Last weekend we watched the parade in Bayview. Three children, ages probably 7 or 8, sat in front of us and gathered up quite a large share of the candy that was being thrown from the floats. There was no room in front for my eight year old son, so when the candy was thrown he got about 1/5 of what the three in front got. Those children never bothered to share or to move aside, and even accused my son of stealing from their huge piles (I was right beside him and know he did no such thing). But what really irritated me is that when the parade was over their mother came to get them and they all walked away, leaving a huge pile of candy wrappers on the ground where they sat. I watched this family gathering up their stuff and moving away and it was clear that their mother saw their mess but had no intention of picking up or having her children pick up their wrappers. I was already peeved with the children's selfishness and accusations so I wasn't in the mood to clean up their mess, but my question is this: should I have said something about their candy wrappers? I thought about saying, "Don't forget your candy wrappers" in a friendly way, but I didn't.

Rachel/Parents Council Blog.

Question: What would you have done?

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