Baby Ravers - or: Minimal age for festivals/ parties req.?

Written by: ravehead

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" No not really, if i got attacked or my kid was hurt the people responsible wouldn't walk out of here"

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Seeing someone get the kicked out of them isn't exactly compensation for having put your kid in a situation where they've been attacked, though, is it?

I certainly wouldn't want my kids to hang around with me and my mates when we were smoking or whatever... that's just totally irresponsible, regardless of whether or not I'd mind them growing up smoking. As a parent, you've got to be rational and dependable for your kids, and I doubt most people at a rave would be that.

Written by: ravehead

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so please dont be so quick to judge

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Written by: Str8Jakit

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i gave up partying for her. that's what you do when become a parent......

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Written by: Rozi

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I did have a rather scary experience up at Woodford Folk Festival last year.

Woodford has a very family friendly atmosphere, including having a huge fenced off kids town, where people look after the children and lead them in activities. However it is also a huge festival.

I was watching a fire/juggling performance in the main part of the festival. A woman came up with a young girl, sat her down on a chair in the crowd, told her she would be back in five minutes, then left her. The girl really wasn't old enough to be left on her own, and was very scared without her mum. She wasn't really interested in watching the performance.

After about 10 minutes, the girl just bolted off into the crowd looking for her mum. I followed to try and catch her. Fortunately another woman in the crowd had found her, and the poor little thing was in a stranger's arms bawling her eyes out. I explained to that woman that I didn't know the girl (her mum hadn't even asked people in the crowd to keep an eye on her), and explained what had happened. She was happy to keep an eye on her for a bit, whilst I went back and watched the show and kept an eye out for the girl's mum.

After about half an hour, the other woman obviously needed to be somewhere, so she brought the little girl back and sat her down again. After another painful 10 minutes, off the little girl went, running through the crowd to find her mum. This time she went so fast I couldn't follow her. I couldn't see her anywhere although I looked.

I am assuming that her mum did find her, but to be honest I never saw them. She was left alone for at least 40 minutes, relying on complete strangers who didn't even know her name and hadn't even been asked to look out for her.



A fireperformance is not a child minding service. It is not like leaving your kids in front of the TV at home for half an hour whilst you peg out the washing. A festival is not a safe place to leave kids on their own.

I have seen a lot of careful parents at festivals and doofs. People who create a safe little place to take their kids back to when bed time rolls around (or take them home). People who put ear muffs and ear plugs on their kids to block out the loud music. People who don't leave their kids to play alone. I have seen a lot of very happy kids at festivals and doofs, usually at 7am playing in the sunshine. There are ways of being responsible with your kids at these types of events. I hate witnessing when people aren't responsible.

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Must be something in the Air at Woodford, becasue I saw some very iresponsible parents everywhere. Letting their small children run around in the Circus tent when fire spinning classes were on. I nearly hit one of them when they came screaming past behind me...... I was like WTF !!! Where are your parents...... ohh their drunk over there.


Then at the Empe Theatere at night, there were around 5 of us that were fire spinning every night up there, and these little kids would come rolling down the hill and nearly hit us while our staffs and poi were alight. I couldn't belive it.....

I know I wouldn't let my kids any where near firespinners let alone for them to run into one of them.....

Not good at all.... some people don't deserve children.

End rant.... I just feel sorry for the children.

Written by: jc_firetricks

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Must be something in the Air at Woodford, becasue I saw some very iresponsible parents everywhere.

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Not meaning to diminish the stupidity of these people's behaviour, I think there is honestly something about Woodford that encourages it. On a general note, it seems like a very safe environment, full of play and delight. And I am sure that it is very easy to fall into the mindset that "the normal rules do not apply".

Specifically with fire, I do think that inexperienced people do get a skewed picture of the danger of fire through fire performances. Whilst all fire performers I know are very careful to say that what they do is dangerous, and don't encourage kids to do it, part of the performance is to make it look confident and easy. As such people will not "see" the care that goes into the safety aspect. Once again, that is not to diminish the fact that they are doing something silly.

And yep, there were a lot of badly supervised and badly behaved kids at Woodford this year. The worst I saw were running around the Village Green when an Aboriginal dance troupe of young kids were performing. They ran straight through the middle of the performance. I think everyone there just cringed.

The best behaved kids I saw were doing the circus performance organised by Reg from Circadia!!! They were brilliant, well behaved and very funny.

Written by: JC Firetricks

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Must be something in the Air at Woodford, becasue I saw some very iresponsible parents everywhere. Letting their small children run around in the Circus tent when fire spinning classes were on. I nearly hit one of them when they came screaming past behind me...... I was like WTF !!! Where are your parents...... ohh their drunk over there

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Written by: aimee

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I can't comment on young children at raves...but anyone remember the 2 little buggers from thr VW campsite at PLAY?
Oh wait..you could hardly forget 2 extremely rude children shouting at the performers non-stop, making a big scene and thouroly pissing off the whole of the audiance - I can't imagen what it must have been like for the performers

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Yes that was one of my low points the main show (especially Dror the Compare's act) being occaisionally ruined by children. They quietened down after I told them to shut up, well at least I didn't hear them again after that.
I understand how they started, the banter and heckling was very funny and all taken in the good spirit it was intended, I guess the kids just tried to be funny too and join in. I don't know if they were with their parents, if they were mine I'd have been quite quite embarrassed.

Ah well, at least we won't have to worry about the VW's this year

Written by: Dunc

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Written by: JC Firetricks

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Must be something in the Air at Woodford, becasue I saw some very iresponsible parents everywhere. Letting their small children run around in the Circus tent when fire spinning classes were on. I nearly hit one of them when they came screaming past behind me...... I was like WTF !!! Where are your parents...... ohh their drunk over there

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Fire spinning classes, with fire, so that's learning fire with fire, and providing no fencing or other blockade to prevent accidents like this?! Sounds more like the organisers complete lack of responsibility than the parents.....

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Um, well, I was one of the organisers. There were no 'firespinning classes'. There were Spinning Skills classes for staff and poi, in the daytimes. No fire.
There were some small children, who we encouraged to participate in the (few)classes we ran for their age group, go to the kids festival, or remain on the outside of the space. Next year we will be even stronger about this; that it is a training space, not a hang out space. We did the same with adults too, moved them out if they were not participating in something specific.
But drunk parents at Circadia? I doubt it, really I do. Hot and sleepy maybe.

Fire was allowed in the training space from about 9 at night, with the permission and supervision of the tent owners (a professional circus). We had large orange 'witches hats' (I thought they were well over the top to be honest) and tape separating the space from the rest of the tent. Which had open sides and a grass floor, wet blankets, fire blankets, safety signage, 4 extinguishers and d60 fuel, which is such a high flash point it can be taken on planes. We also had daily safety audits and... I think you get the picture....

Written by: ravehead

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, i WILL take my daughter to fests/meet/rave and house partys when she is old enough to understand whats going on, she will do it any way given time

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rave, budy, no you won't. maybe fests/meets casue they can be family frendly. but you won't take her to raves. reason being....when she's old enough to "understand them" you won't be doing it any more. lmao and besides i've been in the scene sense '99, and i don't "understand what's going on" 90% of the time no one there does

trust me man. i said the exact same when my daughter was fisrt born. never happened, never will. granted she does paly with glow sticks. all i have to do to keep her entertained while i clean my house, is crack a couple of sticks, and let her play in front of the bathroom mirror. she's a ravers child, no doubt. but i have never taken her to a party/rave etc. the closest she's come is hanging out with me and my friends when we practice our sticking.

now you are right, our kids will, some day, do the we do now. all we can do is try to keep them from being wraped up in the "dark side" ya know, the all drug side. i'm teaching cyanne <daughter> that glow sticking, liquid, and so on, is motion art. self expression. and that's the best i can do for now.....