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Mom challenges ‘politeness’ after a stranger makes her daughter uncomfortable

Politeness is one of the first things many parents try to teach kids when they’re young. Children learn to say “please” and “thank you,” to wait their turn to speak and to show respect for others. But teaching children to be polite doesn’t have to mean teaching them to neglect their own boundaries. After a stranger on a bus started pressuring her daughter to talk, one mom stepped up to teach her little girl another important lesson: You don’t have to be polite when someone is making you uncomfortable.

Nicole Bescoby recently penned a viral post about the incident on her Facebook page, He 3 Smalls. She writes that she was riding a bus with her elementary-aged daughter, Ellie, when a man they didn’t know sat down beside her little girl. Not wanting to sit near a stranger, Ellie got up and moved closer to her mom. 

https://www.facebook.com/He3smalls/photos/a.733819410078141/2508099459316785/

“Aw you don’t need to be scared. Give me a high five,” Bescoby recalls the man saying. But Ellie didn’t want to, so she turned to look at her mom and ignored the man instead. Bescoby says the man started asking Ellie about her holiday plans, and why she wasn’t speaking. He even leaned close to her and said, “Cat got your tongue?”

“I felt her press into me. Trying to merge into my body,” Bescoby writes. “Everything about her body language was screaming STOP ̷0; but he wasn’t listening. Why do people do this?”

Bescoby told the man that Ellie didn’t want to talk to him, which seemed to make him upset. According to the mom, he shot back with, “You should teach her some manners. She should at least be polite!”

“I looked at him and I saw all the times people had ignored my discomfort,” Bescoby writes. “From grandparents demanding hugs. Aunties chasing me to ̵6;pinch a kiss.’ Being tickled until I couldn’t breath and it was a long way from fun. Family friends demanding I speak to them. Strangers demanding I be civil ̷0; All because it suited THEM. I remembered the times I had been called rude because I didn’t feel like speaking. I remembered all the times I was forced to put other people’s comfort above my own.”

Instead of telling Ellie to speak to the man, she took the opposite approach. “I turned to my daughter and spoke clearly so she could hear and so that he could hear too,” she writes. “‘Sweetie, you do NOT have to speak to this person. People do NOT get to make you feel bad. You can tell him to stop, and if he doesn’t listen then HE is wrong, and you can make sure he knows it! If people like this don’t listen, you can shout ‘Stop, right now! Leave me alone,’ and you keep shouting it until they hear!’”

Since it was published, Bescoby’s post has been shared more than 57,000 times. Her smart message is resonating not only with parents who have been in these situations with their kids, but also with people who remember the pain of having their own boundaries violated when they were young. 

“Thank you,” one woman writes. “You̵7;re so right, and yes, I remember feeling the way you and your daughter felt. We are always putting other people’s feelings before our own. Time to change this. Well done, wish you were my mum!”

Another person adds that teaching kids to respect their boundaries is another way of teaching them to protect themselves from danger. “This is where children learn to be complicit victims to ‘friendly’ predators,” they explain. “Yes, some ppl might not mean them any harm, but some do and in this era where ppl can be so evil and cruel, it̵7;s best to trust your instincts and teach children to do the same.”

And one parent notes that this advice is not just for daughters. “This is powerful and does not apply to just girls,” they write. “This applies to our baby boys as well!”

But a few people were torn on whether or not it’s OK to ignore someone who is speaking directly to you. “I don’t understand why people can’t be nice,” one woman posts. “I talk to strangers all the time and always have ̷0; Being nice costs nothing. Why not teach your children that instead of to be afraid when there is nothing to be afraid off?”

Another person writes, “An old man that wanted to chat? And you all make out he is a mass murderer? What’s wrong with this world?”

In recent years, there’s been an ongoing conversation among parents about how to help kids set healthy boundaries. In the wake of social movements like Me Too, parents are more concerned than ever with teaching kids about consent and helping them understand that no one is entitled to their attention or affection. The Girl Scouts of America has even gotten on board, with a viral article about how girls don’t have to show affection to friends and family members if they don’t want to. 

The Harvard Graduate School of Education notes that, as early as preschool, kids should begin learning about consent and “the notion that we should respect one another’s boundaries, in order to be safe, preserve dignity and build healthy relationships.” This includes asking for and giving permission for physical contact, like hugs, but it also includes teaching kids that they have a right to express their feelings.

The Child Mind Institute — an independent nonprofit group of clinicians, researchers and educators who research children’s health — explains that showing kids empathy and respect is an important part of helping them learn how to be empathetic and respectful to others. They caution that “dismissing children’s boundaries is something grown-ups do all the time without even realizing it,” and they advise parents to make an effort to respect the physical and emotional limits kids set for themselves whenever possible.

Some might think that Bescoby was extreme in teaching her child that it’s OK to ignore people, but the mom says her concern at that moment was teaching Ellie that she doesn’t owe anyone a conversation, and her feelings always deserve to be respected. “I want her to know she has a choice,” the mom writes. “She never has to stay quiet for someone else’s benefit. She is powerful and she is able to say STOP. I want her to know Stop means STOP̷0; And No means NO. And if someone is offended by her boundaries, that’s THEIR problem.”