sometimes these things have a way of escalating from foul language and rough treatment to much worse .

How many times do we read in the news of small children found horribly injured or even dead at the hands of negligent parents, with the comments that it could all have been avoided - if only ... ?

It took me two minutes to find this example

Baby's treatment delayed by Disney show

 

[renault12ts]

"I catch site of a young (4 or 5 year old) beautiful blonde girl, who has a smile bigger than her face."

Did she look unhappy, abused etc? Few of us would be untouched by what you saw. But, it could have been isolated.

Getting SS involved could have had many unintended consequences for a family and child which did not deserve it. It's very difficult to call.

 

[french]

I remember my Dad hitting me when I was 15 yrs old (I deserved it I had hit my sister ) I remember it because its the only time he ever hit me.
The hit I soon forgot, the hurt I felt because I thought my Dad did not like me & told me he was ashamed of me lasted for years , I never did it again.

 

[fabes]

Being now involved in Fostering is an eye opener to the issues that are out there .
You have to harden up but unfortunately, so do the kids.....

Some will come through it relatively normal, but the trauma affects too many for too long / forever