Teenagers Attack Shop and I Step In

A few weeks ago, I was in a toy shop with my kids looking at some stuffed toys. We were there for a few minutes when three other children, two girls and a boy, probably aged 14 or 15, entered the store and started looking at the same stuffed toys. I peered over at them because they looked a bit dodgy, just the way they were dressed and so on, and I kind of thought they weren’t the type to be looking at stuffed toys, but who am I to judge? But then suddenly, my worst fears were realised, and the two girls started attacking the toy shop. They pulled down all the soft toys from the rack, probably around 50 or 60 toys, and scattered them all over the floor. And then they started to run away laughing. I could see the staff weren’t going to do anything. To be fair, the two female staff were probably only teenagers themselves, so I didn’t really expect them to put themselves in danger just over some toys, so I pursued the attackers myself.

Now, I know this comes with risks. There has been a spate of crime in the region of late, especially youth knife crime, so I was being very cautious in my actions. I kept my distance and yelled out, quite politely mind you, “Excuse me! Can you please tidy up the mess you made?” The girls stopped, confused almost. It was like they weren’t expecting anybody to intervene. They just looked at me, so I repeated. “Excuse me. Can you please come back and tidy up the mess you made?” The girls didn’t know what to do, but the boy stepped forward in a fairly intimidatory way I suppose, I guess hoping that I’d back down. I just said to him, “Look mate, I know you didn’t pull the toys down, so I’m not blaming you, but can your friends please come back and clean up the mess they made?” He just replied, “What if we don’t?”. I just said, “Mate, I’m not going to chase you. I’m not going to fight you over this. If you want to walk off and leave all the mess for somebody else to clean up, well that’s up to you. But I’ve got two children here, and it’s my job to teach them about right and wrong.” He kind of looked at his two friends and gave a nod to go clean up the toys, which they did, well, they put all the toys randomly back on the shelf. It was hardly tidy, but they attempted to put the toys back. The whole time, the guy was staring at me, and I was staring back keeping my distance. The girls finished up and they all left the store. To keep with the polite theme, I yelled out, “Thank you!”

Now I don’t know if I handled this well. I don’t know if it was smart to do such a thing. It could have ended very differently. But you know what, I’m sick of this inaction. The police tell us to Escape, Hide, and Tell, you know basically not to put ourselves in danger and to call the professionals, but imagine how that would have gone down. “Excuse me, police. Some teenagers just entered our toy shop and pulled down all the soft toys.” “Are they armed?” “No, they just left the shop.” “Okay, we’ll send over our best detectives straight away!” Obviously, nothing would be done in this situation. I’m not even blaming the police here. They’ve got bigger fish to fry. But with this inaction comes a price. I’ll talk about that soon.

I spoke to one of the staff members after, and she just said that this happens a lot, and there’s nothing they can do. In the past, they have called security, but the security guards usual don’t arrive until at least a few minutes later – it’s a big shopping centre – and by that time, the perpetrators are long gone. So basically, society is set up in such a way that these young offenders are getting away with anti-social behaviour. So the only realistic solution in my mind is that regular people like you and me start standing up and calling them out on their bad behaviour. Unless violence is involved, the police won’t attend, at least not quickly. Security guards are always minutes away. The only option is for members of the public to call out these young offenders at the time of the offence.

Look, I don’t know if I had any lasting effect on them. Perhaps they went to the very next toy shop and did the same thing. Or just maybe the very action of me calling them out got them thinking. Maybe they realised what they’re doing is not very nice.

I don’t expect everyone to step in in these situations. I understand there’s risks involved, but if we don’t step in, if we let these young offenders get way with their anti-social behaviour, well that’s how society’s going to end up, full of messed-up toy shops and smashed-up chips. And that’s not the sort of society I want to live in.

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Allégro by Emmit Fenn