S/O Why can’t moms just chill and be nice?

[Anonymous]

I live in Arlington, my youngest just graduated high school, and I have noticed the following over the years:
--no outright bullying or meanness, just the occasional backhanded comment about my lack of fitness training or something by the uber athletic moms,
--once someone joins a country club, my social life with them completely ends unless I initiate, but the excluding is silent,
--any vocal excluding of others is by the political active moms if you disagree with them,
--by high school, some of the nicest moms have the worst daughters and the nicest daughters have the crazy, negative moms. It has caught me off guard to be honest.

[Anonymous]

To run into bullies twice is like winning the powerball.

[Anonymous]

I kept my distance from other moms in NOVA when my kids were growing up. Groups of women low-key unnerve me because I was the family scapegoat bullied relentlessly and excluded by the women in my family to the point I've had to go no contact with the entire family. They poisoned the well against me and made it okay to emotionally and physically abuse me (yes, I got hit). So I've experienced how cruel women can be in groups and I don't want any part of their "mom dinners".

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I live in Arlington, my youngest just graduated high school, and I have noticed the following over the years:
--no outright bullying or meanness, just the occasional backhanded comment about my lack of fitness training or something by the uber athletic moms,
--once someone joins a country club, my social life with them completely ends unless I initiate, but the excluding is silent,
--any vocal excluding of others is by the political active moms if you disagree with them,
--by high school, some of the nicest moms have the worst daughters and the nicest daughters have the crazy, negative moms. It has caught me off guard to be honest.

The country club and “mean daughters/nice moms and nice daughters/mean moms” thing is 100% true.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Because in truth, women tend to be very catty ➕ emotional.
They are also very competitive and tend to hold a grudge.

Women = drama.
Period.

Signed,
A Woman 👩🏻

He’s never going to pick you.

[Anonymous]

One-on-one friends don't face these problems. You are well matched and enjoy each other's company, or you don't. Or don't enough to see each other very often. Steer clear of groups

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I want to note that OP didn't ask why moms can't just BE chill. She said "why can't moms just chill." So she's not referring to personality, but behavior. She's asking why moms can't just leave each other alone, instead of gossiping, criticizing, or judging one another.

And I just want to point out that this thread grew pretty fast and with a lot of contentious back and forth between, presumably, moms, with plenty of gossip, criticism and judgment, of each other and of other moms they know.

Can you imagine a similar thread for men, where a bunch of dads posted judging and criticizing each other? I think men as a group are kind of horrible but this is impossible for me to imagine. My husband would never be able to sustain actual interest in other dads to engage in something like this. He would give up and go watch a sporting event or play a video game or read a book. Sorry to throw out so many stereotypes about men but I'm describing my real husband who I guess is pretty stereotypical in this respect.

So it's a fair question. Why are we like this? How can we stop? Why are men able to just "do less" when it comes to male friendship or interacting with peers, and largely just not care enough about each other to sit around comparing and judging and criticizing and gaslighting each other?

“We” are not like this. Women are no more prone to comparison, judgment, criticism, and gaslighting than men are. You believe this behavior is ubiquitous because you’ve bought into a misogynistic lie.

Potentially it was more important for women to fit in with the "herd." The gatherers and child tenders needed to stay close. The hunter could go off and do his own thing? He'll need to collaborate enough with his hunter colleagues, but that's a smaller office crew. Just spit balling.

The converse is that it would have been more important for women to keep harmony, so where's that?

[Anonymous]

I'm now making friends with Moms I never knew when my kids were going through school. MS and HS were large so we probably didn't cross paths. Came from different ES. Our kids didn't really do the same activities. No past drama here. It's been very refreshing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This site and talking with friends who left DC makes me wonder if it's really worse out there in the suburbs, especially those with "high performing" schools. Most families I've met in DCPS are pretty chill.

I'm in South Arlington and it's overall pretty chill. Occasionally you get a nutty parent, but 90% of them are fine. The MONA ladies make themselves known pretty quickly and we all avoid like the plague.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I kept my distance from other moms in NOVA when my kids were growing up. Groups of women low-key unnerve me because I was the family scapegoat bullied relentlessly and excluded by the women in my family to the point I've had to go no contact with the entire family. They poisoned the well against me and made it okay to emotionally and physically abuse me (yes, I got hit). So I've experienced how cruel women can be in groups and I don't want any part of their "mom dinners".

I'm in DC and wish we knew each other because this is me, too. My mom and sister were the same and while I can now do 1:1 relationships with women that are functional, I find groups highly triggering. My biggest issue is when people refuse to just communicate directly with whoever they have a conflict with. Like if you are upset with Jenny because she never texted to check on you after your surgery, just go talk to Jenny about it. Tell her why you are upset and how it makes you feel, and ideally Jenny will listen and be similarly honest and emotionally mature, and you guys can work it out.

What a lot (maybe most) people in a friend group will do instead is go tell Claire how they feel, refuse to speak to Jenny directly, and then just live with weird vibes and passive aggression forever. I simply cannot. I went to therapy for over a decade in order to unlearn all that toxic, manipulative, passive aggressive BS I was raised with, and I don't want to recreate it in my adult friendships. So unless someone is mature enough to discuss issues with me directly, own their feelings, both apologize and forgive when appropriate, I just can't do it. And I have found that in female friend groups, there is often at least one woman who can't do this stuff and it brings everyone down. So other than one small group of women I've known for 20 years (which is part of a larger friend group of men and women so we actually only occasionally hang out just as the women on our own, which changes the dynamic), I stick to 1:1 friendships where I find it much easier to ensure good communication and mature conflict resolution. At this point I find I don't really have conflicts in my relationships, we're just kind and supportive of each other. But it took a long time, and a lot of culling of my friendships, to get to this point.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I want to note that OP didn't ask why moms can't just BE chill. She said "why can't moms just chill." So she's not referring to personality, but behavior. She's asking why moms can't just leave each other alone, instead of gossiping, criticizing, or judging one another.

And I just want to point out that this thread grew pretty fast and with a lot of contentious back and forth between, presumably, moms, with plenty of gossip, criticism and judgment, of each other and of other moms they know.

Can you imagine a similar thread for men, where a bunch of dads posted judging and criticizing each other? I think men as a group are kind of horrible but this is impossible for me to imagine. My husband would never be able to sustain actual interest in other dads to engage in something like this. He would give up and go watch a sporting event or play a video game or read a book. Sorry to throw out so many stereotypes about men but I'm describing my real husband who I guess is pretty stereotypical in this respect.

So it's a fair question. Why are we like this? How can we stop? Why are men able to just "do less" when it comes to male friendship or interacting with peers, and largely just not care enough about each other to sit around comparing and judging and criticizing and gaslighting each other?

“We” are not like this. Women are no more prone to comparison, judgment, criticism, and gaslighting than men are. You believe this behavior is ubiquitous because you’ve bought into a misogynistic lie.

Potentially it was more important for women to fit in with the "herd." The gatherers and child tenders needed to stay close. The hunter could go off and do his own thing? He'll need to collaborate enough with his hunter colleagues, but that's a smaller office crew. Just spit balling.

The converse is that it would have been more important for women to keep harmony, so where's that?

In American culture, harmony is considered far less important than individual freedom and expression. The idea of compromising or working through differences to keep group harmony is considered weak and even a violation of your rights. Instead we engage in individualism and competition. Men and women both do this, it's not unique to women at all. However, men still primarily view the working world as their sphere of influence, and individualism and competition are generally appreciated and even encouraged in American workplaces.

Women remain in charge of home life, family life, and community ties though, even when they are also engaged in the same workplace competition. But when you apply the principals of individualism and competition to parenting, home, and community, it creates a lot of dysfunction. Because community should not be competitive, it needs to be collaborative. But our culture doesn't encourage collaboration.

Mothers in the US are pitted against each other and often jockey for position for themselves or their kids. The idea of making parenting choices for the purpose of being pro-social or the good of the group is not popular (compare to a variety of culture in Asia, Europe, Africa, and South America, where social cohesion is considered paramount and individualism is actively discouraged or viewed as selfish and entitled). But unlike at work where the reward for successfully competing is financial reward or higher status, motherhood has few concrete rewards for "winning" this competition, other than sometimes superior positioning of your kids. It certainly doesn't result in more friends or social cohesion. So American motherhood can feel deeply discouraging. You feel judged and evaluated by others, including other mothers, all the time, but also isolated and unsupported. This is not a functional way to parent.

[Anonymous]

I'm in a really active local moms group on Facebook and it's really made me distance myself from most moms. I'm not a mean mom, nor a bully. Their kids all seem to be special snowflakes who have no respect for teacher and have never been disciplined in their lives. Currently it's full of moms bemoaning how their kids can't have 12 weeks of summer this year (I'd like longer breaks throughout vs a long summer). I just don't feel like I have much in common with anyone anymore. And every topic is so divisive!
-anti vax
-their kid got kicked off the bus after 5 warnings- why is the school so mean??
-their kid shouldn't have to do what the teacher wants them to do.
-they don't send their kids to school regularly. Like they routinely take 4 weeks off a year for vacation and are upset they get unenrolled.
-nonstop talking about teleworking at home with newborns, babies, and toddlers. (shortchanging their employers and their own children!)
-posting about how bad daycare is nonstop and how good moms wouldn't send their kids.
-Then there's the hyper PTA moms who want spirit weeks every week, constant food signups for the teacher's break room, $10 gift card drives nonstop, fundraising nonstop. I don't have the energy for all of that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:To run into bullies twice is like winning the powerball.

Uh... no. There are bullies of various severity in most settings. Also bullies tend to target people they view as vulnerable, which means the same people are often bullied in multiple settings.

Even if you have never been bullied, it is highly likely you've been in at least two settings where bullying of some kind was occurring. Virtually everyone was adjacent to some form of bullying during their K-12 years, because it's so common in those years. And most people have also been around a workplace bully or social bully as an adult. Again, you might not have been their target, but odds are that you have interacted with them and even witnessed or hear about bullying behavior because this stuff is not that uncommon. There are many immature, entitled, dysfunctional people in the world.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don’t engage with people like this. My friends do not either. I see it for sure, and sidestep. It leaves our family on the outside of the school community, away from toxicity though as well.

I’ve never hung with mean girls.

Exactly this. You can usually spot them before even speaking to them or it's revealed within a few conversations. These women are not hiding. I avoid them and do not have issues with mom friends. It doesn't mean I click with every mom I meet. But the ones I am the most friendly with are kind women.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I want to note that OP didn't ask why moms can't just BE chill. She said "why can't moms just chill." So she's not referring to personality, but behavior. She's asking why moms can't just leave each other alone, instead of gossiping, criticizing, or judging one another.

And I just want to point out that this thread grew pretty fast and with a lot of contentious back and forth between, presumably, moms, with plenty of gossip, criticism and judgment, of each other and of other moms they know.

Can you imagine a similar thread for men, where a bunch of dads posted judging and criticizing each other? I think men as a group are kind of horrible but this is impossible for me to imagine. My husband would never be able to sustain actual interest in other dads to engage in something like this. He would give up and go watch a sporting event or play a video game or read a book. Sorry to throw out so many stereotypes about men but I'm describing my real husband who I guess is pretty stereotypical in this respect.

So it's a fair question. Why are we like this? How can we stop? Why are men able to just "do less" when it comes to male friendship or interacting with peers, and largely just not care enough about each other to sit around comparing and judging and criticizing and gaslighting each other?

“We” are not like this. Women are no more prone to comparison, judgment, criticism, and gaslighting than men are. You believe this behavior is ubiquitous because you’ve bought into a misogynistic lie.

Potentially it was more important for women to fit in with the "herd." The gatherers and child tenders needed to stay close. The hunter could go off and do his own thing? He'll need to collaborate enough with his hunter colleagues, but that's a smaller office crew. Just spit balling.

The converse is that it would have been more important for women to keep harmony, so where's that?

In American culture, harmony is considered far less important than individual freedom and expression. The idea of compromising or working through differences to keep group harmony is considered weak and even a violation of your rights. Instead we engage in individualism and competition. Men and women both do this, it's not unique to women at all. However, men still primarily view the working world as their sphere of influence, and individualism and competition are generally appreciated and even encouraged in American workplaces.

Women remain in charge of home life, family life, and community ties though, even when they are also engaged in the same workplace competition. But when you apply the principals of individualism and competition to parenting, home, and community, it creates a lot of dysfunction. Because community should not be competitive, it needs to be collaborative. But our culture doesn't encourage collaboration.

Mothers in the US are pitted against each other and often jockey for position for themselves or their kids. The idea of making parenting choices for the purpose of being pro-social or the good of the group is not popular (compare to a variety of culture in Asia, Europe, Africa, and South America, where social cohesion is considered paramount and individualism is actively discouraged or viewed as selfish and entitled). But unlike at work where the reward for successfully competing is financial reward or higher status, motherhood has few concrete rewards for "winning" this competition, other than sometimes superior positioning of your kids. It certainly doesn't result in more friends or social cohesion. So American motherhood can feel deeply discouraging. You feel judged and evaluated by others, including other mothers, all the time, but also isolated and unsupported. This is not a functional way to parent.

Very thoughtful response and so true. No easy path out of this dysfunction, I don’t think, unfortunately.