do you tell your kids to be nice to strangers?

ack!

i cant believe i did this.

the other day, my son was playing on the brio train table at the toy store. some guy was watching him play, and ds says, reallly loud, "i dont want you watching me!". then, i, not clueing in, say, "be nice" or something else totally disempowering to my son. i realized later, that my son probably got some weird vibes off of the guy and was trying to get rid of the guy, because he got weirded out by him.

 

should had asked your son why he said that .


some things are ok , but some are not. like my son who is four is noticing how people look and will say "she is fat". that may be true but not ok to say out loud to a stranger its rude.

 

yeah, next time i'll definitely ask him why

it was just so much of a knee jerk from my past programming (be nice, be polite, respect your elders, blah blah blah). i generally try to stay more aware than that. i think it's important to make sure that kids have access to their personal power. if it's empowering and their gut is telling them to use caution, i think it's perfectly all right to 'be rude' instead of 'being nice'.

ps, re the fat thing~ once my son asked about the baby growing inside a woman's tummy. she was just carrying around a few extra pounds. that's always fun to explain. :&

 

I would be more concerned that a stranger was taking such an unhealthy interest... all children look at people and stare.... that this man felt uncomfortable with that is strange..

Teaching your son to be polite is good...but a stranger?... i'd always teach caution

 

I would have got down on my child's levle and asked him why he used that voice and apologised on his behalf.

IMO there are very few instances where being rude to strangers is appropriete for children and adults alike. If some man was staring at me funny I wouldn't be rude to him right off the bat. I don't know his postion, I can't judge ya know?

I do believe that children have a right to feel the way they do, but voiceing it is another thing completely. If we all said exactly what was on our minds to strangers, this wouldn't be a very nice world

 

I wish there was one good answer on what to teach kids and in my case grandkids about strangers. There are certainly "danger stranger" situations. However, as was pointed out rudeness is bad and there was the recent case of the lost child who avoided rescuers for fear that one of them would "steal” him. I guess I always went with the try to teach politeness, tell the truth about real risks, and try never to take my eye off them (grin)

 

There's a difference between being polite and going into a stranger's car.

How old is your kid?

 

Out of the mouths of babes, right? My kids have uttered some doozies to strangers and family alike. Just the other day my 5 year old son says to my 21 year old brother-in-law "hey uncle *so-and-so*, I heard you got fired from your job, now you can sit around all day and do nothing!"

I agree with what colorfulhippie said, I do the same thing with my kids.

 

You know what's funny is usually when one of my kids says something about a stranger, I was usually thinking the same thing to myself. You just get vibes from people, you know?

 

you know, my daughter gives me fits because she loves just about everyone. however, on some occaisions she just doesn't like someone, and that's fine with me. I'M terribly rude to people who get too close to my daughter and i don't know them. if someone i don't know is closer to my daughter than i am, that person has trouble. it's kinda funny, because i've always been so polite to people, but now i'm just NOT.